Is anyone suspicious of the fact that every new anticipated product gets a “leak?” Not that it matters but it feels credulous to write that when it happens every time. Syntakt, obx8, Juno x— its like you’d have to be a foolish company not to leak
Official leaks vs accidental ?
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Incontinence?
When people complain about £5k i chuckle. Because back in the 80s they were double this. I paid £1500 for a duophonic synth half the size.
https://www.vintagesynth.com/misc/octavecat.php
I think synths have become cheap not the other way round.
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I don’t think people are complaining here so far. Maybe complaining that they can’t afford it period, rather than it being overpriced. 5k is a lot of money for most people regardless of the value it provides. I agree this is much cheaper than the past.
Median income (without looking it up) is around $50,000 a year in the US.
Take out taxes and living expenses (rent skyrocketing, inflation etc) and this could be, most, all, or more than you can afford.
It could be a crappy used car you need (cars are a necessity in most of the US), or 2 months rent, not mention medical care expenses if needed (which are not a right here). Insurance costs thousands of dollars a month for families.
5k is a lot of money to most people.
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How did people afford them in the 80’s then? I saved for a year and nothing else.
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Yup. The guy I bought my S1000 from saved up 7000US to get the S1000HD with the 2MB ram expansion. That’s 7000US in 1987 money. He ate top ramen and basic pasta to make things happens
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That’s what they’ll have to do if they want it.
That’s what I’ll do and hopefully save enough to get it next year.
I think the main point is that if you can only save a very small amount it could take years to purchase.
So the complaints are that it still takes a ton of effort and time to save that amount for most.
If it were cheaper (not that it should be) then people could save for it faster. They wouldn’t have to neglect so much else for so long for one amazing synthesizer.
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I don’t think most people did afford them. Keep in mind that there were only around 800 OB-X synths produced. That was an instrument you bought if you were one of the lucky few that had a label deal or a lot of money to burn. The rest of us made do with pawn-shop finds or cheap monosynths. My first trip to a music store for a proper synth was instigated by seeing Greg Hawkes playing a Prophet-5 at a Cars concert. I had no idea what such a synth cost. A friend and I pooled our money and were utterly crushed by the price once we got to the shop. No way we were ever gonna get one. We walked out with the only synth they had that we could afford - a Moog Rogue.
I didn’t know a single person that bought a new P-5, JP-8, or OB-Xanything back then. However, I knew a lot of people that played Rogues, Micromoogs, and MS-20s.
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Thats true. I remember the Fairlight costing £50k or so. Only the Human League and a few others could afford it paid for by their record company. Yeh i only could afford an Octave Cat to get my band going. Oh and some Symmonds drums🤪
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In my country the average yearly income is around $12.000! How’bout that? 
I just looked and the average yearly salary/income for what i do here is $320.000 in Switzerland; i could buy 10 of ob-8x without problems 
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There’s a reason the Poly-6 and Juno-60 sold as well as they did. They put polyphony in the hands of working musicians. Even those were a bit pricey for the casual player, but were still achievable if you could stomach the Top Ramen and boxed mac n’ cheese. I was stuck with monosynths for a very long time - seven years, in fact. The Alpha Juno was the first polysynth I could afford, and even then, only because I found it used. And I was so, so happy to play that first chord… 
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A desktop version would interest me. After I finish all my car payments.
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You should probably use PPP adjusted dollar figures for such comparisons.
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~50k is the mean annual wage in the US. The median is closer to 35k IIRC.
OB-X8 looks lovely, though 
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But the synth still costs $5k for all of us
I knew it was lower, but even at the rate I mentioned it’s very difficult, let alone 35k.
I think people see the US as a rich country, and it is. But there are large amounts of people who can’t afford to eat well and then can’t pay for the medical care needed as a result.
The whole “pull up your bootstraps” attitude doesn’t consider the struggles of those who grow up in broken homes or who have problems they don’t have. I don’t want to devolve the thread into this, so I’ll say no more and respond to no more about this.
My real point was that the complaining hasn’t been that it’s over priced. It’s that many people simply can’t afford it and that it’s not a dig at Oberheim for its pricing.
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i guess someone will buy this but isnt it going to sound basically like their other devices from decades ago?
wheres the innovation ?.
Indeed!! I wasn’t disagreeing with you at all (rather, emphasizing the point even more… our income distribution is very right skewed…)
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Also remember spending 5000 does not always have the same cost depending on what you spend it on. Spending 5000 on a trip will cost 5000. Spending 5000 on an analog synth will cost you the time value of the amount (basically what you would earn if you lend the money to a bank, or invest it in bonds or something risk-comparable) and the difference between the money you put in and the current market value.
Looking at my own purchases the last year, I bought a bluetooth speaker for around 1700 euros that the moment I opened the box was worth 500 less, and in 5 years who knows. I also bought a second hand Nik Huber guitar that in 5 years will be worth the same, maybe a little less a little more, but nothing dramatic.
Why pur your money in the bank when you can put in into something that has utility (the utility being fun and happiness).
Edit: reading my post I sound a bit tone deaf. I forget that you need to have money left after basic necessities to have the luxury of being able to put it anywhere. Which is not universal at all. Even in a wealthy country like the US or Europe.
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