What Moog? Slim Phatty, Minitaur, ???

[Colonel Monk]

Howdy ALL

I'm not really a stranger here, I owned a Little Phatty for several years. I sold it to a bandmate that was just plain better than me using it as a lead instrument.

I never really bought it as a lead instrument. I am a bass player, and I'm interested in creating ambient soundscapes/dropping Taurus brown notes to accompany our music.

I have nearly a full set of MoogerFoogers (missing a ClusterFlux still) and firstly, I'd like some sort of a companion to my Foogertron to sorta develop soundscapes. This might be single notes, could be sequenced, could be arpegiated... I'm not sure.

I had intended to get a Slim Phatty to replace my LP, but now there's the minitaur, and the werkstatt...... I'm a little unsure what I want. Basically, I'd trying to create a small modular synth using my Foogertron. I have played with it and felt the LP sorta gave me what I was looking for, but it was too big for me to have onstage, and possibly more than I really needed.

How could the Minitaur or Werkstatt fit into this? And how compared to Slim?

The other thing.... Yes, I want to have something compact that allows me to play accompaniment with my feet. How does the Minitaur perform for such a thing? I have a Fatar MIDI pedal setup, I never did use them yet as I had sold my LP before I could try them.

I really don't see myself every being a "keyboard" player per se - I don't know proper technique or anything. But I can tap out notes to make my synth make sound. So I suppose input method would be footpedal or like an M-audio 25 key controller, computer, sequencer, etc.

Yes, I have also had a hankering to get a MOTM "radial" analog sequencer. I'm def more of a knob guy, but I could also see using a MIDI sequencer to be able to recall and replay stuff.

Can you guys help me? I sit here wanting and I really don't know what step to make.

If there was a compelling reason, I could see having a Slim for the soundscape stuff and Foogertron Modular and maybe a minitaur for footpedal stuff, but I just haven't seen anyone doing what I want to do. Moogs videos assume that you're a "keyboardist" and that you understand how everything works together. I know how to use the CV stuff, I have experimented extensively but I have never done MIDI in my life, and I just don't understand what my options are.

Thanks!

CM

[stiiiiiiive]

Well, from what I’ve understood, your criteria are basically : something light with the Moog sound. You already have the pedals so any instrument without keyboard will do it.

The remaining questions are: the sound and possibilities.

The Slim Phatty, you know it. This one may be more comfortable since you may feel at home with it.
The Minitaur has more knobs, which seems to be convenient for you. In the other hand, it has less possibilities.
The Werkstatt, from what I know about it, is the only one with only one oscillator. Envelopes options are reduced too. But it is more open thanks to the brand new patch bay option.

Voilà, to start thinking together
What do you say?

[Colonel Monk]

Is there any hope for CV out with either the Minitaur or the Slim Phatty? I suppose you don't have a true "mini modular" unless you can

I watched some video of the Minitaur being played with Roland PK5 midi pedals.... That's kind of what I had in mind for that.

In what fundamental ways does the Slim and Minitaur differ? They are both desktop synths, both have two osc, both have filter, ...... What are the primary differences? Both capable of the same sounds?

It could be that I need both. That's not outside the realm of possibility....

[stiiiiiiive]

I wouldn't hold my breath for CV out on either, indeed. [EDIT: you can always use a MIDI-to-CV converter...]

About the differences, here are the ones I can remember in a heart beat (please note I haven't tried the Minitaur):
- Oscillators: the detune can be set in a different way on the Taurs, they attack the filter and section in a different way too, which is (from what I've read) the reason why the Taurs have that oomphactor no other has. They can generate fixed square and saw while the Phatty's can go triangle and pulse.
- Modulation: the Minitaur envelopes have 3 dedicated knobs on the panel because they used to have common D and R values. I think you can set D and R independantly now. The Minitaur LFO is triangle shaped, end of line. It can modulate VCOs pitch of VCF cutoff freq.
- General: the preset system on the Minitar is less convenient than the Phatty's, on the other hand you have almost everything under the knobs. The Minitaur's footprint seems handier. The Minitaur is also cheaper. [EDIT: the Phatty have an arpegiattor]

That being said, sometimes I would like the D and R segment to be common on my Phatty, and it is pretty capable of good ol' Mooguish basses, no doubt.

Anyone who's played both, please contribute

[Colonel Monk]

Thanks, Stiiiiive.

I did a little research on the CV and found what you're saying, I wish someone out there had tried it. I get it that there may not be room to so something that looks pro for panel mount jacks, but who cares? drill a hole and run some wire out to a pigtail, should work fine. Surely some EE synth pro has tried this hack? Seems it can't be more difficult than snooping the circuit to find them and then solder on a few wires?

I have my Moogers rackmounted in a wooden chassis I built, and plan to mount the slim in there as well.

Been reading and I think I might just try to swing them both. I'm heavily intrigued by the SUB37 and all the built in sequencer and such, and who knows, when the market has used ones available I might just think about that.

But I do have sorta two separate wants and needs, and I'm thinking that the minitaur with my midi bass pedals would be great, where having the Slim part of my foogertron might be just the "minimodular" that I'm looking for for soundscapes.

Now I need to find a keyboard controller

[EMwhite]

I no longer have a Phatty, but have a set of Taurus III pedals and a Minitaur.

I had my LP Tribute modified by Moog to add the CV Out. It was very handy for modular control meaning that I used it to play and modulate my modular regularly.

Since the Minitaur, much like the Slim Phatty does not have a keyboard, there is really no use for it to have CV out, except perhaps to 'send' envelopes and the Modulation output. For Pitch and Gate, Steve's comment about getting a Midi->CV converter is the right answer.

As for differences between the two, may have already been stated but I'll add the following:

Oscillator:

Taurus is a Sawtooth beast, but the Minitaur added a fixed pulse width waveform (aka Square wave) for a more varied sonic palette so you have a choice of two. But it's an either or choice (hard switched) The Phatty family has general purpose OSCs which have other choices and they can be morphed from sine/triangle'ish through pulse width. With an LFO modulating this, you can affect pulse width modulation or any waveform modulation. Minitaur, due to the volt/Hz. architecture and the range of the power supply was designed to only play lower frequencies so at a certain point, the OSCs cease to play higher notes. Fine for bass pedals or left hand playing but not general purpose.

[going from memory here] Phatty only has 2nd OSC frequency for detuning; so you can set your 2nd oscillator to be a musical fifth up from the fundamental oscillator and play anywhere across the keyboard range and it will be musically proper.

Minitaur can do this also but adds a BEAT frequency parameter, which on earlier firmware could only be modified from the App. More recent firmware versions now have a way to shift the panel to control the BEATing. The BEAT parameter stays constant across the keyboard range so if your OSCs are beating a 4 Hz. (four times a second), it will continue to do so whichever note is played. 2nd OSC detuning, on the other hand will double every octave just as the primary frequency does. So detuning of 4 Hz. played an octave higher will still 'beat' but at 8 Hz. So OSC 1 may be 440 Hz. and OSC may be 444 Hz., but an octave higher, OSC 1 is 880 Hz. and OSC 2 is 888 Hz. the difference being 8 time a second you can hear (and see on scope) the OSC pulsing. Great for conventional musical detuning, in fact, it's necessary; but not ideal for low bass rumble. If you are familiar with the Minimoog/Voyager, you can see the same sort of feature in Oscillator 3 which can be disconnected from the keyboard and beat at a fixed frequency regardless of key pressed.

Envelopes:

Steve is right, there is a shift button sequence you can use from the panel of the Minitaur to dual purpose the Decay knob for a true four stage envelope which is more like the modern Moog synths. Taurus III, Taurus, and Minimoog for that matter had a different envelope/contour generator.

LFO:

Minitaur only has a single waveform, where Taurus III has a many choices to choose from as does Slim Phatty. Minitaur does have one advantage since you can bind the LFO to both LFO and VCO, different amounts, simultaneously. The Phatty engine (Little/Slim generation) can only route LFO to a single destination because there was only one Mod bus and no multi-dest capabilities; But both have CV Input jacks which let you independently modulate pitch, filter, and volume for that matter assuming you have external modulation sources.

There are of course, more differences but these are a few of the biggest in terms of synth architecture. If you are already accustomed to playing Bass pedals then get a used Minitaur and see how it suits you? If you really want room shaking bass, it will deliver. What it will not do, out of the box, is make any sound without another controller... but if you have a CP-251, you can send it a pulse wave (trigger) via LFO and go crazy from there.

If you want a small keyboard and a general purpose Phatty type synth, maybe consider a Sub Phatty, you should be able to get one of these cheap these days.

If you are interested in the Sub37, well then, you are back to a full size Phatty footprint again, lots of $$ and maybe you ARE a keyboard player

FWIW, I owned the MPK25, the Novation SL 25 MK II (both bought specifically to play and tweak the Taurus III with and both are fine but these days, you might be best with something with a synth engine built in that is also 2 Octaves. Note that some of the other, dare I say non-moog options, will give you some CV out capabilities and some Arpeggiator/Seq control. I know know thing more about the synth engines than you can read on the spec sheet but the Brute series looks pretty capable and has some CV output.

[stiiiiiiive]

The Phatty engine (Little/Slim generation) can only route LFO to a single destination because there was only one Mod bus and no multi-dest capabilities; But both have CV Input jacks which let you independently modulate pitch, filter, and volume for that matter assuming you have external modulation sources.

Actually, there is a second destination setting reachable through a menu. The amount is all the same as for the main destination, which is limited but does exist.

the Brute series looks pretty capable and has some CV output.

Yep, the Brute are amazing: fun, good sounding, small/light... I struggling not to get one.

[EMwhite]

I thought that you could alter / swap Mod dest 5 & 6 to Noise/S+H but it was an instead? But ah, this may be the one exception between the Tribute and the Stage editions. I'm sure you are right.

[stiiiiiiive]

Yes, you can swap the sources 5 and 6 from resp. envelope to noise and to S&H.
AND you can add a "destination 2" value or not.

MOD SOURCE 5 (MOD SRC 5): Values: FILT, S-H
MOD SOURCE 6 (MOD SRC 6): Values: OSC2, NOISE
MODULATION DESTINATION 2 (MOD DEST2): Values: OFF, PITCH, FILTER, WAVE, OSC2

I'm not aware of any Tribute Edition specificity on this point, but you know better than me.