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Nevada Convert

Budget Synth of the Year: The Berhinger DeepMind 12

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For those that can’t handle the monster prices of the vintage, there’s been a huge wave of new companies (large and small) that are making real analog synths again. @retrofade @toonkee
 

Deal of the month: Behringer DeepMind 12

I was very skeptical because B is known for low budget, low prices lower quality with not the best workmanship. But so far they’re holding up very well. So for around $600 to $800 you get this great sounding synth. Shocking for the price.

 

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Buy a computer and a midi keyboard. No one will be able to tell the difference. 

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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Just now, Nevada Convert said:

Software synth stuff is thin small compared to the real thing. If you've ever done an AB comparison, it's night and day. The same thing with modeled guitar amps. 

I have done A and B Comparison with synths, guitar amps, guitars, drums, etc. No one can tell the difference on a recording or live, except for the occasional tone junkie who generally is too interested in fiddling with nobs to write a good song. It all sounds the same to the vast, vast, vast majority of people. 

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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To be fair, Convert, I do think vintage music gear is really cool and a valid pursuit for the purist gearheads. But I've also been around musicians in my day that like to compare and talk sh*t about other players who have gear that they consider mickey mouse - especially in the synth and guitar world. So I always try to point out that the only people who care about gear are gear heads, and the best way to blow away an audience is to write a badass song and rock the house. No one at the club is gonna talk about tone afterwards. 

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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16 minutes ago, smltwnrckr said:

To be fair, Convert, I do think vintage music gear is really cool and a valid pursuit for the purist gearheads. But I've also been around musicians in my day that like to compare and talk sh*t about other players who have gear that they consider mickey mouse - especially in the synth and guitar world. So I always try to point out that the only people who care about gear are gear heads, and the best way to blow away an audience is to write a badass song and rock the house. No one at the club is gonna talk about tone afterwards. 

Well, I would agree that the shitty digital resolution that most music is being heard with certainly makes it harder to hear better instruments. I would also agree that soft synths can do some basic analog clone stuff convincingly enough, but there are some more complex sounds that soft synths really do a poor job on. 

Funny, my friends at work said that they didn't believe me that I could hear the difference between 200 Kbps (I think 196 actually) to CD quality. They made sure the attenuation was the same for the CD player and the MP3 player. We did 10 songs and I nailed every single one. So we did another five, and I got those right, as well. The louder it gets, the easier it is to hear the difference. The lower bit rate sounds distorted where the higher holds its self together more as distinct solid instrument sounds. 

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1 hour ago, smltwnrckr said:

I have done A and B Comparison with synths, guitar amps, guitars, drums, etc. No one can tell the difference on a recording or live, except for the occasional tone junkie who generally is too interested in fiddling with nobs to write a good song. It all sounds the same to the vast, vast, vast majority of people. 

I admit, I'm one of those people. Been listening to music all my life and playing guitar, poorly, for 30 years. My "ear" has improved dramatically since I started playing but there's no way in hell I can hear the difference between analog and digital, I've tried. I know vinyl was making a comeback for awhile and an audiophile friend was raving at how rich and full his new system sounded. I nodded but it really sounded all the same to me.

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3 minutes ago, renoskier said:

I admit, I'm one of those people. Been listening to music all my life and playing guitar, poorly, for 30 years. My "ear" has improved dramatically since I started playing but there's no way in hell I can hear the difference between analog and digital, I've tried. I know vinyl was making a comeback for awhile and an audiophile friend was raving at how rich and full his new system sounded. I nodded but it really sounded all the same to me.

What I'm talking about goes beyond even this. I'm talking about whether a person can tell the difference between an analog synth recorded live and a digital reproduction meant to mimic or simulate that synth or one like it... or the difference between someone playing a vintage guitar through a vintage amp vs someone playing a middle-of-the-road replica guitar plugged straight into an effects unit meant to simulate those conditions, then straight into a computer or a sound system which further modifies the sound. Even in a high-quality recording, very few people can tell the difference. And frankly, the vast majority of people don't care about the sound itself as much as they care about the melody. I can generally tell the difference, and I've heard a lot of bad music played through great gear in my day and vice versa. These days, if I see really good gear in a club, I assume I'm gonna hear unnecessary noodling. 

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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10 hours ago, smltwnrckr said:

What I'm talking about goes beyond even this. I'm talking about whether a person can tell the difference between an analog synth recorded live and a digital reproduction meant to mimic or simulate that synth or one like it... or the difference between someone playing a vintage guitar through a vintage amp vs someone playing a middle-of-the-road replica guitar plugged straight into an effects unit meant to simulate those conditions, then straight into a computer or a sound system which further modifies the sound. Even in a high-quality recording, very few people can tell the difference. And frankly, the vast majority of people don't care about the sound itself as much as they care about the melody. I can generally tell the difference, and I've heard a lot of bad music played through great gear in my day and vice versa. These days, if I see really good gear in a club, I assume I'm gonna hear unnecessary noodling. 

You can get away with some really mediocre sounds live, but on a record if it’s an important part of the mix, not so much. So a club plays a song off a record, and it’s cranked. That’s why the actual recording is so important because at loud volumes it holds together tight without a bunch of phasy muddy slop. At low volumes you can get away with a lower bit rate a lot easier. 
 

But for me CD quality is just barely OK. 24/96 is where it’s at. What you get in improvement is a general warmth to the material, a tad more organic and analog. Jumping to 24/192 is kind of a waste. You double your size and for what? I can see it’s use in rare situations but what most important is the quality of the converters. You want low jitter. A simple analogy of jitter is to imagine trying to draw a straight line across a paper in a car that’s going over bumps in the road. You might be drawing a super high resolution line left to right, but if the bumps cause your line to smear up and down, it hurts the quality. The high end recorders keep the digital recording move straight with no or very little up and down smearing of the recording. 

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8 hours ago, Nevada Convert said:

You can get away with some really mediocre sounds live, but on a record if it’s an important part of the mix, not so much. So a club plays a song off a record, and it’s cranked. That’s why the actual recording is so important because at loud volumes it holds together tight without a bunch of phasy muddy slop. At low volumes you can get away with a lower bit rate a lot easier. 
 

But for me CD quality is just barely OK. 24/96 is where it’s at. What you get in improvement is a general warmth to the material, a tad more organic and analog. Jumping to 24/192 is kind of a waste. You double your size and for what? I can see it’s use in rare situations but what most important is the quality of the converters. You want low jitter. A simple analogy of jitter is to imagine trying to draw a straight line across a paper in a car that’s going over bumps in the road. You might be drawing a super high resolution line left to right, but if the bumps cause your line to smear up and down, it hurts the quality. The high end recorders keep the digital recording move straight with no or very little up and down smearing of the recording. 

What you can get away with depends entirely on who is listening.

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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6 hours ago, smltwnrckr said:

What you can get away with depends entirely on who is listening.

True, but I have min. standards for people that love and respect good sound quality and music., As for everyone else, I don’t care about them. You need to have pride in your workmanship. 

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7 hours ago, smltwnrckr said:

What you can get away with depends entirely on who is listening.

The other thing is today’s kids don’t know how lucky they are that it’s so easy record music these days. I remember the local music shows the rock stations used to do on Sunday nights. In the mid-late 80’s in San Diego, they were still playing demo tapes done on 4 track tape recorders which were terrible. In big markets like in LA they required demos to be professionally done at a studio as long as I can remember. I always would listen to Joe Benson at KLOS do the show and I’d pick out band I thought would get record deals. I remember hearing The Bangles, Quiet Riot, Motley Crue, Dokken, Ratt, Stryper, The Go-Go’s, shila E., Iron Maiden, etc. 

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2 hours ago, Nevada Convert said:

True, but I have min. standards for people that love and respect good sound quality and music., As for everyone else, I don’t care about them. You need to have pride in your workmanship. 

I respect quality sound, but there is a strong tradition of lo fi recording that results in great music too.

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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1 hour ago, Nevada Convert said:

The other thing is today’s kids don’t know how lucky they are that it’s so easy record music these days. I remember the local music shows the rock stations used to do on Sunday nights. In the mid-late 80’s in San Diego, they were still playing demo tapes done on 4 track tape recorders which were terrible. In big markets like in LA they required demos to be professionally done at a studio as long as I can remember. I always would listen to Joe Benson at KLOS do the show and I’d pick out band I thought would get record deals. I remember hearing The Bangles, Quiet Riot, Motley Crue, Dokken, Ratt, Stryper, The Go-Go’s, shila E., Iron Maiden, etc. 

I generally agree here. Making and consuming music is so much easier today than it ever has been.

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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