Tuesday, 16 February 2016

Pioneer CDJ 1000 Mk1

I think I'm finally going to sell one of my treasures.
No it's not the ARP 2500 or any Buchla! In monetary terms it not in their league.
This is more of a sentimental loss.

I friend wants to buy my Pioneer CDJ 1000. It's a Mark1 .... the first CDJ I bought. This was back in 2001.

I'm trying to create some room so it seems logical to sell, and I have some fine Pioneer 2000 Nexus's
which do everything except cook my dinner.

Back in 2001 I think I paid something like $3000. I only bought one .. it was all I could afford.
But it allowed me to play my own tracks in the club.  I used one vinyl deck & one CDJ1000.

The CDJ-1000 (retroactively known as the mk1 after the release of mk2) is generally accepted as the first CD player that can accurately emulate a vinyl turntable - including the ability to scratch - This is why it quickly became the market leader and the club standard.

 The original mk1 was discontinued in 2003 during the introduction of the mk2 into the market.

 The CDJ-1000 (and its reincarnations) are currently the most widely used DJ-style CD decks to be found in the booths of the world's best nightclubs.

 I'm half hoping my friend changes his mind and decides not to buy this. There are MarkIIs galore but few Mark Is. Like the Technics 1200 is considered to be a icon of the 20th century, I think this will come to be recognised as a icon of the 21st century.

Saturday, 13 February 2016

Grand Hotel - Illawarra - Valentine's Dance

I had a awesome time last night. Sat 13th Feb, 2016
The girls took control of the decks at the Grand Hotel in Wollongong.

 DJ Cassandra- Neon Ivy

 It was a beautiful warm night playing under the trees & stars.


.....

That's Katie Valentine & KLP on the right.

DJ Katie Valentine.

.....

DJ KLP

Best night in ages. !!!


Friday, 12 February 2016

ARP 2500 - Filter bubbles

Set filter resonance all the way up and use an LFO to modulate the cutoff.
The 2500 doesn't have a dedicated LFO, but the 1023 VCO module has a slow range
which does a fine job here.... though a separate LFO would be useful.

I'm also using an envelope and some random voltages to modulate the LFO speed.
You could also just turn the LFO speed knob by hand.

arp 2500 - SOME LIVE TWEAKING of the 1045

Some more sounds from the 1045 voice module of the ARP 2500.
There are two 1045 modules in this video.

I used a 1023 VCO to modulate the filter of the first 1045.


In low range its a LFO

...


The 1016 noise and random nodule is also used to trigger some envelopes of the 1045s.

The full patch is here:


Thursday, 11 February 2016

ADAT

 
The ADAT Lightpipe is officially known as the ADAT Optical Interface.
It was developed by Alesis.
 
It stands for e Alesis Digital Audio Tape 
 
It uses  fiber optic cables to carry data.
Its very popular today and many third party hardware manufacturers use Lightpipe interfaces on their equipment.
 
Lightpipe uses the same connection hardware as S/PDIF, but dont be confussed.
Both have  Toslink connectors at either end.
The data streams of the two protocols are incompatible.
S/PDIF is used for transferring stereo or multi-channel surround sound audio
ADAT  in comparison, supports up to 8 audio channels at 48 kHz, 24 bit


 

Saturday, 6 February 2016

ARP 2500 - Module 1045 - Voltage Controlled Voice

I've always wanted one of these.
The 1045 is virtually a whole synthesizer in one package.


It has a VCO, a low pass VCF, a VCA & two envelope generators.
EG 1 controls the VCF, and EG 2 does the VCA.
The module seems to be made up of half a 1023 VCO, a 1006 filtamp (except that there is no audio mixer at the input) and two 1003 envelope generator circuits.

I really like the sound of the filter in this module. It gives great character.

The outputs of both envelope gens can also be used to modulate other modules.
The lower section is where your external modulation inputs can be found. Both have attenuators.
The EG outputs are here too.

The VCF & VCA can either be voltage controlled externally with other modules or internally with old fashioned knob tweaking and/or the built in EGs. How versatile !!

 Your waveform selector. The oscillator is based on the 1023 VCO.

This upper section is very interesting.
An envelope is initiated when signals are applied to both the gate (shown by the square) & trigger (the decaying pulse) inputs. This is what happens from the keyboard.
The output of the EG stays at the sustain level for the duration of the gate.
Without a trigger signal, the EG will still output a voltage so long as there is a gate.

 Some pics of the 1045 patch. I'm only using one 1045 - the right one.

New Zealand - Franz Joseph Glacier

These are pictures from the beautiful south island of New Zealand.
It's very cold - the day before the climb.



These are the steps (cut into the ice) that lead to the glacier.






For more travel postcards click here:

Friday, 29 January 2016

ARP 2500 - Vintage Brochure

A cool brochure.
I picked this up the other day and thought I'd share.
It's a useful summary covering the main modules.



Summary

1004 - VCO modules.
All these ARP oscillators seem to use the same basic circuit and the main difference is the arrangement of inputs & outputs and the type of switching between waveforms.  The 1004-T indicates that a toggle switch is used to switch between inverted and non-inverted waveforms. The 1004-P indicates a pot (just non-inverted waveforms) and the 1004-R a rocker switch.
Each VCO has the following waveforms: Sine, triangle, square, saw, pulse.
The 1023 VCO is not mentioned in this brochure.




1005 - The Modamp Module


1006 - The Filtamp Module


1016 - Dual Noise/Random Voltage


1027 - The Sequencer
The internal clock on this sequencer is similar to the pulse waveform of the 1004 oscillator. It's width can be controlled by the "% pulse width" or by using an external signal for pulse width modulation. The clock out appears to be more a "gate" than "trig". You may need a gate to trigger converter to drive external sequencers.
Something like Ken Stone's CGS24 may work.



1033 - Dual Delayed Exponential Envelope Generator.

In the ARP 2500 universe, there are 3 envelope generator modules: the 1003, 1033, and the 1046 (see below). The 1003 which is not mentioned in this brochure is identical to the 1033 except that it contains no "Gate Delay" (the top two pots). 
The output voltages range between 0 to +10V.




1036 - Sample & Hold/Random Voltage.
Cabinets - The different choices available.


1045 - Voltage Controlled Voice



1046 Quad Envelope Generator


1047 - Multimode Filter/Resonator.


The 1050 Mix Sequencer.