Fw: [A6] micron musings

[Tom Remi Flygel]

I went the opposite direction, I bought an Ion 1,5 years ago (Micron big
 brother), which was my first "analog" synth (it's VA I know, but I hadn't
 worked on subtractive synths before). I found it a wonderful learning tool,
 it is very knobby and a nice clean big LCD display. I bought a couple of
 books on subtractive synthesis and dove in there. Nice thing was that
 everything that was in the books (Powertools for Synthesizer Programming by
 Jim Aiken, Sound Synthesis and Sampling by Martin Russ), I could find on 
the
 Ion. About a month ago I had scrambled together money to get an A6. I 
didn't
 feel immediately at home on the A6 although I'd played with the Ion for a
 year before. Haven't used the mix mode much except listen to the mix
 presets.
 Of course the way the parameters jump up on the screen was just what I was
 used to, but the mod matrix is different and caused a few head scratches. I
 liked having all the routes in one screen, as opposed to using the mod
 buttons next to modules..but now I've got used to it and can set up routes
 in a matter of secs. Also the A6 filters dumbfounded me, as the Keytrack
 parameter seems to move the offset upwards as it is increased..I was plenty
 frustrated when the filter wouldn't respond for more than the first 5
 millimeters of the knob twists in many patches, until I discovered you
 compensate with negative offset value to get a larger sweep range.
 All the little things :)

 ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Richard" <richard at chorlton.com>
> To: <a6 at code404.com>
> Sent: Friday, September 02, 2005 9:58 AM
> Subject: [A6] micron musings
>
>
>> Hi
>>
>> I'm late to the party I know, but I finally got my hands on a a micron 
>> and thought I'd give an Andromeda users comment on it:
>>
>> Firstly it feels great, good keyboard, love the rubber the knobs... the 
>> layout is great, your hand just sits by the control knob and just feels 
>> right and it was flying around it in minutes ... nice feeling.
>>
>> Secondly the OS is AMAZING - a brilliant piece of design which is soooo 
>> much easier to use than the Andromeda  - despite mostly using only 1 
>> knob! - the microns setup mode is so much easier than A6 mixmode and you 
>> can flip between them without loosing data... the navigation is really a 
>> delight and a credit to Alesis that they put in the time and energy to 
>> get it right... in particular it really kills that old 
>> yamaha/roland/akai/korg page after page way of doing things. The manual 
>> is excellent too. Patterns and rhythms are nice extras... the assignable 
>> controllers are very well thought out... you really want to use them. 
>> This makes me think the A6 OS could be utterly, and I mean utterly, 
>> transformed if Alesis ever chose to reconsider the A6 in the light of 
>> what they know now... yeah I know, dreaming....
>>
>> Soundwise, well, I  like it, the extra filters are great, and overall the 
>> sound is smoother than the nords (the only modern VA I have to compare it 
>> with) and the filter movements feel nice, like you can feel them 
>> physically moving which is not normally the case with digi stuff. Does it 
>> sound analogue? No, not really, it sounds smooth digi, clean digi, nice 
>> digi... but hearing all 8 layers of it sequenced it sounds a little 
>> samey... you start to hear that lack of weight and movement... And some 
>> animation is lacking the filters -  only analogue filters have that IMO. 
>> And basswise, well its not bad but I have an A6, and an evolver, nord 
>> modular, and a matrix1000 sitting here and it pales next to all of them 
>> for bass, I think Native Instrument softsynths will do a better bass 
>> too - so I wouldn't get one if your looking for a bass machine. I guess I 
>> might revise this view when I get more deeply into patching but that is 
>> how it seems at the moment. Does it sound like an A6? errm no, really 
>> not, its too small and neat and tidy. But because of its design you can 
>> do some pads and things with are reminiscent of it... which leads me to:
>>
>> What surprised me and what delighted me was that I already knew how to 
>> use it : the structure of thing is so utterly based on the A6, right down 
>> to the pre and post mixer sections etc. It almost is a scaled down digi 
>> A6 - only everything about it is smaller. This meant that I knew how to 
>> construct sounds immediately and think I grasped almost everything the 
>> machine does in 2 or 3 hours, this is a record for me with any synth. So 
>> if you have adjusted to an A6 way of thinking this is a great bonus 
>> reward - I can sit with it in front of the telly keeping an eye on 
>> cricket, sit in bed with a cup of tea and do some patching... I can carry 
>> it between studios, take it home, sit in a coffee house with it... I've 
>> never had a keyboard that wants to be used so much... and I think using 
>> this may even improve my A6 patching...
>>
>> I paid £200 for this thing used.... 10% of what the A6 cost new - that is 
>> just amazing, how the heck anyone is making a living from that I don't 
>> know... but its really a delightful little synth which I would heartily 
>> recommend, especially for people who already have an A6...
>>
>> Richard
>>
>>
>>
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>>
>>
>>
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