Cruise Castillo « Convincing »
Published on 06/27/14 at 06:43
Best value:
Excellent
Analog mono square wave / sawtooth (mixing).
Lowpass filter (very) resonant 24dB/octave ..
Modulation possibilities generous enough: LFO and envelope to filter, LFO to pitch and pulse width (square wave).
The LFO has several very welcome changes (stairs, random, noise ...).
Amp section can be controlled by the envelope or note duration.
Midi connection in. All octaves or almost extreme velocities trigger a "accent".
Audio input to filter - but that disables the synth part and requires a midi trigger.
Audio Out with huge volume. Transformer good, but no switch.
UTILIZATION
a synth of this type is relatively simple to use, we can consider that the manual is sufficient.
After ten minutes heating oscillator is stable and holds the agreement (but not indefinitely).
The knobs are very nice and solid feel is there. Used with various hardware sequencers (MPC, MMT-8, Dark Time) successfully.
Please note that sometimes certain notes held too get stuck and need to disconnect / reconnect the transformer to be silent.
LFO sync is automatically activated upon receipt of a message but not clock off by unplugging and plugging it back (again) the transformer.
The additionnal features like the glide or the arpeggiator can be switched by MIDI CC. They certainly have the merit to exist but have also won especially benefit from their own switches (increasing obviously adding to the exit, but how much?). For the "LFO / sequencer eight steps" function here is more complicated: we must send a MIDI note and CC for the different outcome.
I'll let you judge the practicality ... Damage to implement such functions without a little more value by making them accessible.
SOUNDS
The manufacturer describes it as falling MS20/303 tradition and it is quite true. Rather than MS10 MS20 may be elsewhere.
Presence, quite safe in low and energy in general. 303 in the spirit it is very convincing and this goes far beyond a x0xb0x a little effete for example. By enabling or not the characteristics "slides" / "accent", once opened (in small doses because it goes so far that it becomes painful) resonance, we are moving towards the "Acid" very sharp with possibilities very expressive variations due to particular envelope settings.
Fortunately it is not restricted to this and this is where this synth can become endearing. It stands very well and spends soft to aggressive with enough nuances, be it up or down the keyboard.
In other words, it goes from beautiful to ugly or disgusting, like all such mono. Upon arrival a real identity, but do not shut up in a too narrow category.
Far from being a silly face SH101 for example, but not really an alternative.
OVERALL OPINION
Purchased at the time also eyeing to Minitaur. A quick demonstration had well developed.
Definitely a good value for money. used occasionally to supplement other analos vintage or traveling for its small size obviously.
Unit that sounds great and is intended for remote nature of computers suffers from contradictions because without at least one controller or a midi sequencer perfected it is quite impractical to access additional functions.
That is the kind of additional equipment that has not necessarily want to have between the legs to have fun and make spontaneous music. Suddenly the machine remains in its original configuration or as we left the last time we had the patience to plug this thing. A shame but not prohibitive either, as it performs its main functions handily.
In view of what is currently available in this price range (but still called compromise), the choice again would not be obvious but not necessarily stupid either.
Lowpass filter (very) resonant 24dB/octave ..
Modulation possibilities generous enough: LFO and envelope to filter, LFO to pitch and pulse width (square wave).
The LFO has several very welcome changes (stairs, random, noise ...).
Amp section can be controlled by the envelope or note duration.
Midi connection in. All octaves or almost extreme velocities trigger a "accent".
Audio input to filter - but that disables the synth part and requires a midi trigger.
Audio Out with huge volume. Transformer good, but no switch.
UTILIZATION
a synth of this type is relatively simple to use, we can consider that the manual is sufficient.
After ten minutes heating oscillator is stable and holds the agreement (but not indefinitely).
The knobs are very nice and solid feel is there. Used with various hardware sequencers (MPC, MMT-8, Dark Time) successfully.
Please note that sometimes certain notes held too get stuck and need to disconnect / reconnect the transformer to be silent.
LFO sync is automatically activated upon receipt of a message but not clock off by unplugging and plugging it back (again) the transformer.
The additionnal features like the glide or the arpeggiator can be switched by MIDI CC. They certainly have the merit to exist but have also won especially benefit from their own switches (increasing obviously adding to the exit, but how much?). For the "LFO / sequencer eight steps" function here is more complicated: we must send a MIDI note and CC for the different outcome.
I'll let you judge the practicality ... Damage to implement such functions without a little more value by making them accessible.
SOUNDS
The manufacturer describes it as falling MS20/303 tradition and it is quite true. Rather than MS10 MS20 may be elsewhere.
Presence, quite safe in low and energy in general. 303 in the spirit it is very convincing and this goes far beyond a x0xb0x a little effete for example. By enabling or not the characteristics "slides" / "accent", once opened (in small doses because it goes so far that it becomes painful) resonance, we are moving towards the "Acid" very sharp with possibilities very expressive variations due to particular envelope settings.
Fortunately it is not restricted to this and this is where this synth can become endearing. It stands very well and spends soft to aggressive with enough nuances, be it up or down the keyboard.
In other words, it goes from beautiful to ugly or disgusting, like all such mono. Upon arrival a real identity, but do not shut up in a too narrow category.
Far from being a silly face SH101 for example, but not really an alternative.
OVERALL OPINION
Purchased at the time also eyeing to Minitaur. A quick demonstration had well developed.
Definitely a good value for money. used occasionally to supplement other analos vintage or traveling for its small size obviously.
Unit that sounds great and is intended for remote nature of computers suffers from contradictions because without at least one controller or a midi sequencer perfected it is quite impractical to access additional functions.
That is the kind of additional equipment that has not necessarily want to have between the legs to have fun and make spontaneous music. Suddenly the machine remains in its original configuration or as we left the last time we had the patience to plug this thing. A shame but not prohibitive either, as it performs its main functions handily.
In view of what is currently available in this price range (but still called compromise), the choice again would not be obvious but not necessarily stupid either.