Yamaha Reface

[silikon]

My guess: sample-based synth of some sort.

I'm likely way wrong. I can't be bothered to give a toss, I'm broke anyhow.

[Walter Ego]

Let's be circumspect for a moment. Even if the actual product is somewhat lame, I think it's a good thing. What it means is that Yamaha is paying attention to the market now.

KORG got the ball rolling and is ahead of the pack right now.

Roland stuck its toes back in the market with the AIRA line and shoved its foot in the door with the DJX JDX's and the reissue of their modules.

Now Yamaha? I don't see this as bad news. They're paying attention to a growing synth market. That means maybe all of Japan's big three are back in the game. It's about time.

[commodorejohn]

That's true. If freaking Roland could be persuaded to even start dabbling with analog again, I don't see why Yamaha might not be open to gradually working their way back into it.

[Alphacode]

First of all lets forget about analog for a minute. Yamaha was the pioneering company in the FM synthesis and today it is not an expensive technology so i would be expecting a fresh approach to FM in their new synth. Plenty of analogues out there but no new Fm synths .this is where their strenghts are and this is what they should be focusing on in my opinion....

[Stab Frenzy]

First of all lets forget about analog for a minute. Yamaha was the pioneering company in the FM synthesis and today it is not an expensive technology so i would be expecting a fresh approach to FM in their new synth. Plenty of analogues out there but no new Fm synths .this is where their strenghts are and this is what they should be focusing on in my opinion....

Very good point. An FM synth with a great interface and a colour screen so you could see exactly what you were doing would be very easy to make now, and would be a big hit I reckon. I've toyed with the idea of making something like that with one of these before:



A good control layout and good visualisations of the algorithms would do a great job of demystifying FM.

[sneakthief]

PreenFM is considered to be an excellent open source FM synth and it's been ported to the STM32F4 discovery board (the one above, but minus the LCD)
http://ixox.fr/preenfm2/build-it/burn-firmware/

[Broadwave]

Very good point. An FM synth with a great interface and a colour screen so you could see exactly what you were doing would be very easy to make now, and would be a big hit I reckon.

But... once again I refer to the Kronos. MOD 7 - Colour (for what it's worth) touch screen, sensible and understandable layout, MODULAR (create your own algorithms!!), and you can use samples for the carrier as well as the standard FM waveforms. Oh, and it loads ancient DX7 libraries via sysex

Yes, I know I keep harping on about the Kronos, it may well be a 10 year old design if you include the Oasys, but it's still way ahead of what everyone else is producing.

[Stab Frenzy]

Very good point. An FM synth with a great interface and a colour screen so you could see exactly what you were doing would be very easy to make now, and would be a big hit I reckon.

But... once again I refer to the Kronos. MOD 7 - Colour (for what it's worth) touch screen, sensible and understandable layout, MODULAR (create your own algorithms!!), and you can use samples for the carrier as well as the standard FM waveforms. Oh, and it loads ancient DX7 libraries via sysex

Yes, I know I keep harping on about the Kronos, it may well be a 10 year old design if you include the Oasys, but it's still way ahead of what everyone else is producing.

That may be so, but the Kronos is a big expensive workstation with a utilitarian control surface. What I'd like to see is an FM synth that's small (Nord lead size at the biggest) and has a control layout that's made especially for making tweaking FM patches intuitive. Maybe that's unrealistic, but I wanna see an FM axe.

[Stab Frenzy]

PreenFM is considered to be an excellent open source FM synth and it's been ported to the STM32F4 discovery board (the one above, but minus the LCD)
http://ixox.fr/preenfm2/build-it/burn-firmware/

Cool, that looks great! Pity about the interface though, I'm big into interface design lately. I'm sure it wouldn't be that difficult to add more controls to that though.

[Jabberwalky]

PreenFM is discontinued. His fm was all CPU based, which makes it sound different. Looks really cool though, spec wise. The interface doesn't look fun sadly.

[sneakthief]

Full PreenFM2 kits will likely be available again in Sept. Boards and chips are still on sale:

http://ixox.fr/shop/

And as I mentioned, you can buy an STM32F4Discovery board for 17€ and make your own DIY version. Adding controls would be simple enough as all parameters are midi controllable:

http://ixox.fr/forum/index.php?topic=63425.0

[Jabberwalky]

Nice! Good to know.

[JayEm]

cs dx cp yc
obviously going to be a digital board with several modeling types available and apparently minikeys. could be cool. price will play a huge factor here.

[salwa]

I think rather four separate boards with mini keys than one with different engines. But probably based on the same technology. The number of controls remains open question - videos are too blurred to judge.

[tim gueguen]

Whatever it is, Billie won't like it.(Just imagine her shouting reface instead of face.)
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/ ... -day/face/