[net.music.synth] PAiA Kits ...

bob@ulose.UUCP ( Robert Bismuth ) (09/30/85)

<------------- do I really still need a blank line here ? --------------->

I was just wondering if anyone on the net has any experience with the PAiA
electronic kits. They advertise such kits as a Hyperflange Digital Delay,
Parametric EQ, Limiter, Vocoder, etc., as well as a unit to be used for
MIDI instrument sync with recorders and VCRs.

Since I operate on a budget and don't have time to design such things
myself, they seem attractive. 

Any comments?

    --  bob
	(decvax!ulose!bob)

ericksen@unc.UUCP (Jim Ericksen) (10/02/85)

> I was just wondering if anyone on the net has any experience with the PAiA
> electronic kits. They advertise such kits as a Hyperflange Digital Delay,
> Parametric EQ, Limiter, Vocoder, etc., as well as a unit to be used for
> MIDI instrument sync with recorders and VCRs.
> 
> Any comments?

I haven't looked at anything PAiA has put out since the world went digital,
but the few kits i've seen were mostly good for "educational value".  I
bought and built a couple of small kits from them: a VCF, which was rather
difficult to integrate with my Moog setup, since PAiA uses volts-to-hertz
rather than volt-per-octave conversion (because it's cheaper, and also
vastly inferior); and a drum-sound generator board, which was a lot of
fun to play with (interfaced to a homebrew 8085-based single-board computer),
but the sound generator board had a signal-to-noise ratio of around 1.

So based on my experiences with their kits, i wouldn't expect much ... but
for the price, they give you something to play with (and see how you could
have designed something twice as good :-) ).
-- 
Jim Ericksen
UNC Chapel Hill

rich@aoa.UUCP (Rich Snow) (10/12/85)

Sender:rich snow

In article <134@unc.unc.UUCP> ericksen@unc.UUCP (Jim Ericksen) writes:
>> I was just wondering if anyone on the net has any experience with the PAiA
>> electronic kits. They advertise such kits as a Hyperflange Digital Delay,
>> Parametric EQ, Limiter, Vocoder, etc., as well as a unit to be used for
>> MIDI instrument sync with recorders and VCRs.
>> 
>based on my experiences with their kits, i wouldn't expect much ... but
>for the price, they give you something to play with (and see how you could
>have designed something twice as good :-) ).
>-- 
>Jim Ericksen
>UNC Chapel Hill
	
	I also have mucked around with PAIAness, (since I PREFER patch
cords, sometimes still do...). While it is true that their older stuff
was real bargain basement, many of the boxes you ask about were designed
by Craig Anderton, rather than their early design staff.  The design
quality may have improved, don't know about the execution; but the
tweaked fuzz of his sounds interesting. (does that statement belong
in net . bizarre?) 
	I'd say try the newer processing boxes, but avoid the synths
(unless you want one for yr kid).  The tape synchronizing computer looks 
like a poor choice (unless you want to spend the next ten years kicking
a modified Vic - 20 around)
	Still - for miscellaneous analog oscillators, Yard-sale PAIA's
are OK.
	rich snow
	...!{decvax,linus,ima,ihnp4}!bbncca!aoa!rich

"Cosmic Togetherness is the Partner of Aural Discord"