[sdiy] Novation peak NCOs - Behringer Deepmind 12

[Mike HEQX]

Thanks for the perspective Tom. Yeah I suppose it's just as analog as 
anything else and I'm not afraid of digitally controlled analog 
oscillators, or straight up digital oscillators at all. I own a few 
synths that are built with DCOs and they sound very good.  I suppose 
their are no "full disclosure" rules when marketing synthesizers. I was 
curious if they had used some reinvented ancient analog oscillator ICs 
in this design, but I suppose not.

So if you ignore everything and just take it at face value it's a good 
synth for the money and in some ways a lot more flexible than some. It 
does have a unique sound. One thing they did which I like is real-time 
illustration on the display of how your slider movements are affecting 
the parameter, and that is kind of cool.

Can't wait to hear the Peak in person.


Mike


On 4/22/2017 6:56 PM, Tom Wiltshire wrote:
> Hi Mike,
>
> It's what I said: DCOs, followed by analog filter, followed by analog VCA, controlled by digital stuff. That's just as "analog" as any number of classic synths, from the Prophet T8, to the Matrix-12, and more analog than some like the Waldorf Wave (digital oscs).
>
> The waveforms from a DCO are entirely analog. The only thing digital about them is the frequency resolution. In this day and age, that means 32-bit counters, and the frequency steps are at sub-millihertz accuracy, way beyond perceptible. We're far beyond the Juno 106, and audible steps if you push it. The same is true of the envelopes and LFOs. Back in the "old days" of classic analog synths, update rates for envelopes and LFOs were in the hundreds of Hertz, if you were lucky, and digital envelopes were sluggish and poor. Now, many kilohertz is much more likely, and you'll get as much snap as you want, and sub-millsecond attacks are realistic.
> In short, there's nothing about it that gives any kind of lie to their claim that it's "a true analog 12-voice polyphonic synthesizer" unless you also want to exclude many classic instruments from that category. In fact, it probably does a technically much better job than most of those classics.
> Now we get to the nitty-gritty: that technical accomplishment doesn't necessarily make it sound good.
> If you swamp it with cheap digital effects, it will probably sound pretty cheap and pretty digital, and if that's what they did with the presets, then more fool them. Ultimately, not everyone is going to like every synth design, analog or not, and trying to hide stuff under a thick layer of effects is bound to make people suspicious!
> This design is just as analog as several recent instruments from DSI or others, so that part of the equation is definitely *not* the problem. It is, as far as I can determine, analog from oscillator core to output in all the senses that that has been understood for some thirty years. The exception to this is the "Insert" effects, which disable the analog path, and are the same as sticking your analog synth through a digital FX box (since that's what you're doing). The "Send" and "Bypass" effects keep the analog path intact, and only add digital "wet" signal, if any.
>
> Regards,
> Tom
>
>
> On 22 Apr 2017, at 22:50, Mike HEQX <mike at heqx.com> wrote:
>
>> Tom,
>>
>> I have played the Deepmind 12 and It's got a certain sound to it. I put about 3 hours of fiddling time into it and I formed an impression of it. Positive I might add. Behringer has this to say "True Analog 12-Voice Polyphonic Synthesizer", and "Classic polyphonic synthesizer with 12 true analog voices for insanely fat and authentic sounds" but I was thinking that I would not call it an analog synth really, but more of a hybrid. This is due to the mountains of digital effects that you can configure and pile on which are an intrinsic part of the sound and are on a large percentage of the presets. So I'd like to know if it is actually analog from the oscillator cores through to the output. If so it's got a sound that is very distinct and somewhat thin, contrary to what they claim, considering what it should be able to do.
>>
>> Mike
>>
>>
>> On 4/22/2017 3:23 PM, Tom Wiltshire wrote:
>>> I thought they'd been pretty clear - the DeepMind12 voice is a couple of DCOs, followed by an analog filter and VCA. From the current CoolAudio chip line-up (e.g. no CEM3320 clone just yet) and the Roland-alike character of the whole project, the filter is a 2/4-pole OTA based thing, probably built around a pair of V13700s. VCAs similar, I'd expect (Roland used BA662, another basic OTA). Everything else (envelopes, LFOs, FXs) is digital, in common with most "analog" synths from the Prophet T8 onwards.
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