I received one today and just spent four hours this evening with it. I’ve got to say it sounds amazing!
I’m not in a position to compare it to a minimoog D so, ignoring the fact that it’s a clone, I think it’s a superb sounding 3 oscillator mono synth for the price…with a few patch points thrown in. I can’t wait to hook it up to the eurorack…maybe sequence it all from Digitone.
Well the Minimoog features a 48 years old technology. It was bound to happen at some point. The synth industry kinda feels like the luxury watchmaking industry: rocking old technology which R&D cost has been amortized years ago and selling it at a high price point.
The only way the Minimoog price is justified is because it is made in the US and it is easier to repair. The Behringer will probably die at some point and will become unfixable. But then again you can buy 9 other ones for the same price so. Can’t beat the cost of labor.
It’s sad for Moog because the competition will eventually make them suffer. And sad for the planet because we’re buying more disposable goods than repairable ones. But let’s not be hypocrites: I bought the Behringer, I would never have been able to afford the original, and now, I don’t need it anymore.
At that point to preserve your moral integrity you’ll have to:
Wear clothes that weren’t produced in sweatshops
Buy locally produced organic food
Live in an ecological house that produces its own electricity and is independent from dams and power plants
Not have a car, even electric (because batteries are horrendous)
Not buy anything made out of disposable plastics
Not have a smartphone (batteries, rare metals)
etc.
Tell me more about how you succeed at all that. We all ignore large transgressions to enjoy small privileges. Shepard Fairey even made it its motto. And then he sold shirts.
Maybe it feels like a perfect starting point only because it’s easier to build a society without cheap synths than it is to build one without cars. We can do without them. Only it solves 0 problems.
Minimoog has been cloned several times before. Behringer is just first manufacturer selling it for a rational price when considering the manufacturing costs.
I think what Behringer is doing is awesome, I don’t understand those people at all who say it’s wrong - because it’s not. Where were those people when Studio Electronics cloned Minimoog? Or when Creamware released Minimax?
A lot of good clones and very good VSTs too. I was amazed by NI Monark. And the official Moog Model D app is superb too! (and it’s “a real Moog”, for the ones among us experiencing guilt at using clones )
In the context of life. To arms, brothers and sisters! Death to the capitalist overlords!
More seriously, I do agree with psyclone001 that when buying something we should be aware that it’s repairable or not. The Behringer, as good as it is sounding, doesn’t look like it will. And it’s an unfair advantage against the Moog, or an hidden cost. But then again (again), 1/10th of the price.
My bad I thought it was soldered chips. The board is tiny but yeah that’s definitely repairable. That kind of cancels all the discussion about sustainability, but that’s for the best.