[sdiy] Wasp clone, was: SDIY UK 2010 pics and vid

[cheater cheater]

eh Tom, "all the work" is nothing compared to Jürgen's new vocoder.
Besides it's really only just a few elements, let's be honest with
eachother, a beginner project at worst. The PCB is nice, big, and
spacious, and there are no heat-sensitive chips either. You could
finish it with a soldering gun.

Given that those things don't seem to sound that bad, it would/could
be an interesting project. Not everything needs to be pitch-perfect
and the limited range is as much a turn-off as it is a turn-on. Even
the wasp interface could stay intact - so that you can use the wasp
midi mod that already exists, or use it with your other wasp if you
have one, etc. Maybe the Spider sequencer could be copied too and then
it could be used directly with the midi interface (it's a small box
with limited capabilities so probably not too complicated at all).
Then there are the Gnat and Wasp Deluxe.

I'm sure enough people are curious about the wasp's sound that they
would build clones. I can easily see enough PCBs selling for the
effort to pay off to anyone who invests their time to copy the pcb
from some photos - and this shouldn't be that difficult, either, just
some scaling with mesh tools to remove perspective / lens distortion
and off you go with a brush and eraser. Given the simplicity of the
circuit at hand it shouldn't be difficult to figure out what goes
where under the chips. I guess it would be "more authentic" than any
schematics-based copies too (schematics lie, and hey, layout is the
king of sound, especially when digital chips are being used for audio)

Cheers,
D.

On Tue, Jul 13, 2010 at 11:06, Tom Wiltshire <tom at electricdruid.net> wrote:
>
> On 13 Jul 2010, at 05:27, cheater cheater wrote:
>
>> Hi Chris,
>> really nice pics, thanks.
>>
>> Looking at the gutted Wasp, it's just one, possibly two-sided, PCB.
>> Given how insanely expensive those things get for what they do, I
>> wonder, why are there no true to life 1:1 clones yet?
>
> Because if you're going to do all that work, you might as well build something better than a Wasp?
>
> T.
>
> PS: I'm curious to hear about the Cygnus too.