dennis@ihlpf.ATT.COM (Dennis Dale) (10/09/87)
I own a Mountain music system for the Apple ][. I also own a Moog keyboard (mind you, JUST a keyboard). I would like to be able to play, compose, etc. music by using the Moog keyboard and NOT via the computer keyboard or light pen. Does anyone out there know how to do this? I understand that there is/was a keyboard system available for this type of thing from a company called Alpha Syntauri (sp?). Are they still around? Is/was the product any good? I also know of a company who sells unpopulated printed circuit boards for this type of interface, but I'm afraid that it would require some special software package to get it all to work (which they do not supply). I am a hardware/software hacker at heart and I am extremely handy with building home brew add-ons. Any help to get me going would be appreciated. Thanks in advance, Dennis Dale AT&T Bell Laboratories, Naperville, IL ihnp4!ihlpf!dennis -- Dennis Dale AT&T Bell Labs - Naperville, IL (ihnp4!ihobp!dennis)
pxd3563@ritcv.UUCP (Patrick Deupree) (10/11/87)
I was working for a computer store back in 1980 or 1981 when the Alpha Sentauri first came out. Since I was the only person who knew what they were doing in the production department, I was the one that assembled and tested the thing when it came in (but this was before I really got into music, so I didn't play with it as much as I could have). I don't know that I would advise it though, since this is what it is. It comes with the Mountain Music card (which is a two card system with a simple light pen attached). And it comes with a keyboard (all it is is an encoded 64 key keyboard with no velocity sensativity, aftertouch, etc), and a ribbon cable that comes out of it and plugs into an interface that goes in ones apple. The system also comes with software for creating and editing sounds (but unfortunatly this system was done in Lo-res graphics using colored blocks to diagram sounds instead of wave forms). But the sequencing software is much better. If I remember correctly it was a hi-res editing system with 16 tracks of recording (although it would be a really short song considering an apples memory). And it came with maybe 40 or 50 patches on disks. The price tag was also in the ballpark of $1400. I'm not sure if they still exist or not, but in this day and age they are a bit archaic. With the invention of MIDI that kind of system is pretty obsolete, and you could probably buy a halfway decent midi keyboard for $300 (You could even buy a Casio, since you could get synth software for the computer to overcome Casio's tinny sounds). And you could buy a MIDI interface for around $300 (give or take $100), and then the software could run anywhere from $40 to $250, depending on how complex you want to get.