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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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 Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 11:51 am Post subject:
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| Peake wrote: |
BTW, I'm told by Yusson in another forum that either COTK or MOS-LABs use the THAT arrays to avoid hand-matching all of those transistors . |
It's the COTK C904a that uses THAT transistor arrays. The MOS-LAB 904a is a very close clone of the Moog 904a and uses all discrete trannies(althought they are modern brands : BC547), you can have a look to the guts at my site :
http://yusynth.net/MOS-LAB
By the way both sound great !
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Yves |
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Peake
Joined: Jun 29, 2007
Posts: 1113
Location: Loss Angeles
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| Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 12:03 pm Post subject:
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Thank you Yves.
http://yusynth.net/MOS-LAB/904-PCB.jpg
Euro-style power connection- I approve.
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We are selling emotions, there are no emotions in a grid. -mwagener
"IC 741. Sometimes you don't want fidelity." -Small Bear Electronics Catalog |
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JohnLRice
Joined: Jul 29, 2008
Posts: 71
Location: Western WA USA
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| Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 1:06 pm Post subject:
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| synthetic wrote: | Yeah, I liked to JH's actual design that you can buy. Peake thinks it needs more drift and stuff, shocker. 
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Makes me think a 'Drift' module is in order here! It would be maybe 3 or 4 super slow cycle LFOs with attenuators on the outputs. Patch just a kiss of drift into your 21st century modules and relive the past!  |
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
Posts: 937
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
Audio files: 2
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| Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 1:13 pm Post subject:
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people always come with solutions like that.
but it will never make a vco sound vintage.
i can tell you iff you want those tangerine dream basslnes.
you want the 901 vco's and not the 921's. |
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JohnLRice
Joined: Jul 29, 2008
Posts: 71
Location: Western WA USA
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| Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 2:21 pm Post subject:
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| mono-poly wrote: | people always come with solutions like that.
but it will never make a vco sound vintage.
i can tell you iff you want those tangerine dream basslnes.
you want the 901 vco's and not the 921's. |
What changed between the 901 and 921 VCO's? (feel free to point my dumb ass to a link if you like )
While the various demos of modern clone synth sequences sound really good to me, (and maybe 'close enough'), the following one which is on a vintage Moog (not sure which oscillators) sounds just an obvious hair better to me. I can't quite put into words why though . . . :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-aQwrXH4Ow |
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
Posts: 937
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
Audio files: 2
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| Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 3:53 pm Post subject:
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They changed a lot like sync on the vco's and pwm inputs etc.
But to me the 901 is the best sounding Moog vco.
The best for those crazy Tangerine Dream sequences. |
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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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| Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 11:46 pm Post subject:
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| JohnLRice wrote: |
While the various demos of modern clone synth sequences sound really good to me, (and maybe 'close enough'), the following one which is on a vintage Moog (not sure which oscillators) sounds just an obvious hair better to me. I can't quite put into words why though . . . :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-aQwrXH4Ow |
Hi this video was shot by Olivier Grall (http://olivier-grall.yusynth.net/instruments/Modular%20systems/page%20systemes%20moulaires.html) on his Moog modular and I can confirm that he only has 901 VCOs in it, but you must know that the 901 apart from their exceptional sound are impossible to keep in tune more than ten minutes, a real pain in the neck ! No wonder why Moog replaced very soon these by the 921.
From the DIY point of view, the 901 looks very tempting because it's schematics is quite simple, but I also know from people who actually built clones of it (in particular Seb Moumon, the guy who is behind MOS-LAB, who used for his attempt only genuine vintage components) that it is nearly impossible to trim it up correctly, tracking is awfull and it drifts continuously. That's why MOS-LAB dropped the 901 and produced 921 instead.
Olivier's Moog Modular :
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Yves
Last edited by yusynth on Tue Sep 02, 2008 1:15 am; edited 1 time in total |
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JohnLRice
Joined: Jul 29, 2008
Posts: 71
Location: Western WA USA
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 12:29 am Post subject:
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| Thank you for the clarifications mono-poly and Yusson! |
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
Posts: 937
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
Audio files: 2
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 2:21 am Post subject:
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| How could people like Edgar Froese preform live with 901's vco's if it is such dramatic as Yves describes? |
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widdly
Joined: Jun 25, 2007
Posts: 268
Location: singapore
G2 patch files: 2
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 2:47 am Post subject:
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In those days, touring with synthesisers was a major headache. The machines were bulky and heavy, but also fragile and temperamental. 'Transportation was horrifying - we spent 30 per cent of our income for insurances and repair of instruments,' recalls Froese. 'Voltage controlled oscillators and other devices were completely unstable,' he adds, because their extreme sensitivity to room temperature meant that 'any given tuning of the oscillator stayed 'in tune' for maybe 10 minutes.' One reason Steve Hillage had three synth-players in his live band during the mid-Seventies was to 'guarantee we could deliver the goods sonically!' Klaus Schulze - who, like Hillage, signed to Virgin as a solo artist in the wake of Tangerine Dream - recalls how the settings on his synthesisers would constantly drift. 'Nobody could make the same sound two days in a row. With my big Moog, when the spotlights went on, the heat affected the tuning. At the same time, the Moog needed two hours just to warm up; you had to plug it in as soon as you lugged it into the hall.'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2007/apr/22/features.musicmonthly7
Last edited by widdly on Thu Aug 05, 2010 10:07 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 3:16 am Post subject:
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| mono-poly wrote: | | How could people like Edgar Froese preform live with 901's vco's if it is such dramatic as Yves describes? |
I understand your perplexity but as a matter of fact Edgar Froese was not using a moog modular on stage apart from a sequencer cabinet , Chris Franke and Peter Baumann were those using modulars, and they were frequently adjusting the tune during concert.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1PmlM57s_Q
Here some remarks (either positive or negative) made by owners here and there :
If you refer to Wendy Carlos , she says that while when recording S.O.B. she had to retune the VCOs between every single takes that is every 5 minutes in average.
Quote from S.O.S. ( http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/oct03/articles/moogretro.htm?print=yes ):
| Quote: | | Apart from making the sound and performance more variable than it could have been, this resistor problem also contributed to the tuning disaster that was the first series of oscillators. The technologically understated Mark I 901 VCO modules were almost entirely unmusical. Not only was keyboard tracking limited to a small range — the specs claimed five octaves, but two-and-a-half was more realistic — but a design flaw meant that even the tiniest temperature variations would send the oscillators drifting away from each other at random. Larger temperature shifts caused more drastic drifts. The stability of the system's power supply was also something that didn't quite match professional expectations. If the mains voltage drifted, so would the oscillators. This made it nigh-on impossible to use a Moog in the run-up to meal times. The cooking habits of your nearest and dearest could send the supply voltage dipping by a few percent and the oscillators drifting by a few semitones. |
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| Quote: | | But most people created raw sounds with simple analogue waveform mixing. The 901 saw the first use of the now-standard selection of ramp, triangle, sine and pulse waveforms. There was also a single rather minimal pulse-width control on the driver, which worked on all the oscillators in a bank. In spite of the limitations and problems, Moog fans still swear by the sheer hugeness of the raw tones sounds produced by the 901s — although anyone who tries to make music with them is more likely to swear at them. |
http://arts.ucsc.edu/ems/music/equipment/synthesizers/analog/moog/Moog.html#901
| Quote: | GETTING AN OSCILLATOR TO PLAY IN TUNE WITH THE KEYBOARD
You can't. For best results (Funky but usable) set the fixed control voltage and control voltage vernier at 0 and the Frequency range at 8 or 4. Patch from the voltage out of the keyboard to the control input of the oscillator. Hit the lowest key repeatedly as you adjust the Range control of the keyboard so that the oscillator pitch is not changed. (Pull the patch cord to check.) Now play octaves and adjust the keyboard Scale knob until things sound right.
The Range knob transposes the keyboard.
The Scale knob squeezes or stretches the intervals. |
However, some clever users have found some trick to improve 901 tracking a bit http://tonetweakers.com/used/moog_1p.1.htm
| Quote: | | 901 series oscillators have a reputation for being somewhat unstable. However, many Moog users feel they sound better than the later 921 series. We feel these oscillators perform very well provided you know this trick... We found that for the oscillators to track the keyboard accurately over its range, the oscillator controller should be set at or below the -1 setting. Above this setting, the oscillator pitches track poorly as they receive higher control voltages. It may therefore be better to initially set the octave range of each oscillator relatively high when the oscillator controller's at the -1 range position and use the lower controller range settings to decrease pitch of all oscillators simultaneously. |
or this kind of ironical remark from WintherStormer where he seems to be very surprised and happy that his 901 stayed in tune during a performance :
http://www.wintherstormer.no/concerts/20051118/20051118.html
| Quote: | | The new synthesizers.com/moog modular sequencers performed excellently, as you can hear in this example (even the moog #901 VCO behaved and stayed in tune and in scale during this concert!) Here is a part from "Random is our friend" (1.8MB) where you can clearly hear the different functions on the sequencer, like run, stop, skip and reset. |
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Yves
Last edited by yusynth on Tue Sep 02, 2008 4:17 am; edited 1 time in total |
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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 3:17 am Post subject:
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Sorry about the length of my message above... Too much quoting I confess... 
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Yves
Last edited by yusynth on Tue Sep 02, 2008 4:19 am; edited 1 time in total |
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
Posts: 937
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 3:32 am Post subject:
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Yves it just seems people make it look much worse as it is.
If i read your post it sounds like it isn't usable at all and i think Edgar Froese did use his Moog live.
I used to have his system with the rare PPG vcf in it and the PE ringmod en noisegenerator.
And yeah it did track about 3 octaves but it was really workable and fantastic sounding. |
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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 4:27 am Post subject:
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What's make the sound of the 901 so special is the actual shape of the waveforms. I discussed of that with Olivier Grall who told me that when he looked at the signals with a scope the wave shapes were kind of different from what one expects from a sawtooth or a sinewave. I will ask him if he can send me pictures of the waveform of the 901, it would be interesting to see how the harmonic content is altered.
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
Posts: 937
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 4:42 am Post subject:
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When i had a system with 901 and 921 vco's the 901's were really the best for TD sequencing stuff.
A modern clone would be cool imho.
Even if it does only tracks 3 octaves  |
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intercorni
Joined: Jun 04, 2007
Posts: 69
Location: hamburg
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 6:09 am Post subject:
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Edgar with Moog Modular System live 1980:
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
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Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 6:18 am Post subject:
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That's late (1980) compared to rubycon (1973) and those sequences made with 901
By the way, on the detailed photo one can see 901 allright but 921 as well
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Yves
Last edited by yusynth on Tue Sep 02, 2008 6:21 am; edited 1 time in total |
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intercorni
Joined: Jun 04, 2007
Posts: 69
Location: hamburg
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 6:19 am Post subject:
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| Is it your system? Are there any of them to other images? |
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yusynth
Joined: Nov 24, 2005
Posts: 1314
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 6:22 am Post subject:
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Same question as intercorni, are you the owner of this 3p system ?
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Yves |
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mono-poly
Joined: Jul 07, 2004
Posts: 937
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 6:51 am Post subject:
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Yeah i used to own this system.
The sequencers and patch storage system is now in Italy.
And my buddy got the synth cabinet. |
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Peake
Joined: Jun 29, 2007
Posts: 1113
Location: Loss Angeles
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 10:25 am Post subject:
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What wonderful comments, music to my ears! 
Yes, you can get a maximum of 2.5 minutes of any particular pitch, and about 2.5 octaves of good tracking (exacerbated if your 901bs track differently).
"And it was good..."
Regarding the sonic differences, the 921b used a 3080 in the core and slow opamps on the waveform outputs. The 901b is discrete- no bandwidth limiting that I'm aware of. You of course can eschew the mylar caps in the 901b core and use a modern power supply, but then it's not the same thing. People don't want The Real Thing. Except myself.
Regarding Synthetic's troll regarding the need to buy something and Juergen's design and my wanting drift:
http://home.freeuk.net/bandpass/904A.html
Mmm, looks like Orange Drop mylar caps in the core.
Also: "Thanks to Juergen Haible for encouragement to go as close to the original as possible."
Contradiction...but what else could you expect?
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We are selling emotions, there are no emotions in a grid. -mwagener
"IC 741. Sometimes you don't want fidelity." -Small Bear Electronics Catalog |
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bubblechamber
Joined: Nov 04, 2006
Posts: 280
Location: NYC
Audio files: 1
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 11:20 am Post subject:
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i remember video that kevin lightner made a few years ago showing the effect the early moog power supply had on the 901. there was a bit at the end where moog said they used a cleaner power supply later that may have increased the stability of the 921.
those early moog seem to me to be a lot like a race car, it's not one specific part, but the way they all work together as a whole. but i could be completely wrong.
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synthetic
Joined: Jun 02, 2007
Posts: 76
Location: Glendale, CA
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 12:54 pm Post subject:
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| Peake wrote: | | Regarding Synthetic's troll regarding the need to buy something and Juergen's design and my wanting drift |
After "Snort- Then why do you still own a Voyager if it is killed by something else? (That's as rhetorical as your statement is silly- I won't be looking for a reply.)" I figured it was safe to come out from under the bridge. The drift comment was meant to be ironical, as I don't think filters actually drift that much, or that the drift would be noticeable. But since the 490 has the wrong vintage caps and Paul was involved then I guess it's crap.
The page you linked calls the 490 "A faithful copy of the 904A to capture the irregularities of the old transistors in the ladder. Sounds great and available now." |
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neandrewthal
Joined: May 11, 2007
Posts: 672
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 1:07 pm Post subject:
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| yusson wrote: | [
Olivier's Moog Modular :
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Sorry, for the OT, but what is the module with one knob/two jacks and why the heck is it on a double wide panel 
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