When a ting’s a ting that shouldn’t be a ting

The Lounge
#1

Those dumb things that simply should not be, here’s a few of mine, what’s yours?

Manuals:
Web only - why in the actual fuck? Portable Document Format exists, use it.
Stupid colours and/or tiny fonts - not good.
One manual, 50 languages - separate them.
PDF - without proper index and links - just seems really lazy.

Midi:
It is a standard - adhere to it or just stop making gear with midi.

Samplers:
Casio SK1, a 1980’s children’s toy had 4 voice polyphony - but your modern one doesn’t? Back to the drawing board then.

Paltry memory/sampling time - your memory chip supplier is laughing at you, they thought they would be stuck with those old small capacity chips, but then some sucker came along and bought them.

Firmware:
Beta testers - If your launch firmware has obvious bugs, get better beta testers, or delay the launch so that paying customers don’t have to be beta testers.

Build quality:
Rubber coating - when you think it will give a premium feel, stop, it goes sticky, it’s shit, don’t use it.

Flimsy construction - spend £10 more on materials, the customer won’t mind paying, if it means the difference between feeling like a cheap knockoff toy or something that is solid.

User interface - if it is annoying to use get better designers, because that is a fail.

USB:
Connector - USB C or gtfo. (Or B for non portable stuff)

Compatibility - host, class compliant, should be standard now.

Noise - don’t expect your customers to buy ground loop isolators just to use your gear, isolate the audio ground in your product, even if it means having a small switch.

35 Likes
#2

That’s a lot of tings.
I don’t know any others right now.

2 Likes
#3

trs-a and trs-b.
why?
why can’t it just be a single trs mini or whatever.

8 Likes
#4

All the Info-Pub products.

#5

Firmwares released literally a couple of days after release. I mean come on why didnt you test it properly!?

3 Likes
#6

I don’t know but for a lot of people, the Octatrack. :rofl:

5 Likes
#7

When software doesn’t reference their own error numbers online, leaving users to figure out what’s wrong.

e.g. if software gives you “error 33” and that’s not described in the help section there’s no point giving it a number, from our perspective.

#8

This 100% is a legitimate problem and one that I will always speak up against.

Small bugs are normal at launch, but shipping products with obvious beta firmware or underdeveloped features is a whole different thing.

** cough Polyend cough**

2 Likes
#9

If something lacks a power switch. Irk.

If something can only be powered via USB. Irk.

8 Likes
#11

Bonus points if the device doesn’t boot properly after a power cycle.

1 Like
#12

AI, we all know where it’s going. And I’m not talking about music here.

4 Likes
#13

bonus points if it’s usb powered only and has lots of nasty ground noise

1 Like
#14

Using the word ting when I think you meant thing

The firmware thing - especially annoying when repeated previous hardware releases ( that likely use same chips etc ) continue to be released with the same issues .
Like many of those **** devices that still release with stuck midi notes that was fixed years ago , but the new devices still have it and need patching
Need better beta testing and a standard set of test cases for the very very basic things to get right

1 Like
#15

clouds: who needs them?

image
image1000×563 99.9 KB

9 Likes
#16

Because History - TRS-midi was not a standard when manufacturers first started doing it.

Which raises problems for manufacturers who have since found themselves on the wrong side of the standard.

#17

I wouldn’t mind if companies always included adapter leads … but they don’t.

And I keep losing them , and haven’t labelled the
Ones I do have

1 Like
#18

i disagree. USB B is totally fine as well.

8 Likes
#19

Any hardware with red text labels. It might as well be in invisible ink.

1 Like
#20

This one is quite understandable. They tested it properly, but kept testing and found more bugs in the months that passed between packaging items and actually selling them in retail.

#21

I wasn’t trying to say the TRS-A/B thing is not a problem … it’s just that a lot of the fixes (that a manufacturer might apply) will create problems of their own.

The best way forward for new devices is to support both A and B (while defaulting to the standard) the way elektron do.

Not so clear what, if anything, to do about gear that was created prior to the standard and is now non-standard … other than: label your cables.

1 Like