First Purchases

[mcomeg]

The first synth I bought was a Microkorg, but I made an album on someone else's Roland JP8000 before that. The Juno-60 and JX-3P will serve you well. I recommend running the signal through a tube pre-amp for some grit and making use of those guitar pedals on the synths as well. Have a groovy time with them!

[bluedad]

My first synth was a Chroma Polaris the year was 1986 at the height of DX mania. I still have it, although it does not work.

[StepLogik]

Who can name their entire gear list? from first keyboard/synth/drummachine whatever to current setup?

I can't be the only nut who has a log.

i keep a fairly complete list of all the studio gear i've owned. i don't keep the dates the gear was acquired/sold though which is a bit of a shame. when i go back over that list i occasionally have facepalm moments where i think to myself, "why did i sell that!"

[aredj]

Apart from software sequencing and synthing in the first half of the 90's, I 'mastered' my friends juno6 and mc303 -

Years and years later, my first actual synth purchace would be the desktop evolver. I never thought I'd get rid o that lil blue monster... (i did for the spectralis, and am not missing it thankfully...)

[zoomtheline]

First was a Yamaha PSS460 which has a primitive synth section, does that count? didn't think so.

Ok so my first was a Waldorf Pulse (I still use it)

In fact I wish I still had the PSS460 as It apparently bends really well.

[glassofwater]

my first synth was the SH-101. it's probably my favourite synthesizer. less is more, for sure, with that one.

[wiss]

Yamaha SY-2

[Z]

Who can name their entire gear list? from first keyboard/synth/drummachine whatever to current setup?

I had a list in the early 90's of my music gear (instruments & audio gear) along with their serial numbers. I started a new list of electronic instruments only (close to 150) that I need to add serial numbers to so I can submit it to my insurance company.

[silikon]

My first synth... back in the early 80's (middle school years) when digital stuff was all the rage was my uncle's Minimoog. It wasn't really 'mine' but I sort of inherited it since he never touched the damn thing. As a kid I was never really fortunate enough to be able to afford any musical gear on my own, and certainly not from my parents; I had to live vicariously through others. Thinking back (and digressing some) I am sure that I was a pain in several people's asses because I was always over at their place using them for their instruments.

I fell in love with all things electronic. The Minimoog didn't stay with me for too many years as eventually my uncle came and repo'ed the thing to sell it off, but I never lost the love.

I can also name off every other piece of hardware that I've owned and the thing that gave it a certain mysticism to me. I don't have a log of all of them, but I recall them all because they all (to me) had a personality akin to a friend, I suppose. I find joy in all my pieces, and play them all more or less quite often; sometimes in a composition, sometimes just noodling about.

At any rate, sounds like you have a nice start, and a good idea where you want to go with your art. Forge on, and regardless of what you have, enjoy it.

[garranimal]

A yamaha PSR-200, which was soon after traded for my first synth: Alpha Juno-1. My first setup was Voyetra's dos Sequencer Plus Gold (which I know still has a following around here), Juno-1, and 03r/w. Then later I added a QuadraSynth and an AX-60. With regret I say I no longer have any of those boards, especially missed are Juno-1 and AX-60. Alas, no money or space to get them back. I sampled the AX-60 and still the sounds are featured on the VSE AX-60 page if you want to hear them.

[Distorted_Frequency]

Well I didn't start too long ago so it's still fresh: October 2010 - Juno 106, Febuary 2011 - TR-707 and Prophet 08. I feel for me these two really do their thing well in my musical direction. I am eyeing a Jupiter 6 [planning on installing Europa] and a ESX. I will see how it goes this year for those.

My guitar rig on the other hand is a journey, but, this is Vintage Synth Explorer not HugeRacksINC.

[Pro5]

Spent a summer mowing yards to buy a Casio HT-700 for $350ish back in 1987. Sold it a year later to a classmate to fund an Akai AX60.

My first synth (more like home keyboard with Synth section built in, at least I believed so at the time) was the Casio HT-3000. Made lots of experimental instrumental tapes with that between the ages of 14-16 or something.

My first 'real' synth was Juno 6 a few years later (swapped for a guitar which had only cost me £60). As for gear, pretty much synth wise it's all in my ridiculous signature that I maintain not to show off my penchant for trying out cheapy old gear and then getting rid of it, but as a kind of record (as I've really only bought synths again since 2008 after going full software for most of the early 2000s).

My first synth was a Yamaha SHS-10.

Not a synth, in any fashion. It's the equiv of a childs home keyboard (something from the PSS range, of which I had 2 before I had my HT-300) with a handle stuck on it! And Yes I know what i'm talking about cos I bought 2 of them (and it's big brother the shs-2000) for £4 each from a car boot sale (flea market) in the last 2 years and sold them for £150 each on ebay, nothing synth like about them, just cos they have sounds based on a really weak version of FM doesn't make it a synthesizer as for one thing it can't synthesize any new sounds.

my first synth was the SH-101. it's probably my favourite synthesizer. less is more, for sure, with that one.

And so far, as of the last few months my latest purchase was a couple of SH-101s. I see some on these forums have called them 'trash' and yet I've found finally in this one simple little machine a sound and a 'way' that I had been searching for ever since I started 'collecting' other people's electronic trash in the sub £500 synth market since 2008. Now I feel I'm pretty much done unless NEW synths come out that impress me and are not just VA.

[Automatic Gainsay]

That's a great big bunch of stuff right in the middle there AG... mid-life crisis?

No, the midlife crisis happened around the ARP 2600 period.

The surge was because of this: I bought a couple of synths for $200 each which sold for nearly $400 each, giving me money to work with. I bought more synths for lower prices which sold for more, and it started a chain reaction. Because the market was hitting a good angle, AND because I knew how to spot a decent eBay auction which LOOKED like a shitty auction, and THEN knew how to make a really great auction which would get the full price, I was able to start selling the synths that didn't really charm me to buy synths I thought might. It was this laborious process that got me into demoing synths... I wanted people to be able to hear the synths they wanted to buy before they had to try to buy them.
Also, it was a good several years income-wise.

[Alex E]

Yamaha CS1x.

[Snarecrash]

Korg M1. Turned out to be not the best one to learn synthesis on.
So when i got bored playing the presets and wanted to make my own sounds i got myself a Poly 800.
But it was definitely an upgrade for me, in terms of editability and a more analog sound.