elthorno schrieb:
So if it’s discrete - is this the opposite to the DSI ‘synth on a chip’ approach?
DSI has been moving away from that too – since the Prophet 12.
Check this…
elthorno schrieb:
Can anyone shed any light on why Behringer might have gone down this route?
In the 80s, the barrier to entry for custom ICs was not that high – everybody was doing it in one way or another. Part count had to be kept low because all parts were through-hole, and thus required costly labor for manual insertion. There was a big competitive advantage in developing and using custom ICs.
Nowadays, outside of the tiny world of synth design, most of the functions that required custom ICs in the past are done digitally by general purpose digital processors. Few projects require custom ICs, and as a result, the teams designing ICs are only located at large semi manufacturers (TI, AD…) where they work on complex projects in which some boundaries are pushed (cost, efficiency, miniaturization, speed). For synth design, it’s no longer expensive in size and assembly cost to make things out of individual components.
The only question that remains is whether to go completely discrete or to use “building-block ICs” like the 2164 or LM13700. The argument for them is that they are easy and predictable to work with – with many kinks already ironed by their designers. The argument against them is cost (less than $1.0 for ten transistor pairs vs $1.5 for a 2164), and less freedom in achieving a specific sonic quality.
