do it! I hooked it up to the LP running in parallel. WOH! The 2 filters are definitely different and respond different. Doing a cutoff sweep with the res up high gives it some great harmonics. Could be useful for somthing. Im going to play with this approach more.
Cosmetically, I am a little (ever so slightly) bummed that the buttons are hard plastic and not the nice soft rubber ones like on the SP. Oh, and the rubber feet are slightly lopsided. Of course, I had to open it up (something I have been doing since a little kid) and see what was under the hood and to check out the PCB easter eggs first hand. I learned that after taking the screws out, to slide the top plate down. There is a ribbon connector that connects the Main board to the Pot board at the top. The bottom plate has a lip that slips between the ribbon connector and the top plate. When I took mine apart, I tried pulling up and must have loosened the ribbon cable because when I put it back together…it wasnt working! That “oh crap, I just totally broke it” fear came over me. I just re-seated the cable and all was good.
I’ve also noticed that there is no way to reassign the MIDI channel. I’d assume that when an Editor is rolled out, it will give this option. Otherwise, it’s locked at 1.
EDIT: I took a stroll over to the download tab at the Minitaur Product page and found the full manual. In there it explains how to put the MT into “learn” mode.
yes yes, I just wanted to clarify for those that don’t know. I’ve heard talk of what the big differences are between a minitaur and SP/LP/MV. The filter is one of the BIG differences, and because of that, you can do things with the MT that you cant do with other new moog gear (other than a T3).
Well, Nova has gotten many first round lots of other Moog Products such as the ClusterFlux (I got serial #20) and Taurus III (I got mine before many pre-orders).
Has alot to do with commitments of #'s of pre-orders and other factors, likely.
It’s just good to see that they are shipping now and that folks receiving them. I think Moog did very well with the timeline considering that Namm was just a month ago. There were rumours that it wouldn’t be shipped until late April or later; beat that by a mile.
Just received mine today. Number 82, coincidentally my birth year
I’ve only had a short time with it, but I am very impressed! The versatility of this unit cannot be understated. I was expecting that Taurus sound, but I wasn’t anticipating the ability to go from buttery filter to acidy filter so easily. The interface is great and intuitive (as Moog stuff tends to be), and it maps perfectly to the LP to use as a controller. The construction is nice, but my only beef is that the surface is not “gritty” like the moogerfoogers, which isn’t that big of a deal, but it makes it feel slightly less “rugged” although it certainly isn’t…
Can’t wait to spend more time with it, I was messing around with some arpeggios via the LP with the phaser and it was just pure bliss!
I have not looked closely at the specs but is the MT the same size as a CP-251 or VX-351? I am wondering if there will be a rack option or not for the MT.
In the future music review, they mention that they have many plans for the Minitaur, including a rack mount solution. I’m fairly certain it is the same dimensions as the VX or CP units. I’m at work currently, but tonight when I get home I will check to see if you can rack it up alongside the CP…
I believe I read it has the right dimensions to compare w/the 251, but all the inputs are on the back so racking would be problematic unless you are making holes in your rack to jack into it.
These pics should answer your ‘size’ and ‘format’ questions.
Indeed it’s the same height and width as a CP/VX, but as mentioned above by somebody else, the wedge shape is an issue at least with the current CP/VX mount.
I assume Moog will take care of this once the new hardware is available.
I had to remove the right wood cheek from my VX in order to have Minitaur sit nicely next to it. As for jacks, they are angled and in my case, I have a Synth.com sequencer above so no issues (even less issues once I get it mounted properly).
Note that the screws on the sides of the Minitaur are the only things keeping it from fitting nicely WITH the VX end cheek so I assume that will be taken into account. And if you can hook up with right angled jacks, I’m confident that even with a ‘deep’ rack device above Minitaur, you’ll be in good shape.
I was thinking the angle shape would be the issue. Thanks for clearing it up! Hopefully they put out a wood kit similar to that of the SP, and a rack solution that makes more sense
Just called Nova and sadly they didn’t get enough in their first pre-order bundle to get down the list to me. I’m #31 on their list. Ahh well. Sometime soon maybe.
One thing I have noticed and hopefully someone with an MT can verify this, but the Release seems to bleed at the end of a note. If I have release OFF, there is a loud “pop” ad the end of each note. I can turn the Release ON and dial it up a bit and it goes away. I can really notice it when I am controlling the MT with an Arpeggiator going pretty fast (165bpm), resonance off and cutoff down low. I’d like to see if this just a “nature of the beast” thing or if it’s a quirk with my unit. Hope it’s just a quirk that can be fixed. Would be a bummer if this is the way it is.
EDIT: Messing with it a bit more I can hear some bleed at the attack too. If Release is on and both A & R are at 0%, the “pop” is crazy loud. Lots of bleed. I can increase the A & R a little bit and the pop settle down, but now the punchyness is compromised. I know this is kinda the norm with analog synths, but this is way more noticeable than my LP.
I may be able to adjust that a bit… but part of the deal is that 0 attack and release = swinging the VCA 10 volts in one millisecond. That makes a pop; it’s basically like sending a square wave to the amp. There’s very fine control over short times so you can dial in just the right amount. One way to get more punch is to turn down the volume sustain amount and then set the attack and decay very short but just longer than the settings at which it pops… you should be able to dial in just the amount of click and thump that you want, with practice.
Here’s a track that I threw together that demonstrates some mid-range / high-end timbres and in particular, demonstrates some of the percussive effects that Amos just mentioned.
Important to mention that this is NOT a musical expression, just some banging around with mild lead type runs and some tweaking. The filter in this range is quite band-pass-ey (if that is a word).
Mainly I just wanted to demonstrate some of the range. Note that this is 100% dry recorded real time into Logic. Read the SoundCloud comments for some more information.
My Minitaur and my Cluster Flux are one the way.