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

teenage.engineering

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

#21

Post by cmrdporcupine »

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?

Back when I DJ'd techno in the 90s I would have killed for this for what it could bring creatively to a set. Just the ability to cut my own tracks onto white labels and put custom loops etc on vinyl would have really changed things entirely without having to front a whole bunch of cash (which I def did not have) to get a batch of records pressed which probably nobody else would order or play.

But now mixing is done digitally and playing with vinyl is a mostly lost art and it's trivial to put your own material together into audio files and mix it.

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

#22

Post by vr46 »

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 outcome of what happens when you have a bunch of creative people who like - and can - do things that are new to them and make them new to others. It's no wonder they keep getting asked to do cool stuff like Panic's Playdate, Baidu's Raven, Nothing Smartphones and Headphones.

TE have retained this incredible playful vibe that has long drained from Sony and Apple.

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.

"God, I'm good," thought the Rolex wearer as he glanced at his wrist.

Hipsters will buy anything that looks cool. But that doesn’t mean anything that looks cool was made for them.

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

#24

Post by colechristensen »

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?

Market: music industry veterans that won the race and have boutique record labels for small runs of obscure or promotional or small bands. Have five records printed for the merch table and the next show. Once you have the machine hopefully the marginal cost of a record would make sense for extremely small runs.

Where a band with no money might struggle to afford a $1000 minimum run somewhere else, they might be able to make beer money at a show with records made on one of these. Probably not "economical" in the machine may never pay for itself, but somebody rich buying one as a mechanism to promote musicians on a small scale probably makes sense to them.

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

#25

Post by 1123581321 »

rtpg wrote: post #20
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?

This isn't that but their "record factory" toy[0]... I'm like 90% sure is the same thing as something Gakken released in Japan for half the price as a little fun toy[1] Even in the age of the internet there's a huge business in people basically taking a "normal" thing from another market and then rebadging it to release as an elevated thing. Studio neat has a $231 tiny box cutter[2]. OLFA (A "professional" box cutter…

That fancy box cutter looks high utility; what don't you like about it besides the price? The retraction seems designed for frequently opening boxes, but not constantly. (I open few boxes and have a bog standard box cutter; I haven't used Studio Neat's or OLFA.)

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

#26

Post by nine_k »

pembrook wrote: post #12
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?

Sir, I commend you for your lack of taste for aesthetics, "coolness", and for maintaining the cynical, pessimistic Hackernews status quo. I've been worried this place has gotten eternal september'd full of redditors, AI bots, and low-IQ emotional mainstream political rants. But then you swoop in here and remind me that it's still 2007 in Hackernews land: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224 Never change.

To me, "cool" is a slightly derogatory term when applied to design. It usually means that smoke and mirrors play a significant role.

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

#27

Post by Brian_K_White »

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?

I would buy a machine that makes new floppy disk media if it existed, and not because of any economical argument.

I would buy a machine that makes new laserdiscs if it existed, and not because of any economical argument.

... aluminized paper for electric arc printers

... wax film thermal print head ribbon

... a re-inker for cloth typewriter ribbon (at least this one is straightforward to design and build myself some day)

... extra wide cloth matrix printer ribbon with 4 colors

... 1.9mm magnetic tape for exatron wafers

A record cutter has way more potential audience than any of those. They will sell every one they can even manage to make.

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

#28

Post by thenthenthen »

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?

There is one company that sells similar lathe cutters in Europe. To aquire it you need to go on a multi day training in a remote Swiss forest. Then it’s around 10.000 EUR in equipment, granted you supply your own record player (sl1200 ~700EUR). But yeah cutting high quality stereo records is an art. No matter the money you throw at it, it will involve a lot of maintenance, skill, experience, spare parts, mastering skills, consumables, and time (these cut in real time). Indeed, who wants to do that? I welcome any effort in this niche though!

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

#29

Post by fragmede »

Waterluvian wrote: post #14
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?

I have a real “I was born yesterday” feeling having realized that “Teenage Engineering” has nothing to do with making audio tech accessible to young newcomers.

rich young newcomers are totally welcome!

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

#30

Post by 999900000999 »

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.

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