Polyend Synth Review & Tutorial

[@krazywabbit]

Excellent walk through. This is going to be a lot of fun. Thank you.

[@D3ROXX]

it is a lot of fun for me now and last night, I never expected this 3xsynth machine could so delightful, exception that even with the 1.01 patch u may have issue, like some patch are bugged on the lfo section and some other OS drawbacks

[@Realestwizard]

When the news dropped today, my first thought was they better have sent my homie Digiphex an early model for review ✨✨✨ BOC and Lone forever!!

[@D3ROXX]

Now I understand what is this red pad for !!! thank for all your nice Rephlex/Warp style presets and explanations Mr Digiphex.

[@arexpressionsphoto]

Best breakdown yet! Thank you.

[@seanseanseanseansean]

Sounds great!

[@patrickbateman7444]

Awesome that you have a video out on this! I have seen others, the sound didn't really convince me, but it sound quite good in your video! It's too funny to evaluate every synth in how well it does BoC sounds, i'm a simple man stuck on this sound i guess. The founder of the company seems to be a BoC head as well, (who actually isn't??). I will most likely buy this for the formfactor (couch jamming) and the great UX concept. The sound and the 8 voice limit doesn't 100% convince me, but you can't have everything at that size i guess. The Behringer Pro-800 is the greatest BoC Synth out there, but i don't want to take it to the couch...

[@squarelanguage]

Always look forward to your Polyend videos

[@martindu4]

Very nice tutorial; love it. Question about MIDI out. Can you assign a different MIDI channel to each grid section and send that out with the associated Lead / Follow configuration. That would be my perfect MIDI controller configuration. Great work.

[@Digiphex]

Yes, you can. The setting for this is not where you might expect. You click the main encoder, choose synth, then you see the MIDI I/O menu choices for all 3 synths and it eventually rolls around to USB 1,2,or 3 and so you can have MIDI over USB, chord following, arps, sequences all going into Ableton or whatever.

[@dawlessnoob]

Dope

[@stuartcarter7053]

Great video! One thing I don't understand is that you picked a chord type (min9) for the left scene. Does that mean all the chords will be that? Because that's very limiting. How do you choose major & minor chords? Does it have to be from a chord pack? Can these be edited?

[@pinkleni-c7c]

hey, sorry if this question sounds a bit ignorant, but what kind of starter tech would you recommend for producing ambient techno? i would also like recommendations for mixing and recording tech.

[@Digiphex]

I would say Ableton if you want to use your computer. But if you want hardware there is a box from Liven that is designed for just that. Definitely starter level. I would mix and record inside of Ableton Live for sure.

[@pinkleni-c7c]

@@Digiphex thank you for the advice!

[@gummo187]

I honestly hate everyone at polyend i hope that this company just ends. But interestingly you have a setup that can do all this and way more for the price of the OG polyend play and the scam update that they pulled ,before that thing here even came out 😂 Love your work All the best Please keep going 🙏💚🙏💚🙏🖖🌻

[@Digiphex]

@@gummo187 MPC was updated, yet offered no path of upgraded CPU. Polyend did offer this and this is a scam?? I disagree and think it was great. UDO Super Six offers an upgrade for their keyboard when it improved, also great.

[@gummo187]

@Digiphex I'm just extremely confused why : 1# the hardware isn't allowing for most basic sample manipulation while their old tracker goes quite far.( having enough other known issues) At least two rows of similarly flexible operations would have made it worthwhile for me. (I mean :As in "voice reduction" to relieve the cpu) 2# I paid 800euro and was offered to pay 400 more short after, to make that thing actually worthwhile .Just when I realized that this thing is mostly a severely overpriced sample player. I'm a disabled man in a difficult situation I didn't have the money and still don't have it. #3the upgrade is sold out 🤣that's the biggest joke. #4 An Octatrack is available for 600 secondhand (a capable enough laptop, too ). I overeploy my Octatrack now to do the plays job in sequencing. Or feed the midi back in to make it a more capable machine, than the play will ever be. The good thing , the play's bad quality,actually brought me even closer to my Octatrack. #5 to use the original play in any way meaningful.... I was spending more time in the computer... Not making music at all, but creating, editing samples on the computer and transporting them back and forth. (While composing is definitely not faster or more intuitive. ) #6 the instantaneous price drop contributed to it being not resellable Like 250-300 for a machine that supposed to be worth 800 a couple of months ago. #7 I actually feel bad imagining selling it to some naive person. I can't respect the company that did. I understand that it was my fault for not i waiting longer to see what flaws will reveal over time (on the expense of other poor fools)and thus to discover how absurd that product is in that petty way. But the trust and trust are simply gone and not unreasonably so . That should summ up my reasoning. I hope that's more relatable like this. Regarding the MPC: I have yet to experience Any emotion of fascination towards an MPC, so I'm not overly familiar with scandals around Akai`s manufacturing ethics.

[@gummo187]

@Digiphex Dearest Sir I'll gladly lay out my reasoning in a more relatable way. But first of all im not overly familiar with Akai's policies the MPC somehow just never tickled me. Regarding my reasoning . What I struggle to understand is Why: #1 there is no sample processing ability Despite the original tracker going quite far. If cpu is the issue due to the resource hungry "innovative" Process I would have been fine with half the trackcount or even less, just to have some sonic flexibility. #2 months after the 800€ purchase fighting with the severe limitations I get informed that I have to pay 400 additionally to make it actually worth while. I am a disabled man, in a difficult situation could not afford it then and can't afford it now #3 the upgrade is "SOLD OUT" Which might be the biggest joke #4 for 600 you get a used Octatrack Or a cheap laptop, both superior to the poliend play Since polyend suggested that I pay 1.200€ to have a functioning instrument You could get both. (God thing:The bad quality of the play actually brought me closer to the Octatrack , Which is now even more intuitive to me Doing sequencing of external gear And even synthesis when midi sequencing Itself. ) #5the instant price drop made it impossible to resell A couple of months old 800 € tool Suddenly worth 450 With a resell price of 200-300 #6 while struggling to make the PLAY fabricate anything that felt personal, I ended up spending more time than before in front of the computer. Just creating and editing samples and sending those between machines. Because: there is no sufficient sample processing. So it's not faster or inspiring to work with it. 7# even to save a little of that money that got wasted on the play would mean to ripp of another naive music enthusiast. But maybe 200 is something someone would actually pay for a basic sample player with an Ok sequencing ability. I should have waited till the rich kids discover all the flaws of the product. But I didn't and naturally there is no way back. I hope that this explanation is more relatable. For now I'm still sure that don't feel ripped off for no reason. I sure hope that that changes. Luv🖖🙏🌟

[@gummo187]

@Digiphex Dearest Sir I'll gladly lay out my reasoning in a more relatable way. But first of all im not overly familiar with Akai's policies the MPC somehow just never tickled me. Regarding my reasoning . What I struggle to understand is Why: #1 there is no sample processing ability Despite the original tracker going quite far. If cpu is the issue due to the resource hungry "innovative" Process I would have been fine with half the trackcount or even less, just to have some sonic flexibility. #2 months after the 800€ purchase fighting with the severe limitations I get informed that I have to pay 400 additionally to make it actually worth while. I am a disabled man, in a difficult situation could not afford it then and can't afford it now #3 the upgrade is "SOLD OUT" Which might be the biggest joke #4 for 600 you get a used Octatrack Or a cheap laptop, both superior to the poliend play Since polyend suggested that I pay 1.200€ to have a functioning instrument You could get both. Or your setup with the mc707 (God thing:The bad quality of the original PLAY actually brought me closer to the Octatrack , Which is now even more intuitive to me Doing sequencing of external gear And even synthesis when midi sequencing Itself. ) #5 the instant price drop made it impossible to resell A couple of months old 800 € tool Suddenly worth 450 With a resell price of 200-300 #6 while struggling to make tthe original PLAY fabricate anything that felt personal, I ended up spending more time than before in front of the computer. Just creating and editing samples and sending those between machines. Because: there is no sufficient sample processing. So it's not faster or inspiring to work with it. 7# even to save a little of that money that got wasted on the play would mean to ripp of another naive music enthusiast. But maybe 200 is something someone would actually pay for a basic sample player with an Ok sequencing ability. I should have waited till the rich kids discover all the flaws of the product. But I didn't and naturally there is no way back. I hope that this explanation is more relatable. For now I'm sure that don't feel ripped off for no reason.

[@gummo187]

😊❤❤❤🎉❤❤❤😊

[@pdelonn]

Nice synth but too bad u can't make a full song with percussion samples etc

[@Digiphex]

Yeah, I think the idea was to keep it strictly a synth since they have 2 grooveboxes.

[@inputsandoutputs]

​@Digiphex hey. Who says a groove requires drums for real? This is a 3 track groovebox let's be honest here.

[@JeremyMeriau]

A flavour of boards of canada

[@jonajhiggins]

Could you not do this all on the Play+ rather than have two instruments? Also does the Synth do drums?

[@RPLKTR]

No. The pads are larger, velocity-sensitive and have polyphonic aftertouch.

[@Digiphex]

I probably could have created it on the Play+ but then lost the idea of playing the 3 parts on the synths and following the chord automatically. It is quite a loop generator if you start playing around with these pads, putting one on hold, putting some arps and sequences, all linked to moving chords. Really a different creative concept than the Play+.

[@jonajhiggins]

@@Digiphex Seems like there's no specific drum engine./synth. Obviously one could generate drum sounds with the current engine, but do you feel like in the way it's designed drums will work with the ways it's set up, or perhaps a follow up Polynd Drums is in the works....!

[@Digiphex]

@@jonajhiggins Really the Play+ is a "Polyend Drums" and has PERC synth drums in it. Better than the Roland TR-8S in my opinion. Synth is really just for synth, it is not a groove box and I wouldn't try to use it that way. You really need a drum machine with it such as Play+ or Tracker+.

[@jonajhiggins]

@@Digiphex Good job I have both of those!