I was just curious and wanted to open a post on whether or not there are differences on Little Phatty Filters or if any one of you have ever heard or hear any differences on different Little Phatty Filters?
I personally have owned 3 different Little Phatty’s; a Stage II, a Tribute Edition, and now my current Stage II CV. But I also know a friend that has a Stage II and another friend that used to have a Stage I. So I have played and heard multiple Little Phatty’s.
Have any of you ever used different Little Phatty’s or own more than 1 Little Phatty, and have you ever heard or hear any differences in the Filters? Or do all Little Phatty Filters sound and are exactly the same?
Was just curious to know all of your opinions on this subject.
Hope you’re all having a great day and a have a great weekend!
Obviously, all LP’s are built the same. Being analog instrumets, it would not surprise me that filters, oscillators, etc. all have minor variations from unit to unit.
yeah, I have heard slight differences in different analog synths before. One main difference for example is between the Prophet '08 PE that I currently have (and am currently trying to sell) and the original Prophet '08 that I used to have. Honestly the original Prophet '08 I had I think sounded MUCH better than the current Prophet '08 PE I have right now. Its definitely nice to have the updated potentiometers over the shoddy old encoders but the old Prophet '08 I had sounded much warmer I think than the current Prophet '08 PE I have right now.
anyway I just wanted someone else to go first with their opinion/story so thanks
The nice thing about Moog is, even though no two units sound alike, they all sound like a Moog. It very well could be that certain things had to be changed in the PE that, for better or worse, changed the sound quality? Not sure. I DO know I don’t like Curtis filters.
I agree about Moog instruments, every Phatty, Voyager, etc, I’ve ever heard sounds like a MOOG, in a GOOD way
Who knows, maybe you’re right about the DSI PE edition. Just to be fair though I’m not saying the Prophet '08 PE sounds “bad” or anything, but just definitely different somehow than the older Prophet '08 I had. The filter is okay on the DSI Prophet, its nice, I like it I suppose, but it is hard finding a good sound on the DSI Prophet in general sometimes, even when programming it, and for such an expensive synth It’d be nice having a multimode filter, not just a lowpass!
Let me guess…artifacts that sound like digital zippering when tweaking the filter? Yeah, that’s what turned me off on DSI. And actually, $2-3k is pretty affordable for an analog 8 voice.
Yeah, I know, but, it really isn’t 100% analog, its has VCA’s but DSI uses digital LFO’s and ADSR’s, etc. Not that I care, it doesn’t bother me, but I’m just saying even though 2k is a good price for an 8-voice analog synthesizer, for that price I still think it’d be a nice and quite possible factor to include a more diverse filter. The poly and mono evolver at least also have a highpass and the poly evolver cost more than the prophet 08 does!
Having had the chance to play a few times on my friend’s Prophet08 PE, I agree with you about the lack of knob resolution. There’s also that annoying tiny red backlit display making navigating between menus a pain. But I loved the keyboard feel tho. Much better than the one on my Voyager Old School I had at the time.
The sound is okay. But we had come to realize that in order to get satisfying performance out of it, it had to be in layer mode most of the time, effectively reducing the polyphony down to 4 voices only.
But what am I doing ? This is a Moog forum…I’m ranting…sorry.
Yes, every analog synth will have its own character, let’s call it that. Best example: Minimoog D.
The cause: tolerances in electronic components.
But a Moog, no matter how different from another Moog, will always manage to sound like a Moog! You’re right about that Voltor07 !
don’t feel bad go ahead and rant. I’ve seen many other threads around here discussing/comparing different synths. for example, Moog LP vs. DSI Mopho K thanks for you comment/input.
edit:
p.s. I’m wondering if I should have spent the $2200 USD on a used Alesis Andromeda instead Even though I do like the way the DSI Prophet 08 looks better than the Alesis Andromeda.
For one main reason: The A6 firmware/software updating has long been abandoned by Alesis. Long before they even decided to discontinue the Andy. So the software still has bugs that will never be corrected.
When, in 2001, Numark acquired Alesis, then on the verge of bankruptcy, music synthesizers were not in their plans. So the Andromeda team was fired, and software development was stopped. They only kept on producing the A6 for a while longer without any improvements to maximize returns on the huge investments that had gone into the development of the Andy.
The Prophet08 on the other hand, has a bug free operating system (to my knowledge), and the company still exists and can still provide upgrades (such as the PE replacement option) and even new firmware if major bugs are discovered. And they can still repair their products. Good luck if an unlucky owner of an Andromeda has a defective unit that needs repair…
But there I go again…ok… Moog, Moog, Moog, Moog, Moog…
The LP also has a digital LFO. I still like the Moog filter over the Curtis. As thealien666 stated, Curtis filters sound very weak, and in order to get a Moog-like sound, you need to layer the voices. When I tried a PE at Sam Ash, I noticed that with a fair bit of tweaking the presets, the Prophet puts out some nice pads. If my LP could do similar pads, I’d be ecstatic. But yeah, I was layering the voices.
I have a LP TE and have also played a friends LP Stage, I did not notice any major difference in the filers. They all are going to have a slight difference .
The Prophet 08 is worth getting to know, I’ve had no problem getting nice pads without layering, that’s not to say I’ve done a few that are layered . As for zippering when adjusting the filter, I do not hear it on mine which is one of the early ones. I’ve upgraded it to the PE, but I do not recall any with the encoders.
Love my Moogs and the other brand and style synths in the studio. They all do something different and lend something different to the palette .
I believe the “zippering” is from the audio mod feature of the filter. It takes the audio from OSC 1 and modulate the filter. This can give it that “Zipper” sound. I thought that too, but I turned the OSC’s off and self resonated the filter. When I turned the the audio mod off, I got a nice smooth filter without any stepping.
It very well could be that certain things had to be changed in the PE that, for better or worse, changed the sound quality? Not sure. I DO know I don’t like Curtis filters.
