The Yamaha AN1x Synthesizer mailing list

Still waiting for my local GC to get it too.
I am almost tempted to buy it online with a time payment plan in case I don't like it, I can send it back.
This is to be expected, no market for keyboards etc. Why buy local when the markup is that high? Cost of building, employees, insurance all the great stuff that drives is up huh? But here is a example where I do not want to drive over a 100 miles to play with and have to deal with the mail order. I am just as guilty as the rest...

dale

Dale Kay
Administrator Kay-Net.com
Lancaster CA
Bus 661.723.0266
admin@...

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: spaceanimals 
  To: AN1x-list@yahoogroups.com 
  Sent: Sunday, September 28, 2003 9:45 AM
  Subject: [AN1x] Test driving new synths


  I had a chance to get out to the big city of Bangor Maine (pop 
  31,000) for a training. While there I figured I'd get some Japanese 
  food and test the new Alesis Ion. The music store guys told me they 
  don't stock any keyboards anymore. No market. So the only music store 
  within 90 miles no longer sells keyboards at all.Sigh. Maybe the next 
  time I get to Boston (350 miles south) I'll try out the Ion.


  Rainbow Jimmy
  http://www.spaceanimals.com
  http://www.mp3.com/spaceanimals


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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I feel your pain. There are a couple of stores in town here to check out some 
of the new Korg and Roland stuff but nobody is about to stock a VA of any 
sort or any other synth that cant be marketed to a church. St.Louis is my best 
bet at about 120 miles away. Even if the local stores did carry what I wanted it 
would probably be 20% more than a mail order catalog. I hate to do that to 
local business but when you are saving literally hundreds of dollars, it's hard 
not to.

Eric


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

yep

tough call on what to do.

Lucky some of the manufactures are starting to put samples of the product on the web to hear but still there have been a few that was effected past the synth which some felt was a attempt to hide the real synth. Not to mention, the look and feel of it i.e. the display if it has one. It took me over a year to get my hands near a MS2000 before I bought it. I am in the market now for the ION. I played with the andromeda a bit and it just didn't turn my crank so to speak. Not that I good not use it or find a home for it, just did not fit what I was needing at the time, nor the cost. 

Dale

Dale Kay
Administrator Kay-Net.com
Lancaster CA
Bus 661.723.0266
admin@...

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: esynthplyr1@... 
  To: AN1x-list@yahoogroups.com 
  Sent: Sunday, September 28, 2003 7:01 PM
  Subject: Re: [AN1x] Test driving new synths


  I feel your pain. There are a couple of stores in town here to check out some 
  of the new Korg and Roland stuff but nobody is about to stock a VA of any 
  sort or any other synth that cant be marketed to a church. St.Louis is my best 
  bet at about 120 miles away. Even if the local stores did carry what I wanted it 
  would probably be 20% more than a mail order catalog. I hate to do that to 
  local business but when you are saving literally hundreds of dollars, it's hard 
  not to.

  Eric


  [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]


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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

> I had a chance to get out to the big city of Bangor Maine

! !
`~

Man, I apologize for my illusory delusions assuming you were from
CaLiFoRniA...

I had to go back and re-read your band bio to get things straight.  Anyway,
don't pine and fret Jimmy, the AN1x can still hold up against a lot of
newer, supposedly better stuff.  I realize that it's better to play one
yourself than to listen to opinions but I'll give you (and the group) my 2\ufffd
on virtual analogs:

The manufacturers are just so far behind where the hardware and software
technology could take them now (for the most part).  We all sit in front of
computers containing processors capable of producing enormous sounds in
glorious polyphony all through numerical synthesis - the pushing of ones and
zeros through binary calculators at billions of operations per second... the
average virtual synthesizer software for Windows often is better than the
hardware synths that the big boys are selling.  The cover article in
Keyboard this month is on software synths.  I couldn't bring myself to read
it because I just don't like playing music from a damn computer.  I want a
musical instrument.

So why are the software synths so far ahead of hardware synthesizers (like
real keyboards with keys, knobs, wheels, ribbons, etc.)?  Hardware makers
have a lot more rocks to jump over to get their product to market than
software.  I know this from experience - I was a compliance test engineer at
one time.  Every digital product must comply with governmental standards so
that it does not interfere with radio, TV and other broadcast signals.
Further, the hardware must not cause electrical hazards (shorts which cause
fires) from poor design.  So the software guys have a big jump on the
hardware guys because they don't have to design in a lot of safeguards which
cost a lot of money.  But the raw reality of live performance is this -
would you trust Windows to give you reliability on stage?  If so, are you
prepared for a reboot time of up to 2 minutes?  I'll trust my "musician's
hardware" any day over a laptop.  (I say this from experience having used a
laptop on stage as merely a patch changer for my synths - and it crashed and
crapped all over our performance.)

So don't fret, Rainbow - your live sound is better than most of the audience
has ever heard anyway... even with your 6 year old synth.  The Nord Lead 2,
reviewed in this same Keyboard magazine, doesn't have a Free Envelope
Generator.  You've still got a leading edge synth.


Ed Edwards
Leader: Ezekiel's Wheel      \ufffd\ufffd\ufffd\ufffdRetro-Progressive Rock\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd
http://www.untiedmusic.com/ezekiel
http://artists.mp3s.com/artists/227/ezekiels_wheel.html
\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd\ufffd.\ufffd\ufffd