I love my OT, but it sounds pretty transparent and that’s not always the best thing. Does anybody use it alongside an old hardware sampler to get that old-school sound? Ideally, one would be able to use the 8 internal sampler tracks of the OT and use the MIDI tracks to control an outboard sampler of choice, but I suppose you could also just resample through it and then bounce back to the OT. Either way, it’s been hard for me to find a unit that ticks all these boxes:
Sounds appropriately lo-fi, gritty, punchy, etc
Doesn’t cost a fortune
Isn’t a behemoth rack monster that takes up my whole desk
Has decent enough storage to hold more than a few short samples without fiddling with SCSI and floppies
Has enough multitimbral parts and polyphony to be triggered and p-locked by the OT sequencer
Filters and effects would be nice too, but not a must. The closest I can seem to find is the SP-202 or 303 from Boss, but I don’t know how it fares in the sound and MIDI control department when compared to something like an Akai S950 (which is, unfortunately, huge). Any thoughts?
Maybe unexpected suggestion but the volca sample springs to mind. It’s got the crunchy sound, analogue filter and midi control you’re looking for, the only hassle is the loading of samples which has to be done via an app (android or ios, not sure if there’s a desktop version).
Does the Volca really sound all that different from the OT? I never put it in that crunchy category as I figured everything nowadays is 16-bit CD quality at least.
Yeah it’s pretty crunchy and lofi compared to CD quality. 16 bit but 31khz sample rate or something. Have a listen to some audio demos, it has a nice sound to it.
Volca sample sounds great, the reverb is nice and the eq is cool too. Very playable but no record and you have to memorize patch numbers - no name.
Kaoss pad 3 is awesome but not sure there’s a midi trigger and the whole thing goes offline while you load samples. For live sampling though it’s great.
Electribe esx is a beautiful instrument. Great sound. Line in record. Reverb sucks though.
Definitely check out the Volca! Sounds nice, in a 90’s house music kind of way, is cheap enough to buy as an impulse. Deffo not a toy, except the size.
I run things through the OTO BIM which has analog circuitry, distortion and bit reduction with the delay turned off. It has a freeze function as well to get pitch controlled short loops.
If it’s the sound you’re after get an S950. I know they are huge but are great paired with an OT. I’m trying to find some rack ears for mine so I can get it in my rack!
If you don’t want something big and don’t have a proper rack then don’t look at the s950 - it is HUGE! bigger than you think. The reason I sold mine! Once it’s in the mix the sound isn’t that important - just sample off old records that have already used the big old expensive failing gear.
