The Clone War - Behringer. Good or Bad?

I recently bought a Behringer Poly D. The build quality is exceptional. Not cheap but really solid. And it sounds amazing. Whats the alternative if i dont like Vst’s?

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That’s kinda the point of the video.
If Behringer just made affordable, accessible clones of unavailable or, for many, unobtainable vintage synths as well as their more original stuff, I don’t think many sensible people would have too much of a problem with them.
It’s the aggressive litigation against people for pointing out facts, the clearly anti-Semitic undertone of the Peter Kirn harassment and now the “copyright facts” nonsense that is putting people off.

If you have a poly D and it makes you happy, there’s nothing wrong with that and owning one doesn’t mean you have to love everything Behringer do, and neither should it make you feel any way at all about them as a company.

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No complaints with any of my B synths (Model D, K2, Neutron, 2x TD3, MS1, RD 8). With the exception of a wobbly octave select switch on the Odyssey (which works fine) they’re all well built and sound great. I’ve got a Cat and a Wasp on the way too.

Compare that to my AR 2 (dodgy pads), AK (need to run calibration routine every time I want to use it) OT 2 (poor finish of its housing) and DN (RAM issues on boot up). That’s over £3.5k of ‘premium’ products, all with one issue or another.

I know who I’m happier giving my money to.

Within the 3 year warranty?

There’s even a part where Benn addresses the question, “I already bought (insert specific Behringer product), what am I supposed to do, feel guilty?” And basically, the answer is use and enjoy what you have, but be aware and maybe reconsider future purchases.

You are happier giving money to a company that publicly engages in:

3:09 - Garbage lawsuits
5:09 - Garbage behavior
7:10 - Abuse of market share
10:10 - Abuse of customers
12:38 - Hiding from charitable pledges

Are you sure?

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I remember when Alan Sugar made a fortune of the back of a crappy Amstrad PC. Built cheap but took a huge slice of the gaming market. He was dodgy as fuck and a lot of people tried to take him down but he had good lawyers. Fast forward many years and hes now sitting at the top. Not bad for a ‘barrow’ boy from London. Like these people or loathe them they do know what people want, and perhaps are a bit unsavoury in their dealings and statements, but you have to be arrogant if your aim is high in the market share.

That Anti-Semitic post is just terrible. . I wonder if this jerk will feel a backlash from the market. Would be a good time to step down and change the corporate structure of the company. Bring in some new heads.
I’m not sure if this has been said yet, but second world countries, in my experience, have shops full of Behringer gear. Their customers pay extreme tax for electronic gear (double in Mexico for products that are many times made in Mexico), so the idea most of the time to get a Mackie vs Behringer is kind of a no-brainer, or the only option. Also, gear coming straight from China is sometimes taxed differently, because China.
So, I wonder what the actual market is for Behringer. How much of their customer base even speaks European/English languages? How many watch, or are informed on all this stuff?
And to be transparent, their newer digital amps are insanely powerful, with little current draw…Like 12,000 watts each (low heat, run for days literally). We run our whole system off 2 or 3. So, now I feel bad in hindsight…Well, you only live once I guess.

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The big problem is that people take criticism expressed towards Behringer’s ethics personal, and thus feel the need to defend. It prevents progression. Behringer continues to do questionable things because they have a hard-core base who defend them. I don’t think there is anything wrong with owning a Boog or Bro1. If it makes you happy, cool, be happy. No one is going to say your anti-semitic for owning them. However when people defend Behringer’s unethical practices (not making donations when you say you are, blatantly ripping off competitions current projects, endless slap lawsuits, straight up hartassing anyone who is critical) they’re never in a position to have to straighten their shit up. The saddest part to me is thinking of those truly gifted and talented individuals who work for Behringer and its subsidiaries. Think of all the great shit they could come up with if they weren’t stuck leeching off of other companies. I hope eventually they cut this bullying shit out, learn to take criticism, and put those talented people to the task of innovating.

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Doesn’t Uli own all of Music Tribe? Behringer subsidiary synth clones are a drop in the bucket, just like the drops in the bucket that are the past decades worth of guitar pedal clones.

They clone literally everything they can. I remember seeing a clone of a simple light display unit. I watched the video and in the comments on YouTube someone linked the item they cloned…

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It’s an ethics thing, not a quality thing.

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Yeah and the guy who owns Amazon is moving to “his” island in Hawaii. Insane times. Insane. Still can’t find another 12,000 watt (2 times 6000) class-D amp that weighs less than 5 pounds…that runs 8- 21" subs. Sad really.

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My K2 had a broken patchbay out of the box, had to take it straight back to the store. Easy to see where the corners were cut since the CV jacks are pcb mounted and not secured onto the panel. Had fun with it for a little while since then, but I decided to sell it rather than deal with the headache of having those jacks break down over time.

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I had one because I’d been lusting after a ms20m and couldn’t afford the real thing at the time. After the “corksniffer” stunt I sold it. Couldn’t hold my nose any longer. I can do better things with other gear and feel good about it.

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Same boat really. Shame as I really do prefer the K2 to the MS20 mini in most ways.

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Yeah, I had a few of their items and wanted more like the Cat & PPG (still have the RD-8 and a cable tester that I didn’t know at time of purchase was a rip-off.)

Sold most off though, they didn’t sound bad but I’m trying to just do more with less and not try to own the world.

Great video. Thanks.

Good point

To be honest I don’t see any difference these days between Arturia Behringer or any other companies out there.

I have had very expensive machines from known brand with wobbly knobs, not precise encoders, faulty pads etc.

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Music Tribe is Uli Behringer, they made acquisitions every year to create one of the biggest Music Corporation of all times.

I haven’t seen any other company troll, bully, harass and post anti-Semitic videos of someone because they didn’t agree with them.

This isn’t about the subjective experience of using these companies’ products, it’s not even really about Behringer as a company. It’s about Uli Beringer and his dangerous inability to take criticism on the chin without accidentally being either a nasty little racist or trying to sue someone for stating facts.
Imagine how it must have felt for Peter Kirn to get up every day to all the shit Beringer and their little minions were posting about him.

Buy as many Behringer synths as you like, it doesn’t mean you agree with what they do. But don’t pretend they haven’t acted like absolute arseclowns over the last couple of years.

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I fully agree with you on this, I don’t like their policy, their marketing and their way of doing business.

I was more referring to product quality

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