images via this auction"The CS-01 is a very old but classic analog monosynth from Yamaha. Although originally designed for use by novice musicians or first time synth-buyers, the CS-01 has been recognized by today's electronic musicians as one fat little bass machine with simple controls. In a nutshell, the CS-01 is simple to use and edit but still has some great features for any situation. It's tiny and portable, it has baby-sized keys and it can run on batteries, and there is a built-in amplifier and speaker which is quite fun.
As for sounds and synthesizing, the CS-01 is the perfect monosynth for bubbly and growling bass! It features a very nice 12dB resonant VCF filter. In addition to the oscillators' sine and square type waveforms there is PWM and noise. There are also LFO controls, glissando (like portamento), a typical ADSR envelope generator, pitch & mod wheels and even a breath controller input.
The CS-01 may look simple or toy-like but it is still able to create cool little analog bass blips, bass lines and bass bubbles that are just perfect for today's electronic musicians.
The CS-01 is a monophonic, single oscillator synthesizer with a 2 1/2 octave mini-sized keyboard, that can run on battery power or via a wall-wart AC/DC converter. It was obviously marketed to the young, first synth buyer, market. However, dispite it's mini-sized keys, it has been since adopted by many professionals for it's simple design, active sliders, and great sound.
The voice architecture is quite simple. A single oscillator with a sub-oscillator, a VCF, an LFO. The oscillator has a slider for fine tune, and an other with four octave settings, with the fifth setting switching it to the noise source. Available waveforms are triangle, sawtooth, square, and narrow. There is also a pulse width modulation (PWM) waveform with a separate slider controlling the PWM speed. There is a slider for glissando (unfortunately, not portamento). The filter (12dB/octave) section has sliders for cutoff frequency, resonance, and EG (envelope generator) depth. There is a EG depth for the VCA. There is a switch for resonance (low and high only). The LFO can be switched to control the VCA or the VCO. There is a slider for LFO speed and the amount is controlled by the controller wheel. The envelope generator is a simple ADSR with sliders for each (attack, decay, sustain, release)Plugged into an amp it gives a great fat sound from deep bass to high glass spliting high notes. Built in speaker if your amp is not around.
Runs on batterys or mains (you need a cheap 12-v or multy-v mains adapter - easy to get for very little money)"
I have two, they are so small that you can put them on top of each other with a book, to create a more massive small synth like a tiny version of the prophet 10..
ReplyDeleteI owned one of these for years, bought one when it came out. It is NOT a "fat little bass machine." It is a cool basic synth. It has one oscillator and no sub-oscillator. Yamaha stuff from that period isn't PHAT and it wasn't meant to be.
ReplyDeleteIt annoys me when people sell these or Korg synths as something they are not. The CS-01 does have a very very nice PWM sound that I could never quite get on another synth. It also has breath control in, but you can use a CV pedal if you don't have the scuba-looking breath controller. And it has two guitar pegs so you can strap it on!