Dave Smith Instruments SYNTHESIZERS

> I had less success doing anything interesting with the digitial
> oscillators (apart from supporting the already good sound of the
> analog oscillators) or coming up with "lush" pads.

It takes some time to get a feel for them, but I find the digital oscs
definitely make for some great sounds!  Often I'll be thinking oh
these waves are all boring ... and then a particular combination of
waveform/cutoff/resonance/keyboard-scaling will suddenly jump out.

As you might guess, this sort of experimentation is much easier on the keyboard.

Pay special attention to the L/R-filter-split parameter.  I rarely
used this on my mono evolver because it was inconvenient to change,
but on the PEK, it's great!  It can often make a sound dramatically
better by letting you have deepness, clarity, and fizz all at the same
time.

> Also I had some difficulties with the interface, specifically the
> lack of indents in the knobs for selecting things like oscillator
> frequency, modulation matrix destination, and other things where
> you've got a long list of discrete values, of which you are trying to
> land on a specific one.  (For example when tuning an osc down
> an octave, shooting for C-1, it would keep jumping from C# to B
> and back again).  Does this get easier after a time?

I don't think so... I'm also annoyed by this.  What's worse is that
apparently the beta units _did_ have stepped knobs for some
parameters, but the beta testers vetoed them, so now they're all
smooth...!

> Is there any
> hope of making mods to one so certain knobs have indents?

I don't know if it's possible to "mod" the current rotary encoders
(though who knows -- maybe the stepped feel is just a snap on
adaptor... :-).

I expect that they're probably interchangeable with the old
evolver-type units though; they seem to be the same in just about
every respect save the stepped-vs-non-stepped feel.

I opened up my PEK to look at the controller boards (one of my knobs
is wobbly, and I wanted to check it out).  The rotary encoders are all
soldered onto one of two smallish pc-boards, but they look pretty easy
to remove and there don't seem to be any active components on those
boards, so replacing a few might be a do-able task even for those of
us who are not so skillful at soldering (I'd think the main difficulty
would be making sure they get soldered in straight so they line up
correctly with the panel openings).

The PEK seems wonderfully constructed for maintenance btw -- you just
remove four screws on the top panel and it hinges right up exposing
all the boards; no need to even take it off your stand.  The boards
themselves are very accessible (not too many screws, connected by long
ribbon cables, lots of space around them), and everything seems much
less fiddly than other synths I've looked inside.

I would be good to contact DSI, and see if the encoders are swappable
with the stepped type.

-Miles
-- 
Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.