Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

teenage.engineering

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–199 of 199 posts

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#191

Post by rumori »

999900000999 wrote: post #30

Very strange. It appears they’ll just rebrand a few record cutters and call it a product. TE always comes off as really low quality for the types of prices they charge. The MPC Sample is 400$ and looks well built, the KO2 is 300$ and has faders falling off. Roland has a few samplers in the same price range as well.

Have both and none is falling apart. Both have their advantages, the Sample is a more robust and also just bland, KO2 is more fun and interesting. It’s comparable to Nintendo vs Sony, both excellent in their own way.

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#192

Post by taylodl »

jeremyloy_wt wrote: post #152
taylodl wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most music today is digitally recorded, digitally mixed, and digitally mastered. It's at the end they distribute it on vinyl and sell it for a fortune. They're literally fleecing people. Now I will tell you digital is far superior to analog BUT - the way music is recorded and mixed today takes all the soul out of music. Rigidly fixing to "the grid" makes it so music can't breathe. Drums are programmed. So much precis…

> the way music is recorded and mixed today takes all the soul out of music > So much precision is required that session musicians are playing most of the things you hear, not the actual artists I’m sure the session musicians don’t appreciate this statement. Just because they can play with high precision and reliability doesn’t mean they are playing without soul. If the featured artists can’t do so on their own, that…

Session musicians know full-well what they bring to the table. They also know the trade-off: they're not interested in the continued touring, dealing with fans, having to create new material, etc., etc., etc. They're "no drama" kind of people.

BUT - to make any money as a session musician, certainly enough to make a living, you have to be good. Damn good.

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#193

Post by taylodl »

adw wrote: post #173
taylodl wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most music today is digitally recorded, digitally mixed, and digitally mastered. It's at the end they distribute it on vinyl and sell it for a fortune. They're literally fleecing people. Now I will tell you digital is far superior to analog BUT - the way music is recorded and mixed today takes all the soul out of music. Rigidly fixing to "the grid" makes it so music can't breathe. Drums are programmed. So much precis…

> So much precision is required that session musicians are playing most of the things you hear, not the actual artists. In pop music this has been true since the 60s. For independent music it has mostly never been true. This hasn't changed much.

[dead]

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#194

Post by fileoffset »

onlypassingthru wrote: post #4
Arainach wrote: post #2

Not even a price listed. I don't understand the market for this - fancy musical instruments for creativity, sure, there's a market, but who wants to own cutting vinyl? How many records would you need to make for this to be more economical than paying a dedicated shop? How many would you need to do to "achieve higher quality"? How consistent are your results?

Are there bootlegs on vinyl? Maybe now there can be.

yes there is, I bought one by accident the other day

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#195

Post by Lio »

picofarad wrote: post #183
Lio wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that entirely fair? Their Pocket Operators are pretty cheap and accessible.

They're like $100! That's not affordable for a thing that makes beeps and boops. I can only hope behringer continues to undercut them on things I care about.

You can get Pocket Operators new from $59 depending on the model.

That’s cheaper than any of beringer’s copies.

If you can’t afford that consider used or stick to software.

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#196

Post by lebuffon »

gwbas1c wrote: post #177
lebuffon wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Old guy here. I brought a few masters into RCA in Toronto, just before dinosaurs went extinct. At that time they used a Studer A80 (if memory serves) 1/2 track machine, modified, with an extra playback head that was placed before the head stack so it read the music on tape about 500mS before the playback head got it. The extra head sound was fed to the motor controller that controlled the speed of the cutting head fe…

I still wonder if the circuitry was analog or digital, though. That could have been an analog "computer".

In my case it was around 1975ish. There was no digital circuitry in signal paths then.

If you are asking how the thread pitch motor controller was working I have no in depth knowledge but it would likely be an analog envelope detector. (simple RC filter/integrator would suffice) That would be rectified to make a DC control voltage and the control voltage would be used to modulate the power to the motor in an inverse fashion. ( more audio signal -> less power )

No digits would be harmed in the process. :)

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#197

Post by lebuffon »

gwbas1c wrote: post #177
lebuffon wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Old guy here. I brought a few masters into RCA in Toronto, just before dinosaurs went extinct. At that time they used a Studer A80 (if memory serves) 1/2 track machine, modified, with an extra playback head that was placed before the head stack so it read the music on tape about 500mS before the playback head got it. The extra head sound was fed to the motor controller that controlled the speed of the cutting head fe…

I still wonder if the circuitry was analog or digital, though. That could have been an analog "computer".

The RIAA equalization curve for recording and playback, was typically implemented with only resistors and capacitors. No DSP required.

I know I know. It's so hard to believe you can manipulate signals without a processor. ;-)

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#198

Post by vr46 »

bigyabai wrote: post #63
vr46 wrote: post #22

I looked and went, "WTF is that? Looks like a record cutting machine" Scrolled down WTAF I'm a total TE fanboi, I have the OP1F and OP-XY, they're everything I ever wanted and my MPC and Digitakt haven't be touched in months. And the Digitone Keys is unplugged propped against the bookshelf. It's extraordinary how addictive these two little synths are for making things happen. The APC-2, however, is a fascinating outc…

> The APC-2, however, is a fascinating outcome > TE's amazing inventions > But that doesn’t mean anything that looks cool was made for them. How anyone tells themselves this while buying Teenage Engineering gear is beyond me. The closest TE came to an "amazing invention" was the OP-Z, and that flopped like a fish on land. The whole business is a marketing-saturated DAWless hipster fantasy, hook line and sinker. I was…

Again, lazy and unoriginal commentary regarding "DAWless Hipster Fantasy" - I mean, is buying any kind of instrument the same thing? Is a guitar? A piano?

Musicians will use absolutely anything to get the sound in their head out, so maybe they're not your favourite musicians, but everyone from Hans Zimmer to Tame Impala use them. You could have found that yourself.

Re: APC–2 – A professional record cutter for producing original playback discs

#199

Post by vr46 »

alexjplant wrote: post #44
vr46 wrote: post #22

I looked and went, "WTF is that? Looks like a record cutting machine" Scrolled down WTAF I'm a total TE fanboi, I have the OP1F and OP-XY, they're everything I ever wanted and my MPC and Digitakt haven't be touched in months. And the Digitone Keys is unplugged propped against the bookshelf. It's extraordinary how addictive these two little synths are for making things happen. The APC-2, however, is a fascinating outc…

> I've heard every lazy comment about hipsters and rich kids who are supposedly their target audience, and the cost of the products, as if the visible ingredients are all that accounting measure. Swiss watches cost orders of magnitude more than TE's amazing inventions, and their only purpose seems to be to remind the wearer how amazing they are when they look at it. Nobody pretends that high-end watches are anything…

You could say the same about guitars and rollerskates - ending up in cupboards because they're cool but require effort to get anywhere with them. Musical devices are just like that, you get on with some and not with others.

If you can't tell the difference between jokes, irony and "unilaterally sh**g on people", then maybe you're taking low-stakes internet comments too seriously.

Post reply on HN