Archival Electronics

[Paul Maddox]

Grant,

I have been thinking recently about the longevity
of electronic musical instruments. It's kind of a 
silly thread I realize, but something I have been
musing over. I took the term "Archival Electronics"
from archival photography which is a set of
practices designed to produce photographs of
the greatest longevity.

[Paul Maddox]  
Something I often wonder, take my obsession with
a mid 80's synth, blue in color, and hard to find.

Since there are acoustic musical instruments
in use that are several hundred years old
(harpsichords for instance), it seems that
analog synthesizers may still be in use
for a similar time period if they continue to
function.

[Paul Maddox]  
Agreed, I can so no reason why not.. how many of
the people on here would give their right arm for a
moog modular? 


First is that people will continue to want to
play and listen to music (I hope so).

[Paul Maddox]  
Something I doubt will ever die, as far as they can
trace mankind there has ALWAYS been music of
somekind, be it drums/tonal.

Second is that musicians will continue to be
willing to carry or play something bigger than
a palmtop computer.

[Paul Maddox]  
Personally if I ever get to do a live gig, Id rather
do it with a pile of synths than one laptop, I dont
think that groups like Tangerine dream would've become
quite as infamous if they'd done the coventry catherdral gig
with 3 laptops and a it of ethernet.

Third is that artists will continue to feel that
specific instruments have distinctive enough
characteristics that they can not be replaced
by a surrogate. (the advent of the synthesizer
did not render acoustic instruments "obsolete"
for example).

[Paul Maddox]  
Many already do, again, my obsession with PPG's
is completely irrational, they're old, hard to find, expesnsive
and hard to repair. same goes for many 'classics' moogs/arps/etc.
Many of these can be simulated and simulated very very well.
but when you chatting to your mate and you say Ive got a 
minimoog, he goes "WOW", if you said 'Ive got a minimoog emulator
on my laptop' it kinda looses its oompf.

With that in mind, would the analog synthesizer
be a candidate for such longevity?

[Paul Maddox]  
YES, YES, YES..

For example, is the theoretical mean time between failure
(MTBF) of a synthesizer module containing 400 transistors
(in a number of op-amps) greater or less than the MTBF
of a DSP chip containing 4 million transistors?

[Paul Maddox]  
This is something that could be a laugh to work out, if you
had a spare couple of months to do so... I dont think there
would be a great deal of difference, the only advantage
of the DSP is that the same number of transistors arent joined
by bad soldering on the PCB :-)

And what about the issue of long term repair parts?

[Paul Maddox] 
This is where the older synth score points... you will (hopefully)
always be able to buy opamps and transistors, DSPs? I doubt 
you will be able to by the same DSP or something that you 
could swap out in 10 years time... 
 
Which will be easier to find in 2100 AD a SHARC DSP,
a TL074 or a 12AU7?

[Paul Maddox]  
I think that comptaible parts for the TL074 would be easist
followed by the Valve, sadly I dont think the DSP would be
possible to replace easily.. we live in a through away world,
If it doesnt do it, chuckit, its not as easy to modify a DSP
to do what you want (if its in a synth) as it is to modify a
Korg Monopoly.


Just a few of my thoughts

Paul
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