sql8 test run

[kensuguro]

thanks to astroman who pointed out sql8 to me in the sylenth1 thread.. I took it for a quick ride. This synth really has a character all its own. Not really sure how to describe it, but the guy who made the emulator has got to be one crazy fanatic to have consciously emulated the "muffle" specific to the hardware, and also the way the filters react, etc. Those are actually selectable as options. (whether to stay true to the hardware's sound or not)

The synth definitely has its quirks in practical use, but I could dive in making sounds from the get go no problem. The interface is.. well, it's pretty much what you'd expect from an older hw synth. I really like this. It's not perfect and shimmering and shining like the uhe stuff or sylenth1, but this thing has a very familiar sound. Not really just wavetable familiar, but it does have a strange plasticky, crappy cool sound of an older hw synth. (pre triton 80's regurgitation era) Even my old sy99 (a monster of a synth for a high school kid) had a similar sound that I'd relate to this.

This is all sq8l, with channel eq and comp where needed, good amount of live's prebundled chorus, and for master, comp, SIR room reverb (my custom impulse) very lightly, and a somewhat aggressive limiter. But astro's got it right, this thing does produce a breed of bass not really common in nativeland.

lol, the bells are so 80s. Still not sure why 80s synths were so infatuated with bells. Do you put a bunch of bells in your tune? I don't, unless I'm going for 80's. I guess they wanted to show off that the synths could produce good treble?

Most of the sounds a straight up preset from the plugin, with minor tweaks to the saw stabs, but rest are pretty much as is, just with some channel effects. I used nomad analog trackbox as the channel strip, which is what I usually use.
http://www.nomadfactory.com/products/bt ... index.html
got some sort of tube sat which I only used on the drums. Rest is just comp and eq.

[astroman]

nice one, that is veeeery 80-ish - poor man's CMI ... one might think
the user interface is quite straight forward for someone who knows the basics of synthesis
(I like those fake fluorescents, they always attracted me with Ensoniq stuff)
and I'm quite sure that if I ever feel the need for another keyboard, it will be that brand.
for synth beginners it's a rather steep curve, maybe that explains why the device is not very popular.

cheers, Tom

[kensuguro]

LOL, ensonique and their flourescent paint... it did catch my eye way back then. Then I looked at the calculator like display and I was like, "oh, I don't understand this stuff". They really put that display in a lot of their synths, and it was confusing as hell. lol, good ol' days. For me, I saw their ASR one a lot, with the huge logo. Their factory demo sounded awesome tho. I wonder if there's an mp3 floating around. I've only heard that only once at the store.

[iSiStOy]

Cool!
Currently also in a 80's preferred songs phase revival (Genesis, mostly), I'd like to contribute with a remark: that snare drum is too much of a beater! You might want to clear (pitch) it up a bit, so that it feels less low end

[dawman]

Definately Chaka Khany tone to it.
80s bells, oh yeah. I had to always track vocals w/ Bellish tones back then, even James Brown was talked into this with that Living In America song, and I guarantee, when he sang that track he had those bells, isolated from the mix on his phones.
He came from old Motown where the ryhthm tracks were done, then the vocals, and the Horns filled the gaps.
Those annoying bells were added to the Chorus by a " producer " that wanted to be hip.....

[jhulk]

the sq80l is good but a cem chip it has not

i have 3 esq1 and an sq80

and being an ex ensoniq repair tech

i own and have owned every ensoniq board

the esq1 and sq80 are the easiest synths to program

unlike the vsti

all params are on the front panel press osc 1 your on osc 1 page

press osc 2 your on osc 2 page

same for osc 3

same for filter and amp its very fast to program and they use decimal 0-99 which is problem matic for midi as that goes to 0-127

but its so easy

ensoniq carried this format to all there synths its very easy to program sounds and the vfx sd1 uses transwave synthesis which is like ppg wavetable synthesis

but in there later synths they used non resonant digital filters

it was not until the fizmo and asr-x and the mr and zr did they have resonant filters using the latest otto4 chip

but they were brought by emu and then creative which turned the fizmo factory into a sound card making factory and emu and ensoniq was dropped to die

the sq80 and esq1 are the only analog filter synths that ensoniq made and there is demand for them yet they stay relatively cheap for an 8voice poly hybrid synth

whats good about the sq80l is that it can interface like a second esq1 or sq80 to give you 16voice poly in the midi link mode where it transfers the midi data to the next machine when more than 8 notes are played and you can transfer sysex between the hardware and the software

rainer butchy is a german dsp software and music professor and it was his student that designed the sq80l with the help of rainer as he dissasembled the os code and worked out what the doc chip did from the software registered

but the software has never been completed the student was working on a better filter emulation by using noise pulse and messuring each setting and making a transfer table or waveshaping table in dsp but he stopped

rainer is still working on an fpga doc chip design but with more memory and better 16bit sound quality

[jhulk]

most famous song made with the esq1 was by adamski and seal was the singer his first appearance killer

he then later brought the sq80 and used that as it had more waves but played the same sounds

[astroman]

thanks for the SQ80 background info, much appreciated
(didn't know that it's a hybrid synth)

cheers, Tom

[kensuguro]

that's awesome that we have someone who was on board with the project! More skin to uncover I guess. But sq8l as a joy to program for me, and because of the awesome attention to the hw emu that went into this one, it's definitely worth checking out.

[jhulk]

hybrid synth is any synth that has a digital front end producing the osc and waveforms and a pure audio analog path filter vca panning control

prophet vs /prophet 2000/prophet 3000

EI/II/III emax1

korg dss1/ dw6000/dw8000

oscar

ppg

waldorfwave /uwave1

kawai k3

davesmith mono/poly evolver

synergy

shruthi diy

ambuka diy

[Nestor]

Sorry for totally ignoring the sq8l thing, what I want to talk about is the music! Man how I love your music This song sounds really cool; I have listened at it four times in a row before answering. I know the song needs some development still as it is half way, but it is all there already. A song like this one played by a good group of musicians live would be a killing joy! Thank you…

[kensuguro]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAWnb1yxr5M

Mama used to say was going through my mind.