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Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2012 6:03 pm
by misterpete
Are there any differences between Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

After I have been thoroughly LOVING my Minitaur I finally took a look at the T3 and thought it looked considerably more like a Slim Phatty with Pedals than the Minitaur or Voyagers...

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Tue Dec 11, 2012 10:51 pm
by EMwhite
They certainly look the same. Same rubberized buttons and 2 line display with encoder knob. The general menu structure is similar as well.

Ironically, however, they are based on completely different microcontrollers (a Sillabs vs. a Ti; [remember them : ) ]). And if I'm not mistaken, the midi Murfs are based on a similar IC. But don't take my word for it.

About your question. The Taurus Arp, since it's bound by the pedalboard which is only 1 Octave + 1 note doesn't allow for as complex Arp sequences. I haven't tried to see if you can do this through a Midi keyboard. It's also quite awkward holding in several pedals. But the fact it's difficult to do anything BUT a single note, means that 'transposing' is quite simple and very musical.

Taurus also has a Random ('order') and "ONCE" (though I can't get mine to work correctly). Also you can do octaves up to 2 in length and then a special 2.1 which cycles up and back again; hard to discern from B/F, which is supposed to be backward forward or back & forth. Mr. Arkadin is all over this code so he can probably explain.

Little Phatty has, of course a much larger keyboard so you can hold notes up and down over a wider range. It also allows for 3 Octaves in the ARP setting.

I think I'm running older Taurus 3 code so your mileage may vary.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 11:59 am
by misterpete
Thanks EM ~
I actually have a Slim not Little Phatty, so the keyboard isn't something I even considered.
A local T3 came up for sale used but the person advertising it never responded.
I love my Hammond M-101,(Baby 'B') but I have mixed feelings about it's bass pedals.
After reading your welcome response about transposition and musicality I was inspired to peruse the manual. Now I'm a little concerned about the lack of CV outs, the T3 appears to offer no CV output, sharing the same CVs INPUTs-only as seen on the Minitaur and Slim Phatty.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 11:39 pm
by Voltor07
CV outs on a Taurus? I fail to see the usefulness of such a feature... :?

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Tue Dec 25, 2012 11:18 pm
by misterpete
Voltor07 wrote:CV outs on a Taurus? I fail to see the usefulness of such a feature... :?
Why wouldn't they be every bit as useful as CV outs on all the rest of the Moog instruments?

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 3:14 am
by Voltor07
misterpete wrote:
Voltor07 wrote:CV outs on a Taurus? I fail to see the usefulness of such a feature... :?
Why wouldn't they be every bit as useful as CV outs on all the rest of the Moog instruments?
Because they're pedals...unless you put them on a shelf or stand, one would need long cables going from floor to stand, and would have to use the Taurus as the controller, which would be awkward at best.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 12:10 pm
by misterpete
Hmmm... Thanks!
I have plenty of short/long/medium cables :lol: but not sure I understand why you would have to use the T3 as a controller to make use of CV outs ~ e.g. I can access CV outs from the Voyagers and MoogerFoogers without having to use them as MIDI controller ~ but perhaps I'm taking their knobtweaking and Expression Pedal friendly interfaces for granted...I guess your answer will make more sense to me when I get a chance to actually see and play a T3.

Voltor07 wrote:
misterpete wrote:
Voltor07 wrote:CV outs on a Taurus? I fail to see the usefulness of such a feature... :?
Why wouldn't they be every bit as useful as CV outs on all the rest of the Moog instruments?
Because they're pedals...unless you put them on a shelf or stand, one would need long cables going from floor to stand, and would have to use the Taurus as the controller, which would be awkward at best.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 2:40 pm
by marty
I think CV outs on the T3 would be just as useful as those on a modified LP. I've never used my band's modded LP as a controller for other synths but it's great to use the keyboard voltage, for example, to get dynamic with the 'foogers. (One of my favorite patches is to dial in my ring modulator to produce a nice tremolo and then routing pitch voltage to the CP-251 and inverting/attenuating to taste in order to decrease the frequency of the carrier as you play up the keyboard. Low notes get a very rapid tremolo that slows down the higher you play. Fun stuff.)

Assuming that your goal is to use the T3 arpeggiator to control an analog synth, you can always use a MIDI—>CV converter. Not the same old skool flavor but you get access to a lot more control options than just four CV outs.

Haven't used the LP arpeggiator much but the T3's is great. You can use it as a simple sequencer too, not sure if that's possible on the LP. Also, if you control the T3 via a MIDI keyboard then you're not limited by the single octave of pedals; I assume controlling via CV would work similarly.

marty

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 3:08 pm
by misterpete
Thanks Marty ~ I have the SLIM and use the arp a lot with and without audio. Apparently there are quite a few differences. I don't think it can be used as a sequencer in the same way that the T3 can ~ as far as I know you actually have to hold down all the notes of a chord simultaneously on the Phatty (slim) arp for the 'pattern' to register.

For sure, CV ins and outs are amazing ~ if previous experience with the foogers, theremin & everything etc weren't enough proof :lol: hooking the Electric Blue/vx-351 into and out of the XL is so instantly rewarding! Essentially that organic dynamic CV energy is what "the MOOG sound" is all about for me. I don't actually have an OS but that's basically the way I use the Voyagers ~the presets (even my own) are always only a starting point... and having the added bonus of CV to electrically move the knobs and modulate the sound over time is what makes the sound so ALIVE :D

The Minitaur is such an amazing little beast ~ plugging it into and out of a T3 will be very interesting!

Another interesting bonus with the T3 is the polyphonic MIDI stacking feature that the Phatty and Voyager offer. I wonder if that's any working better now than in early reports around the forum. :?:

marty wrote:I think CV outs on the T3 would be just as useful as those on a modified LP. I've never used my band's modded LP as a controller for other synths but it's great to use the keyboard voltage, for example, to get dynamic with the 'foogers. (One of my favorite patches is to dial in my ring modulator to produce a nice tremolo and then routing pitch voltage to the CP-251 and inverting/attenuating to taste in order to decrease the frequency of the carrier as you play up the keyboard. Low notes get a very rapid tremolo that slows down the higher you play. Fun stuff.)

Assuming that your goal is to use the T3 arpeggiator to control an analog synth, you can always use a MIDI—>CV converter. Not the same old skool flavor but you get access to a lot more control options than just four CV outs.

Haven't used the LP arpeggiator much but the T3's is great. You can use it as a simple sequencer too, not sure if that's possible on the LP. Also, if you control the T3 via a MIDI keyboard then you're not limited by the single octave of pedals; I assume controlling via CV would work similarly.

marty

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2012 2:10 am
by misterpete
YES ~ very musical indeed!!! Thanks for this reply ~ and everybody who encouraged me~ I scored the T3 today and immediately started recording a few 'live' tracks with it and posted them to SoundCloud here:
https://soundcloud.com/misterpete/the-new-wild-bull
and here:
https://soundcloud.com/misterpete/christy-blatchford
then, I ran the FW update which was successful and easy~ I don't know why you wouldn't want to update~ after reading the addendum it looks extremely worthwhile!
I will check the new features out tomorrow....
Oh and the Taurus showed up in the Min REV 2 editor fine without doing anything to plist as suggested in another thread here ~I just had the Minitaur plugged in the background and swapped it for the T3... but I didn't actually do any sound editing with the REV2 ~ yet...
I just started playing/recording 'tweaking & a-frequin'" immediately and loving it!!! 8)

I got the T3 secondhand still less than a year old from a young guy who had almost no clue how to use it :lol: ...claims he only took it out of the box a few times :?
Just wondering what comes in the box with a new T3? Original owner said he 'couldn't remember but will look around and send it to me if he finds it' :roll:
Should there be a printed manual or a CD? This was just the instrument in the original box with styrofoam and no documents. thanks!
EMwhite wrote:very musical.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2012 2:50 am
by EricK
Voltor07 wrote:CV outs on a Taurus? I fail to see the usefulness of such a feature... :?
I would certainly put those CV outs to good use.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2012 5:00 am
by stiiiiiiive
Wow, congrats Mister Pete :)

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2012 10:04 am
by misterpete
thanx Stiiiiive! who can sleep? gotta get back in studio and in between a few oscillators :lol:
i probably should repost my question about shipping contents in the Taurus/Minitaur forum
<shrug>
stiiiiiiive wrote:Wow, congrats Mister Pete :)

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2012 8:29 pm
by Voltor07
misterpete, there should be a manual...a book, to go with the T3.

Re: Little Phatty vs. Taurus Arpeggiator?

Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2012 8:35 pm
by psynthetic
EMwhite wrote: About your question. The Taurus Arp, since it's bound by the pedalboard which is only 1 Octave + 1 note doesn't allow for as complex Arp sequences. I haven't tried to see if you can do this through a Midi keyboard. It's also quite awkward holding in several pedals. But the fact it's difficult to do anything BUT a single note, means that 'transposing' is quite simple and very musical.
You can get around trying to hold down several keys with your feet quite easily (without using another controller) if you just turn on the note latch function in the main menu, this will let you add notes to the "stack" one at a time and build up an arpregiated loop of upto 128 notes (i think?).. I know i've put 4 bars of a downward progression and then 2 bars of an upwards progression into the note stack before.. so its big in anycase..

Arpreggiator Latch On> All notes will be added to the stack as you play them. Arpreggiator Latch Off > Repeating a note will remove it from the arp loop/stack.

Im pretty sure once you've got a loop happening you can transpose the entire thing as a whole aswell, eg, move everything up 3 tones or whatever, WITHOUT having to stop your loop... so this is a super powerful tool for live, being able to build up and dismantle loops on the fly, with tap tempo and/or MIDI sync to boot, life is good. :D