What's your latest purchase & what are your intentions with it? [pics ftw] (Part 2)

whats the verdict? always been curious about this company’s ‘budget’ mixers.

2 Likes

Hmm :thinking:

Serial #35

I’m 3 DIY projects deep now and no time in the near future to work on them.

I’m okay with knowing that this one is waiting for me though. There has already been a BOM update since I ordered it. Might not be all bad that I have to wait a bit.

I’ll definitely put some samples of this one up when I finish it though :slight_smile:

Knowing me, I’ll end up throwing parts at it every so often. I’m just too excited to not find time somewhere.

25 Likes

Does your Syntakt have it’s own beanbag chair?

Wow Airyck, I wasn’t expecting that to show up for a bit. Man I can’t wait for the updates.

2 Likes

Yup, I have found those little beanbags to be great stands, any angle you want and apparently the Syntakt is really comfy!

1 Like

Schaaaaawing! :drooling_face:
¥ to US$ rate must be favouring you kindly.

1 Like

I wasn’t sure what to expect from this Taiwanese mixer, it’s definitely not high end but nor is it super budget.
So far I’m bloody loving it…it ticked all the boxes for what I needed, a simple mixer to allow me to jam with PT, MM2, DT + others without taking up too much space in my tiny environment and without constantly needing 3.5mm stereo to 1/4" mono splitters.
The knobs feel a bit budget but the case is metal and feels sturdy. It has a 3.5mm mono (I believe) input on CH1 set up for microphones and offers switchable 0/1.5/48v phantom power and a built in echo (not tried)…they include an XLR-3.5mm adaptor in the box. CH2, 3 & 4 are 3.5mm stereo inputs and CH5/6 and 7/8 are L+R 1/4" mono connections. The volume sliders on each channel are smooth but have very limited tracking (just 2cm) so, fine for me pissing about at home and basically setting them and leaving them…if you wanted to use them as part of your performance I’m guessing they’re a bit short. The master output slider is 3cm so a it more controllable. The channel mutes work well and are a nice-to-have on a mini mixer.
Channels 2 - 4 have an ‘EQ’ which is reminiscent of the tone control on a 70s transistor radio.
Channels 4, 5/6 & 7/8 have a gain control which has been useful if you have a bit of low output gear vying to keep up with the others.
I’ve just changed things around last night to feed my monitors from the L+R 1/4" output on the back and then attach my Tascam recorder to the headphone socket of the mixer and that is working beautifully for adding/removing the recorder without cocking up my levels to the monitors.
If you’re looking for a small mixer for the studio that you can set and forget this definitely does the trick.

1 Like

I pre-ordered it very early on so I got locked in at the cheaper price. They added on the cases for a few hundred at the end.

Luckily a lot of the more expensive and hard to get parts are on the PCB’s already. I already had stocks of the majority of the passive components from buying extras over the years.

I mostly just need a few more active components, unique connectors, sliders, and special parts. Luckily none of those are horribly expensive. Maybe a few hundred in parts left to buy.

Besides that I mostly just need time to work on it. It really isn’t too bad of a build IMO. High number of parts mostly. I could probably get it built in around 25-35 hours if I could focus. Maybe a little longer with tuning and finalizing things.

5 Likes

thanks for that. was interested in the smaller ones as cheap interfaces for kids
should prolly just get a couple and try em

Nektar Panorama P1 as I was curious about the sort of ‘Automap’ that it offers in Cubase and Reason , actually only tested and is already back in the box ready to be sold… Interesting controller I admit.

How’s the Erae to use? Was thinking of maybe using it to pair up with a Hapax and then getting rid of my Keystep - I’m not a keys player so it makes more sense to me.
Perhaps it’s not necessary if I’ve got Hapax.
Man - I’m GASSY as hell this last few weeks :joy:

I’ve been wanting to pick up a medium format camera for a while and I found one today at a second hand electronics store.

27 Likes

So far so good- I haven’t really had a lot of time with it yet (pesky work) but it definitely functions extremely well as a surface to drum on, as a programable control surface and as a (flat) MPE board.

I have had both a Roli Seaward and a Sensel Morph- The Roli was the most sensitive to touch, but I found the small one unplayable really and the Sensel was fun (with different overlays), but not very sensitive to lower velocities and again, a bit too small. Neither had a display so you could customise on the device and for sensitivity I would say from first impressions almost as good as the Roli but without feeling like you are playing a marshmallow.

The Erae is plenty big enough…sensitivity is very adjustable from ‘I use heavy stick’ to quite a light touch, I have had no problems playing it, but playing any ‘flat’ surface is a bit weird so you just have to get used to it…having a surface you can put any controller on and then operate in X/Y and Z is pretty amazing…a different overlay for each synths! (up to 32 of them I think that can be switched from the hardware, as cane scales, midi channels etc.)

It laso has a Ableton ‘clip launcher’ and a sequencer but I haven’t tried those yet…given its just launched it could be a real winner especially if people start to make and share scrips, overlays, API etc. (there are a few for Serum and Pigments etc with pre-sets already)

I hope that helps- I will add more as I work it out!

1 Like

Thanks very much for your overview, that’s really appreciated. I’ll keep my eyes on it for now and see if I can be enticed any more - got an Analog Heat on the way so may need to wait a month before I get one on order :slight_smile:

They should offer you a franchise State side.
If you get tired of soldering here’s another option I found recently

1 Like

Got this to control the M. My Digitakt is on drum and sample duty now, and Grandma is handling analogery.

Selling the Hydra Deluxe, but may end up with one again if I change up my studio space some day. It’s such a nice synth to just sit down at and play.

The Digitone Keys is going to be the perfect controller/sequencer for the M though, and all that four part goodness from both is going to be fun.

Edit: Wow! That timing couldn’t have been better! The Digitone Keys ships, and then next day there’s a song mode waiting for its arrival! The synth god Gary is truly shining down on me today.

23 Likes

That’s definitely rich for my blood right now!

I have more than enough now. Everything from digital to analog, mono to para to poly, and drum machines galore :joy: Not to mention an extremely well upgraded monitoring system.

Let’s not even talk software.

Basically the sale of new music gear could be banned worldwide and I’d still have enough high end gear to explore for multiple lifetimes.

Now I just need to sell my house, buy one smaller and cheaper with cash. Then I’ll just lock myself in my studio for the majority of the rest of my life and I’ll finally be at peace :smiley:

6 Likes

My Hapax landed today.

It gonna replace my Pyramid/Launchpad Pro mk3/midihub combo (gone one month ago to fund it) and much more !

20 Likes

An dustcover for my Octatrack for two reasons:
(1) settle in stone that I am going to keep it and sell the rest (bye bye PT and nanoloop)
(2) accept that I am in a long journey and will have to let it just hang there with his dustcover.

4 Likes

Second hand mint condition Microfreak, still pending to update - vanilla for now :slight_smile:

The aim is to help on supplying sequences for live and studio work.

https://www.instagram.com/s/aGlnaGxpZ2h0OjE3OTY2OTA5Njg2ODU0NTQ5?story_media_id=2928433319060275796_12489424872&igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=

Those are some test

Picked up some stands for BIM-BAM-BOUM on the cheap, and they’re working nicely so far.

10 Likes