Tuesday, May 05, 2009
Akai MPC 2000XL and E-Mu SP1200 Flash Drives
"Introducing the worlds first USB flash memory drive shaped like the Akai MPC 2000XL, one of Hip Hop’s most classic drum machines / samplers. This is the long time favorite Sampler of producers such as Dr. Dre, Pete Rock, Just Blaze, Lil Jon and more! Akai’s powerhouse drum machine has been immortalized as a 4 GB USB flash memory drive. Every nuance of the Akai MPC 2000XL has been captured in extreme detail! These unique devices are perfect for Hip-Hop beat makers, producers, and enthusiast on the go. This is the only portable data storage solution that screams “Hip Hop”."
"Introducing the worlds first USB flash memory drive shaped like the E-Mu SP-1200. Its Hip Hop’s grittiest 12-Bit drum machine / sampler. This is the long time favorite sampler of producers such as Ayatollah, The RZA, Large Professor and more! The SP-1200 drum machine has been immortalized as a 4 GB USB flash memory drive. Every nuance of the E-Mu Classic has been captured in extreme detail! These unique devices are perfect for Hip-Hop beat makers, producers, and enthusiast on the go. This is the only portable data storage solution that screams “Hip Hop”."
Pre-orders for June 12 here. via Zero via Gizmodo.
Hard Soft Synth 2
CL Scams - Buyer Beware
See this post for common eBay scams.
A few CL scams were reported on the Analogue Heaven mailing list today. I thought I'd put a post up for new buyers. Always be careful out there. What I found interesting about the scams was when I think of Craigslist, I think of local pick-up only. I would never buy something from CL unless I was able to pick it up and try it out in person. I wondered what the seller might do if I were to state I'd like to pick it up and/or test it out. The following is an actual reply a list member, Mati, received from a seller:
"Hello,
My name is Sandra Cooper and I am now in London UK, the reason why I listed this ad in your local area is because a friend told me that I would get a better price and faster deal there than here in London and I am more than happy to ship it to you for free.
The item is in perfect condition barely used for a few hours so I wouldn't mind calling it brand new. Obviously we need a safe way to complete this deal without worrying about the safety of your money or my item.
The best way I could think of is to use a shipping company that will also act as an escrow service and found one with quite a good name.
I chose to use TNT WorldWide Transaction, a subsidiary of the well known(at least here in europe) TNT.
Using their services your money will be safe with them until you receive and check the product and I will rest assured that I'll get paid if you like and decide to keep the item. Also the company will provide you with 5 to 7 days to test the item and make sure you're making the right decision.
Please let me know what you think so I can explain to you the transaction steps in detail.
Thanks for your time,
Sandra."
The images in the listing were pulled from a valid Ebay auction.
A rule of thumb for Craiglist is to simply not buy unless you or a friend in the area can pick up and test the item in person. Make that clear to the seller, and if it's a scam the seller will most likely back out. And of course be careful meeting up with people. You never know what's out there. I'd pick a public place with outlets to test the gear. Bring headphones. Note Ebay is full of scams as well, review a seller's feedback, ask the right questions and be very careful. Also I try to filter out multiple scammers on the Ebay links on this site. If you catch any feel free to let me know and I'll review them for removal as well, but be careful, there are first time sellers out there and not everything suspect is a scam.
Update via Paul on AH:
"Hi all. Don't want to beat a dead horse, but there are a few methods by which you can suss out the type of scams we've been seeing on CL:
1. Do a google search on some of the text in the posting. I did that on the recent 909 scam and it returned clone ads in HongKong and Athens. I searched for the string "This is the one and only Tr-909. Nothing beats it! I had one a long time ago that wasn't as nice as this one." and google found some of the ads.
2. Another way is to use the jaxed service: http://jaxed.com/cgi-bin/mash.cgi?cat=mus&itm=roland&loc=&fil=tr-909&ys=&ye=&submit=++++go++++
I just tried it now, and it shows the same 909 ad in over 30 cities now! These people are more spammers than scammers, it seems. They spray ads like bullets and hope they hit someone. Small chance anyone here will be taken for a ride, but it's nice to have some tools to help spot these kinds of scams.
Again, sorry if I'm out of line here, but if it prevents people from posting about a great deal on CL the next time this happens, it will have served its purpose."
If you have any tips feel free to comment.
A few CL scams were reported on the Analogue Heaven mailing list today. I thought I'd put a post up for new buyers. Always be careful out there. What I found interesting about the scams was when I think of Craigslist, I think of local pick-up only. I would never buy something from CL unless I was able to pick it up and try it out in person. I wondered what the seller might do if I were to state I'd like to pick it up and/or test it out. The following is an actual reply a list member, Mati, received from a seller:
"Hello,
My name is Sandra Cooper and I am now in London UK, the reason why I listed this ad in your local area is because a friend told me that I would get a better price and faster deal there than here in London and I am more than happy to ship it to you for free.
The item is in perfect condition barely used for a few hours so I wouldn't mind calling it brand new. Obviously we need a safe way to complete this deal without worrying about the safety of your money or my item.
The best way I could think of is to use a shipping company that will also act as an escrow service and found one with quite a good name.
I chose to use TNT WorldWide Transaction, a subsidiary of the well known(at least here in europe) TNT.
Using their services your money will be safe with them until you receive and check the product and I will rest assured that I'll get paid if you like and decide to keep the item. Also the company will provide you with 5 to 7 days to test the item and make sure you're making the right decision.
Please let me know what you think so I can explain to you the transaction steps in detail.
Thanks for your time,
Sandra."
The images in the listing were pulled from a valid Ebay auction.
A rule of thumb for Craiglist is to simply not buy unless you or a friend in the area can pick up and test the item in person. Make that clear to the seller, and if it's a scam the seller will most likely back out. And of course be careful meeting up with people. You never know what's out there. I'd pick a public place with outlets to test the gear. Bring headphones. Note Ebay is full of scams as well, review a seller's feedback, ask the right questions and be very careful. Also I try to filter out multiple scammers on the Ebay links on this site. If you catch any feel free to let me know and I'll review them for removal as well, but be careful, there are first time sellers out there and not everything suspect is a scam.
Update via Paul on AH:
"Hi all. Don't want to beat a dead horse, but there are a few methods by which you can suss out the type of scams we've been seeing on CL:
1. Do a google search on some of the text in the posting. I did that on the recent 909 scam and it returned clone ads in HongKong and Athens. I searched for the string "This is the one and only Tr-909. Nothing beats it! I had one a long time ago that wasn't as nice as this one." and google found some of the ads.
2. Another way is to use the jaxed service: http://jaxed.com/cgi-bin/mash.cgi?cat=mus&itm=roland&loc=&fil=tr-909&ys=&ye=&submit=++++go++++
I just tried it now, and it shows the same 909 ad in over 30 cities now! These people are more spammers than scammers, it seems. They spray ads like bullets and hope they hit someone. Small chance anyone here will be taken for a ride, but it's nice to have some tools to help spot these kinds of scams.
Again, sorry if I'm out of line here, but if it prevents people from posting about a great deal on CL the next time this happens, it will have served its purpose."
If you have any tips feel free to comment.
A Mini Waldorf Largo Review and Samples
via Boele of SCD on the Waldorf list, posted here with permission.
"Yes, Largo is approaching :D
Largo looks like Blofeld/uQ in terms of parameters, but it can sound quite different and has some very fine additional features.
First of all, it has all the wavetables Blofeld has, including the Upperwavetable, the matrix, the 4 envelopes, 3 LFOs, 2 filters, FXs etc. all known from Blofeld/uQ. Also the arpeggiator is there.
In addition, the first two oscillators have a sub-oscillator with selectable foot and level settings.
The phaser FX has been improved a lot. It sounds *way* better than the one on the Blofeld (personal opinion).
There is an added Fuzz FX in the FX section which also sound pretty good.
My personal favorit: the step LFO (only LFO3). you can set a value for each of the maximum of 16 steps and you can also smooth out the steps a little if wanted. Last but not least, you can set any number of steps while the LFO speed is maintained.
Now when you sync the LFO to MIDI clock you can imagine the funny things you can do. I really love this feature and hope to see it back one day in Blofeld.
The delay has gotten extended delay time up to three seconds. Very usable for ambient sounds :)
There is a global equalizer and also a bass boost knob to finetune the overall sound of Largo.
You can create four layers of sounds and send them to various outputs if wanted. Waldorf also developed some smart bank/preset loading/saving routines. (maybe some other betatester can spread a bit more light on this? I didn't use it yet).
All in all, I started to like this piece of software a lot. Not bad for a hardware guy :) 90% of the parameters are approachable by MIDI CCs so with a good controller it feels like hardware anyway.
Is there nothing to complain about? Well, maybe only the missing PPG filter. Not sure if Waldorf intends to add this in a future release. But even without it Largo gives so much sound fun.
The above is just my own personal view on Largo, developed during testing. It will hit the market in the very near future as far as I know.
Check it out!
Boele"
And via Stefan Trippler:
"If it's of any help, the Largo demos I already posted on the list were made
on a Pentium Dual Core 2,4 GHz
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/tanzindenmai.mp3
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/messie.mp3
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/lullaby.mp3
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/murmur.mp3
In terms of the sound character: when I made these demos I had only my own weird sounds available that always have a little too much overdrive, FM or modulations of any kind. The Largo can also make nice sounds ;)"
"Yes, Largo is approaching :D
Largo looks like Blofeld/uQ in terms of parameters, but it can sound quite different and has some very fine additional features.
First of all, it has all the wavetables Blofeld has, including the Upperwavetable, the matrix, the 4 envelopes, 3 LFOs, 2 filters, FXs etc. all known from Blofeld/uQ. Also the arpeggiator is there.
In addition, the first two oscillators have a sub-oscillator with selectable foot and level settings.
The phaser FX has been improved a lot. It sounds *way* better than the one on the Blofeld (personal opinion).
There is an added Fuzz FX in the FX section which also sound pretty good.
My personal favorit: the step LFO (only LFO3). you can set a value for each of the maximum of 16 steps and you can also smooth out the steps a little if wanted. Last but not least, you can set any number of steps while the LFO speed is maintained.
Now when you sync the LFO to MIDI clock you can imagine the funny things you can do. I really love this feature and hope to see it back one day in Blofeld.
The delay has gotten extended delay time up to three seconds. Very usable for ambient sounds :)
There is a global equalizer and also a bass boost knob to finetune the overall sound of Largo.
You can create four layers of sounds and send them to various outputs if wanted. Waldorf also developed some smart bank/preset loading/saving routines. (maybe some other betatester can spread a bit more light on this? I didn't use it yet).
All in all, I started to like this piece of software a lot. Not bad for a hardware guy :) 90% of the parameters are approachable by MIDI CCs so with a good controller it feels like hardware anyway.
Is there nothing to complain about? Well, maybe only the missing PPG filter. Not sure if Waldorf intends to add this in a future release. But even without it Largo gives so much sound fun.
The above is just my own personal view on Largo, developed during testing. It will hit the market in the very near future as far as I know.
Check it out!
Boele"
And via Stefan Trippler:
"If it's of any help, the Largo demos I already posted on the list were made
on a Pentium Dual Core 2,4 GHz
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/tanzindenmai.mp3
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/messie.mp3
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/lullaby.mp3
http://www.trippler.net/files/mp3/murmur.mp3
In terms of the sound character: when I made these demos I had only my own weird sounds available that always have a little too much overdrive, FM or modulations of any kind. The Largo can also make nice sounds ;)"
KURZWEIL K-2500 XS Parts
via these auctionsnot the best shots, but interesting.
In order:
"KURZWEIL K-2500 XS "MASTER VOLUMEN, ASSIGNABLE CONTROLLERS FADERS, SOLO, MIXDOWN, MIDI FADERS BUTTONS USED BOARD MODEL ASSY 121076"
"KURZWEIL K-2500 XS "MAIN PANEL CONTROL BOARD MODEL ASSY 121069 COMPLETE ALL CAPS AND ROTARY INCLUDED"
"KURZWEIL K-2500 XS "HEADPHONES, (R & L) MIX, (R & L) A, (R & L) B, (R & L) C AND (R & L) D AUDIO OUTS USED BOARD MODEL ASSY 121065"
"KURZWEIL K-2500 XS "CC PEDALS/BREATH/SWITCH PEDALS/SCSI THRU PORTS IN/OUT USED MODEL ASSY 121074 BOARD"
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MATRIXSYNTH - EVERYTHING SYNTH
© Matrixsynth - All posts are presented here for informative, historical and educative purposes as applicable within fair use.
MATRIXSYNTH is supported by affiliate links that use cookies to track clickthroughs and sales. See the privacy policy for details.
MATRIXSYNTH - EVERYTHING SYNTH
