Synclavier vs. Wavestation

no offence intended but..... if you spend so much cash (i guess a
synclavier does not come cheap, even today) it sounds a bit silly to me
to trust other people's judgement if you buy this thing purely for one
trick it does, without even knowing what it is or how it sounds....


ron


George K. wrote:
> I'm considering the purchase of a Synclavier for its Timbre Frame
> Resynthesis capability, which is a type of wavetable synthesis.
> (Crossfading over time between a succession of waves.) Before I plunk
> down the cash however, I'd like to make real sure, I'm not spending $$$
> $ to buy a unit that's just a close copy (okay, original) of my Korg
> Legacy Wavestation's wave sequencing? (Which is also wavetable
> synthesis.)
>
> By itself, wavetable synthesis can be great or poor, depending on its
> implementation, I still remember how lifeless it sounded to me on a
> Waldorf MicroWave. (Your taste may differ). Its Legacy WaveStation
> incarnation works so well for me, that in spite of having all kinds of
> high-whiz newer synths from Chameleon to Metasynth, I still call most
> often upon my Legacy Wavestation for a new track (often layered with
> my Triton and EXS24, though.)
>
> All in all, my question is: does anyone have hands-on experience with
> the Synclavier's Timbre Frame Resynthesis AND the Korg Wavestation, to
> comment whether adding a Synclavier for its wavetable synthesis
> capability will expand my musically useful palette significantly? Or
> am I dangerously close to blow $$$$ on a machine that will turn out to
> be just an early version of my WaveStation?
>
> (If I could only find a CD where an artist really uses the
> Synclavier's wavetable synthesis capability to the max...)
>
> Thank you in advance for your help

On Jun 20, 2:56 am, Ron <[email protected]> wrote:
> no offence intended but..... if you spend so much cash (i guess a
> synclavier does not come cheap, even today) it sounds a bit silly to me
> to trust other people's judgement if you buy this thing purely for one
> trick it does, without even knowing what it is or how it sounds....

To really know how similar or different the Synclavier and the
Wavestation are when you drive both at 101% as well as to form an
educated opinion takes someone with years and years of hands-on
experience with both. Flying over to the seller's place and doodling
with the Synclavier for a few hours is just a superficial scratch at
the units outermost layer. Instead of being 100% in fog, I'll be only
95% in fog, then, at the cost of $1K in plane tickets, car rental, etc
and I still won't have an educated answer.

if you're adamant on getting either synth, get a synclavier first, if
u could find a very good condition one

wavestation, u can get it anytime, it's 'quite' abundant. there's no
'rush' or 'urgency'

wavestation is still my all time fav synth.

On Jun 21, 2:54 am, "George K." <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Jun 20, 2:56 am, Ron <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > no offence intended but..... if you spend so much cash (i guess a
> > synclavier does not come cheap, even today) it sounds a bit silly to me
> > to trust other people's judgement if you buy this thing purely for one
> > trick it does, without even knowing what it is or how it sounds....
>
> To really know how similar or different the Synclavier and the
> Wavestation are when you drive both at 101% as well as to form an
> educated opinion takes someone with years and years of hands-on
> experience with both. Flying over to the seller's place and doodling
> with the Synclavier for a few hours is just a superficial scratch at
> the units outermost layer. Instead of being 100% in fog, I'll be only
> 95% in fog, then, at the cost of $1K in plane tickets, car rental, etc
> and I still won't have an educated answer.

"George K." <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:e63599a5-9872-4a66-a9c4-87526f4afc50@s33g2000pri.googlegroups.com...
> I'm considering the purchase of a Synclavier for its Timbre Frame
> Resynthesis capability, which is a type of wavetable synthesis.
> (Crossfading over time between a succession of waves.) Before I plunk
> down the cash however, I'd like to make real sure, I'm not spending $$$
> $ to buy a unit that's just a close copy (okay, original) of my Korg
> Legacy Wavestation's wave sequencing? (Which is also wavetable
> synthesis.)
>
> By itself, wavetable synthesis can be great or poor, depending on its
> implementation, I still remember how lifeless it sounded to me on a
> Waldorf MicroWave. (Your taste may differ). Its Legacy WaveStation
> incarnation works so well for me, that in spite of having all kinds of
> high-whiz newer synths from Chameleon to Metasynth, I still call most
> often upon my Legacy Wavestation for a new track (often layered with
> my Triton and EXS24, though.)
>
> All in all, my question is: does anyone have hands-on experience with
> the Synclavier's Timbre Frame Resynthesis AND the Korg Wavestation, to
> comment whether adding a Synclavier for its wavetable synthesis
> capability will expand my musically useful palette significantly? Or
> am I dangerously close to blow $$$$ on a machine that will turn out to
> be just an early version of my WaveStation?
>
> (If I could only find a CD where an artist really uses the
> Synclavier's wavetable synthesis capability to the max...)

The Synclavier was the absolute top line instrument you could buy back in
those days. Though I deeply respect Dave Smith's design capability, (The
originator of the Wavestation) and his keyboard is on the later synclaviers
as the primary control interface for imputing notes, I can't imagine that
the Wavestation would compare to what the Synclavier could do. For one
thing, the synclavier has so many options for programming the thing that I
suspect your options would be vastly greater in dealing with wave
sequencing. You can probably define your own waves if you want to, their
order, direction of the wave in the sequence, start and end points, relative
volumes, place in the stereo field, and just about anything else you wanted
to. And with that you get a powerful sampler, FM synthesis with a lot of
operators, powerful sequencing capability, digital recording -- this is
still one seriously powerful music production system even today

My big concern is that they are a serious pain to get repaired. But if you
can afford it, don't hesitate to get it, because it's way up on the food
chain in the digital music realm, even today.

Rick Massey wrote:

> My big concern is that they are a serious pain to get repaired. But
> if you can afford it, don't hesitate to get it, because it's way up
> on the food chain in the digital music realm, even today.

I don't know what the status of the Synclavier Users Group is these
days, as a consortium of serious users bought most of NED's assets when
the smoke cleared in court, some years ago. That brings into serious
question what you would do if the proprietary Reciprocating Magic Wand
Assembly blows out or you need a software patch in a specific area.
Considering the other tools you use, why do you want to tackle such a
vertiginous, elegant dinosaur now? There are many cheaper, easier ways
to do wave sequencing or enact other types of digimagic now. Its
especially true now that you can use any sound source as fuel, doing
mirror-images, hand-drawing of waveforms or LFO fading between numerous
elements.
That said, it depends on WHY you really want a Synclavier. Its not
easier or more accomodating to play than newer synths and it takes you
into a bit of a modular realm, in that you gotta wrangle it all by hand.

Start by looking into both the support aspect and what else is around
that will let you define a wave or sequence by frames.

--

HellPope Huey
You'll gladly pay me Tuesday
after some quickie rhinoplasty today

"This film is apparently meaningless,
but if it has any meaning,
it is doubtless objectionable."
~ British Board of Film Censors,
on banning Cocteau's
"The Seashell and the Clergyman" in 1929.

"An anarchist is anybody who don't need a cop
to tell him what to do."
~ Amon, via Utah Phillips

The late Utah Phillips speaks
http://acksisofevil.org/audio/inner182.mp3

> Start by looking into ... what else is around
> that will let you define a wave or sequence by frames.

An interesting discovery: Digidesign's quarter-a-century old program,
Turbosynth 2.21x3 still works perfectly on my G5 ! I just tried it. I
remembered it because I used it for this kind of "wave sequencing", to
morph between sample snippets over time, in the early 80's. (On an
Atari ST, no less)
So the program still works perfectly, only my memory doesn't. I can't
recall how I used it to morph two samples, even though I've been
nagging it for the past hour. (The manual is gone.) Hmmm.