Midi to Cv Help!

[Ianh]

I am looking for a midi to cv converter that wont break my wallet but is also flexible enough to use with my keyboard-less Transcendent Tk2(has weird voltage). All it needs to have is cv, gate, and 1 aux. I would also really prefer the ability to use it via usb. I have been looking at the Kenton Usb Solo. But it is expensive and i am not sure that it would work 100% with the Transcendent tk2. I am also willing to look at the internal ones. Sorry I am pretty ignorant about these things and would like to know if people have had success with certain kits or boxes. I also don't want to pay for more than i need.
Thanks
Ian

[th0mas]

Get a MIDI->USB separately. You can get them for very cheap, much cheaper to get that and a MIDI->CV converter separately than trying to find one with both built in.

[meatballfulton]

Since your synth uses non-standard voltages, you will want a converter like the Kenton that lets you properly scale the voltages.

A converter is only expensive when it costs more than the synth is worth

[Ianh]

I don't think the Kenton is too expensive for what it is. I like that its bus powered and kenton is a brand i trust. But it does have many features i won't use. I am just curious if there is something like the dtronics engineers@work usb to cv & gate but with variable scaling for odd voltages.
Thanks for your responses
Ian

[madtheory]

The Kenton is hard to beat. Actually, it's impossible to beat. You're right, it's not too expensive for what it is. In fact it's incredibly well priced. You get an extra LFO, you have the aux CV output and you get much better portamento than any monosynth can provide. You can use velocity (or any MIDI cc) to control the aux CV. I usually used the Kenton LFO for vibrato, so the LFO on the synth could do cool stuff like FM. I usually had velocity going to the filter cutoff via the aux output. It turns even the lowliest monosynth into a musical instrument.

The extra feature that you're not using can be regarded as "free".

[speak_onion]

If your audio interface doesn't filter out DC (MOTU, Alesis I/O line, maybe some others?), you can just use 3 outputs on that and the Expert Sleepers Silent Way. I don't know what that Kenton costs, but it might be more than an Alesis I/O audio interface plus the Silent Way plugin.

[Ianh]

Thats also a good call i had remembered motu's volta but didn't recall the expert sleepers software. I am going to do some research on that. I was also looking at the USB-Octomod but i am not good with writing software.
http://gregsurges.com/circuitry/usb-octomod/
I assume at this point i am going to be spending around $250.