Zephyr Posted April 4, 2009 Posted April 4, 2009 Looks like an interesting product, they're accepting users for their beta release at the bottom. http://www.teenageengineering.com/products/op-1/ Quote
Dj Mokram Posted April 5, 2009 Posted April 5, 2009 Reminds me of the korg nano serie: The OP-1 kind of like merges them all in one. Sounds promising. Quote
djpretzel Posted April 5, 2009 Posted April 5, 2009 Genuinely cool... looks to be applying some Web 2.0 style usability principles to the interface/display, as well. "Teenage Engineering" though... does this mean it will dress up in black on certain days, wearing a wallet chain, giving me an attitude? I do not know. Hopefully it'll be priced reasonably - I'm interested. Quote
Gario Posted April 5, 2009 Posted April 5, 2009 Damn, that thing is a monster! It looks pretty sweet, though. I'd probably use it as a portable synth over anything else, but as a midi controller it looks very nice, as well. The 'Teenage Engineering' sort of scares me, though - I hope it's just a name . OP-1 stands for Operator 1 After reading the specs I seriously thought it stood for 'Over Powered 1'... Quote
analoq Posted April 5, 2009 Posted April 5, 2009 looks to be applying some Web 2.0 style usability principles to the interface/display, as well. I can understand that in the sense that this thing will be in beta for the next 10-12 months. Beyond that, some explanation would help. Quote
djpretzel Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 I can understand that in the sense that this thing will be in beta for the next 10-12 months. Beyond that, some explanation would help. Youtube video of display test SEEMED to suggest that the entire display was taken over by a large envelope editor whence tweaking settings, hopefully contextually, with an auto-switch back to whatever the "main" display is after said knob/setting stopped changing. Basically, abandoning a lot of the multi-level heirarchical stuff for some quick-and-dirty, instant feedback type display action... maybe that was just my misinterpretation from the video, but it seems like there's room to explore that sort of approach. Quote
The Pezman Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 Meh, laptop keyboard is portable enough for me. Quote
Kanthos Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 Reminds me of the korg nano serie: The OP-1 kind of like merges them all in one. Sounds promising. The OP-1 is an actual synth with, from what I've read, both subtractive and FM synthesis. It's way more than the Nano series. Quote
Dj Mokram Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 Actually I was refering more to the design aspect, but yes Op-1seems full of potential all right. Quote
Yoozer Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 I can understand that in the sense that this thing will be in beta for the next 10-12 months. Beyond that, some explanation would help. It's a portable synthesizer, with a body made of a solid block of aluminum. The encoders are high-quality; the OLED used will be in stock for 5 years, and currently they're busy in Taiwan to set up a production line. The innards consist of an Analog Devices DSP and 1gb of internal memory. The concept is not that far removed from that of a MonoMachine in the sense that you get a compact synthesizer with several methods of synthesis - FM, virtual analog, SID-like, etc, small enough to take with you. Projected price is around 600 euros. There's only a single design mistake I can see, and that is that they've only got 14 of the long, pill-shaped "white keys" instead of 16. Quote
analoq Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 stuff And that explains the puzzling Web 2.0 comparison...? Or did you just quote the wrong person? Quote
OverCoat Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 Let's see if it beats my Casio VL-tone, and its calculator-based envelopes! I see a little speaker on that OP-1 that I can cup my hand over and make a wahwahwahwah Quote
Yoozer Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 And that explains the puzzling Web 2.0 comparison...? Or did you just quote the wrong person? Oh wait, you wanted an explanation about the Web 2.0 comparison, not what the box did. Whoops, sorry! . Quote
analoq Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 No problemo. Nice tidbit about the target price, though. $800+ puts it in a niche. My iPhone is more portable and I have a variety of music making apps to choose from with unique graphical interfaces. If I didn't already have a laptop, for $800 I could buy a used macbook/cheap laptop pc to do more sophisticated jamming on the go. If I want a small form factor synth+sequencer, mfb synth2 is cheaper and it's analog. I realize all of those examples represent personal preference, but I just keep seeing this OP1 thing on the blogs and I continue to not understand the hype. Quote
Zephyr Posted April 6, 2009 Author Posted April 6, 2009 It would be really cool for 100$ or so, especially since it's so small. People are willing to pay more money for bigger things, 800$ would be waaaaaaay too much. Who knows, maybe the beta will be cheap. Quote
analoq Posted April 9, 2009 Posted April 9, 2009 I wouldn't quite go that far. There's a variety of kit that people (myself included) are willing to pay thru the nose for because they do one thing particularly well and/or has a convenient form factor. The design and form factor are definitely cool but it's hard to say what this thing would do particularly well considering they're being secretive about its features. I generally don't complain about prices, so when I have the impulse to do so it seems like something is missing. I'd guess OLEDs are exorbitant even at that size. Quote
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