Winter NAMM, January 2010

- The Analog Haven booth was the happening spot.

http://www.analoghaven.com/

Juergen Michalis was there with the new Jomox 909 snare; Herr Schneider was as well, doing his good work, as ever. Always a pleasure, gentlemen!

http://www.jomox.com/

http://www.schneidersbuero.de/

TipTop Audio have an upcoming DSP module with FX and multiple filter types, three VC inputs, and you can step through programs via gates. They've also come up with stackable 3.5mm jacks. This is so cool and so obvious, it makes you both slap your forehead and reach to get some.

http://www.tiptopaudio.com/

www.mungo.com.au will be available at Analog Haven. The large State Zero machine is entirely digital, has full patching, four oscillators per voice with phase and freq adjustment, four filters per voice, 8 voices total (monotimbral), IIRC full recall of settings and even patching, and will likely cost 10K+. Thank designer John Pillans for the run-through!

The Radikal Spectralis 2 takes the wonderful Spectralis and updates it without losing the excellent sonic character. This is truly a "make an entire CD with just one machine" piece of gear. Wonderful. It deserves a great deal of attention.

http://www.radikaltechnologies.com/spectralis2_hybrid_synthesizer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Uv-uejUaLA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZVbduhdZL8&feature=related

Thanks to Chris Stack and Amos and Mike of Moog Music for the Taurus information (limited to 1K units, nearly sold out for $3K or so each), and for the run-through on the MIDI MURF. Very, very smart, very very fun, very good-sounding too. Steve Roach needs two of these.
http://www.moogmusic.com/

The new ADAM monitors are stunning. Although I sat far too close in (way inside the recommended listening distance) and the image was wonky as a result, the dynamics, clarity, and gut-wrenching presence of the music was instantly apparent. Not perfect, but I'm fairly certain that no one else is anywhere near this close! (I wish their relationship with David Bryce had worked out.)
http://www.adam-audio.com/

www.MESI.fr were there (Hey Marc and Emmanuelle, congrats on the baby!) showing the Persephone 2, among other items. Keep up the great work!

Don Buchla was there showing the 200e, and it was impossible to get close to him due to interest...All success to Don and his gear!

http://www.buchla.com/

The Moon Modular stuff was there, but I didn't get a chance to tweak it. Tom Carpenter and his Analog Solutions line were there, showing the new Patchable SEMblance, a new under-development sequencer, and photos of the upcoming Liepzig mono keyboard (in a Prophet 5-type case- beautiful!!). Cheer, Tom, great to see you and all the new gear.

http://www.moonmodular.com/

http://www.musicradar.com/gear/all/keys-synths/synthesizers-compact-synthesizers/synthesizers/telemark-216358/review
or:
http://tinyurl.com/ydl3efb

The Batmobile was on display at a booth, what a hoot. Too bad the original cast weren't there as well!
Does everyone know that half of Malekko is Paul Barker, of Ministry fame? I did not, and made a dweeb of myself as a result gooof Josh and he had a large area and the gear looks and sounds wonderful. They have many plans for this year...as does Tony of MakeNoise (who acknowledged that the QMMG is indeed punchier-sounding than the Buchla 292). Very nice, I want one or two...and the lamp on the MATHS is also a switch. Outstanding. Did I see a CHOICES module, with a joystick? Yes I did. Please take my first-born in trade for modules, because the matrix sequencer is the shiznit.

http://www.malekkoheavyindustry.com/

http://www.makenoisemusic.com/modular.html

NIIO Analog show their first product, the IOTINE core, which is a 2U signal processor featuring two mixed or serial signal paths, each with a multimode filter and selection between ten types of saturation/overdrive, into a summer with a static multi-mode and other goodies. Two envelopes with a stated minimum attack time of 40uS (faster even than the Technosaurus Selector's 70uS minimum attack time) round it out. The filters have a Moog-style "whistly" resonance, did not self-oscillate, but are clean and solid-sounding. Users of dual filtration units will recognize the ability to have the bass slam and to sweep the detail with the other filter. There are three VCAs; one is Post, and there are LFOs for various duties. It's out now at Analog Haven for $1495.00. Check youtube.com for video..

http://www.niioanalog.com/

Visit www.PluginGuru.com for much fun...Long-Time Korg and Ilio users will recognize the name "Skippy" and his outstanding work.

That's just a little; it was nice to see everyone, even those who mocked me to my face regarding the modular flame wars. To each their own; it's all about the gear, and this excellent NAMM show firmly states that the Euro format is the format of the future. Thanks to Tim from M-Audio for getting me there and back again, and Roger from Big City Music for the pass. My pardon to anyone I've neglected to mention!
http://www.bigcitymusic.com/

It was also a pleasure to meet The Harvestman and his tangential, outstanding equipment. Deiter Doepfer and Frau Doepfer were there as well, but I didn't get a chance to get a run-through of the new modules. He always has a smile about the gear...

There were many, many Chinese companies on hand, selling everything from stand-up basses to wireless microphones. It is clear that Chinese product will continue to have a lasting impact upon the world.

Now, someone give me many thousands of dollars for large ADAM monitors. Cough it up, bassids...

Tune / Tuning / Calibrating Oberheim SEM / TVS / FVS

I've long used the Xcelite P3324 screwdriver, flathead, very long, and thin enough to get into the calibration holes, and down to the trimpots on the main PCBs.

It appears that this may be an obsolete tool, as there are only a couple of Google hits, and they are not specifically about this tool.

Sony APM X360 Information

Per the last post, the APM X360 appears to not have much depth on the internet.

I have what I'll take to be the middle section, with a downward-firing woofer, square midrange, and a tweeter. There are dowels aiming downward from the bottom (which is open), implying a base, and there are four rubber holes in the top, implying something sitting up there as well...and speaker terminals on the very top of both speakers (which do NOT connect to the internal drivers; must be a chaining to additional components).

The grilles do come off. There are two pins at the top and bottom rear of each side of each speaker. Pinch the grill fabric in and pull at the rear top and bottom and they come off.

There are three drivers in this unit:

-Woofer: Sony 150370711, 6" cone in an 8 3/20ths frame, 16 ohms, 100 watts max.
-Mid: Sony 150370911, 16 ohms, 60 watts maximum.
-Tweeter: Sony 150370811, 8 ohms, 100 watts maximum.

ued.com have listings of these parts. For example, the tweeter:

http://www.ued.net/ued/addItems.do?itemCode=SNY150370811

$25.90 each.

Note that the woofer (nice heavy magnet, but paper cone) is easily replaced with Pyramid WX85X woofers, 100 watts RMS, and I paid around $35.00 for a pair, delivered. Got mine at http://www.crispdeals.com/.

Otherwise, the Sony woofer:

http://www.ued.net/ued/addItems.do?itemCode=SNY150370711

$119.56

By the way, UED are a great source for Japanese circuitry. I've never ordered, but they have listings of many hard-to-find items.

I see that there are no crossovers in these speakers at all, excepting a 2.7uF Nichicon cap on the tweeter (thankfully, an audio-grade capacitor). This looks to be about 5KHz at 6dB/Octave. The midrange and woofer just play on and outward to the ends of their response ranges (which is very good for overall phase response; Irving Fried was finally able to use 6dB crossovers when drivers became available with enough power handling to allow it.).

I had worried about blowing the (full-range) midrange driver...I noted on the internet that the Yamaha NS1000 speakers were sometimes modded with tupperware containers to enclose the rear of the midrange as there had indeed been cases where the woofer action had blown out the mid!

The port noise became tiresome, so in went enough toilet paper to stop it, but not enough to firmly stop the port, or too little to be sucked into the unit during play.

As these speakers are coated in a plastic sheen, I find that warm water made short work of the tape gunk residue covering mine, and did not detract from the finish.