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TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

teenage.engineering

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Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#201

Post by eternityforest »

This is how all mixers should be! I can't believe how audio is still basically analog. Even digital things are still linked by analog connections.

Digital wireless exists but is completely nonstandard. Digital audio over XLR exists but there are multiple standards and none are anywhere near as big as analog.

And mixers are all still analog despite the fact they could probably be cheaper if it was done in a DSP at sufficient qty, and there would be no concern about scratchy faders, ever.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#202

Post by pmags »

halfnhalf wrote: post #187
pmags wrote: post #36

Small, portable mixers with lots of stereo inputs are relatively rare. That plus the Teenage Engineering "tax" (think Apple tax but for synth-heads) is driving the price. A cheaper, but slightly less tactile alternative is the 1010 Music Bluebox: https://1010music.com/product/bluebox

Bluebox doesn’t have a digital interface and can only record to an sd card. USB is only for power :/

Indeed I do occasionally wish the bluebox also acted as an interface, but I also really like the fact that the Bluebox is a stand alone recorder (unlike the TX-6). I often don't want to be sitting in front of a computer when I'm jamming and making music.

There are two USB interfaces on the bluebox -- one for power, the other USB midi devices.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#203

Post by sparker72678 »

aidenn0 wrote: post #84
azornathogron wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

3 channels for the price of 6 is still a terrible deal.

It's Teenage Engineering, so more like the price of 8 or 12. Also, no balanced inputs.

Darn. I saw TRRS and assumed balance mono inputs.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#204

Post by biztos »

I am the lower end of the target market for this: I mess around with synthesizers and I prefer DAW-less and while it wouldn’t be an impulse purchase, I could probably afford it.

Except that it doesn’t record, so I still need another device at the end of the chain.

I can’t figure that out. For the price, surely recording would have fit. It’s digital audio anyway, right, in order to do the effects?

There might be a good reason why there’s no built-in recorder, and maybe someone will explain it to me, but it seems like a massive missed opportunity to be the last link in a serious portable synth chain.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#205

Post by eternityforest »

javajosh wrote: post #176
IAmPym wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who literally does this for a living at Sequential, you couldn't be more wrong

I don't do this for a living and can't imagine how a statement like "your prototype will be cheaper than commercially available options" could be taken seriously by anyone.

If you don't count your time whatsoever and don't go for the nice case design.

I mean at the extreme case, if you can tolerate 40ms of latency and stuttering, a Raspberry Pi and some USB soundcards can do it all. The actual power needed is reasonable and ADC/DACs aren't that insane.

A Teensy 4.1 connected to an ESP32 could probably do most of this, if you wanted to do $15k of software development in your spare time and were really good at DSP.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#207

Post by eternityforest »

MisterSandman wrote: post #181
jedimastert wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking a look at a pic of the back the jacks look to be about 3mm apart, which seems fine for most 3.5mm straight jack cables. What I'm betting is that most people don't have 6 3.5mm to 3.5mm cables, given that most boards and interfaces take 1/4"

To be fair, 3.5mm and 1/4" are virtually equivalent ports, and the only reason 1/4" is used for audio interfaces is because of convention (and probably because it's easier to grab). Converters between them should be dirt cheap. It's not like Apple shipping 2022 iPhones with Lightning v/s USB C

Converters are an issue when the whole point is small size.

I wish they'd develop a full USB-C alternate mode for pro audio.

One C cable could do dozens of channels, or one of legacy analog, and provide clean regulated power for wireless gear, and the connectors pack very densely.

You could even make it daisy chainable, plus speakers could be powered over PD at small shows, and so could lights.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#208

Post by wyager »

IAmPym wrote: post #189
DoctorNick wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Crashes are definitely a problem. Knowing the chip they use and the complexity under the hood. The fact is though, all instruments suffer from issues like this. You will not find a single piece of gear on the market that doesn't have bugs. Crash issues are rare in our gear only because they are more simple by comparison. When I was writing the Tempest OS I had tons of crash bugs I had to work through because it was…

I'm just trying to give you perspective Nearly every complex instrument still has critical bugs after 10 years because development moves on after 4-5 years. Hardware bugs are != software bugs in terms of complexity because the debugging and tools you have available are simply not even close to comparable. This is why you don't get a whole lot of complex instruments from small companies. I applaud anyone who gives it…

> I applaud anyone who gives it a shot, it isn't easy.

You make it sound like a hobby project and not a $1200 instrument nominally targeted at professionals.

The reality is that nothing I do on the OP-1 is very complicated. It should be a lot more reliable than it is.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#209

Post by Phrodo_00 »

IAmPym wrote: post #184
wyager wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Reliable. It is for people who want something that is high quality and doesn't break. My TE OP-1 synth has not really matched these adjectives. One of the keyboard keys is misconstructed, so it’s on a hair trigger. The lightest brush will cause it to get set off. I have to replace the keyboard at some point to fix it. This should have been caught in QC. It also undergoes fairly frequent software crashes (esp. for a…

Small sample size bias Small companies don't have the same QC that a large corporation does, you'll never get the same consistency across products at the early stages of a company. Unfair to compare against that. You should definitely contact support and let them know, my guess is they'll take care of the keyboard. Could be debris inside it somewhere, could be a number of other tolerance issues or something else. Cra…

> Unfair to compare against that.

They're a consumer business, they get to be compared against other similar businesses. A product's quality rating shouldn't depend on the size of the company.

Re: TX-6 – Teenage Engineering

#210

Post by relaxing »

lamp_book wrote: post #161
IAmPym wrote: post #159

"Why is it so expensive?" - commentary from someone who does this for a living at Sequential Small Volume - each unit is more expensive than a large volume product, you don't get price breaks on any components or tooling costs Design focused - Who is the product for? It isn't for people who want to spend 250$ on a Behringer mixer. It is for people who want something that is high quality and doesn't break. Reliable. F…

> doesn't break Can get behind the rest of your comment but I don't think anyone's ever accused TE of making durable products. To their credit though, they replaced my broken PO without a fuss, so I'm not a detractor.

The PO series are a different beast entirely. You can’t compare their $80 toy synths made of PC board to their high end stuff.
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