minitaur vs phatty

[FX23]

what can the minitaur do what the phatty carnt?

[RANTARAVE]

the oscillators stay in phase with eachother better.

[golden beers]

Fit in a man-bag

[spacefolklore]

Minitaur can sound like Minitaur, which is different from the Phatties.

[Mardi Gras]

The Minotaur is capped at C4

[Liquid Legacy]

Minitaur have 1 knob for each parameter.

Minitaur can do authentic Taurus sounds.

Minitaur can be had for less dough

[clusterchord]

disclaimer: had LP arround for a month, minitaur i only heard what everyone else heard so far..

that being said, i noticed two things. low end seems livelier, organic and more brute on minitaur. and, high end seems more open, and as a result the resonance on the filter is more liquid (compared to LPs rather shaven of high end). i suspect minitaur has a better implementation of classic 4pole ladder filter than LP, but id need to hear it in person to confirm this.

other than that LP is more versatile machine . you can change the number of poles, have distortion circuit, it plays in full range no restrictions etc. however i decided not to keep it. ymmv.

[FX23]

how much are you selling your rx100 for

[Lovebot]

Originally Posted by FX23

what can the minitaur do what the phatty carnt?

The Minitaur will likely sound better in conversation compared to something like, "Yeah, I just picked up the phatty" kind of like... "just picked up the mopho"

[Liquid Legacy]

Originally Posted by Lovebot

The Minitaur will likely sound better in conversation compared to something like, "Yeah, I just picked up the phatty" kind of like... "just picked up the mopho"

Haha, good point. "I paid 800$ for that phatty yesterday..." doesn't sound too good

[FX23]

which one would sound best to play?

[Spectral Climax]

Originally Posted by FX23

which one would sound best to play?

If you look specifically for a mighty bass synth with basic functionality, then, Minitaur is just that. If you look for a modern sounding Moog all-rounder which won't cost you a finger then the LP is better.

It depends on what kind of music you actually play and what you feel that is missing from your current setup.

[spacefolklore]

Originally Posted by Lovebot

The Minitaur will likely sound better in conversation compared to something like, "Yeah, I just picked up the phatty" kind of like... "just picked up the mopho"

Yes, Mr Phatty has been around for around six years now. It doesn't sound like a Minimoog D and the novelty factor has worn out. But at the same time it is one of the most mature and reliable performance synths. With the current version of firmware you can do with it almost everything you would expect from an analogue monosynth, including some exotic things like custom scale tunings.

Originally Posted by clusterchord

that being said, i noticed two things. low end seems livelier, organic and more brute on minitaur. and, high end seems more open, and as a result the resonance on the filter is more liquid (compared to LPs rather shaven of high end). i suspect minitaur has a better implementation of classic 4pole ladder filter than LP, but id need to hear it in person to confirm this.

Minitaur is designed to be a bass synth - it must have ballsier low end, this is the whole point of it.

I agree with you about the high end to some extent. Little Phatty doesn't exactly excel at screaming high pitched tones but it's got enough high end to announce it's piercing presence in the mix.

Here's a short example of high pitched Little Phatty against the DX7 in the background:

I'm getting Arturia Minibrute specifically for more "electronic" sounding screaming tones to support the LP where it is lacking.

[iksrazal]

What about a Minitaur if you have a Voyager, any sonic area the latter can't cover? I thought I'd ask since I'm kind of going thru a Moog phase right now via foogers and expanders.

[soundxplorer]

Originally Posted by FX23

which one would sound best to play?

Do painting forums get questions like "Which color is prettier to look at, blue or green?"

[Mr Arkadin]

Originally Posted by soundxplorer

Do painting forums get questions like "Which color is prettier to look at, blue or green?"

If FX23 is on them, then yes.

[Spectral Climax]

Originally Posted by iksrazal

What about a Minitaur if you have a Voyager, any sonic area the latter can't cover? I thought I'd ask since I'm kind of going thru a Moog phase right now via foogers and expanders.

I think it's the same with the Minitaur vs Phatty situation IMO. Minitaur was designed as a simple bass synthesizer, and it sounds like a very powerful one. It sounds more raw, full and deep compared to Voyager's bass tone. You'd better search some Taurus 3 vs Voyager topics...Minitaur is like a portable Taurus 3.

[pointsource]

Not until we hear some A B comparisons, I'm not sold...

I wonder If the sonic difference is subtle...

You can get more low end from the phatties by EQing a bit...

[soundxplorer]

Originally Posted by clusterchord

and, high end seems more open, and as a result the resonance on the filter is more liquid (compared to LPs rather shaven of high end).

The self-resonance on my Little Phatty goes up past 20kHz (.wav file attached below). Since that's the limit of human hearing it's fine with me.

But maybe you're talking about the early Tribute edition that Sound On Sound reviewed when they remarked that the filter didn't quite open all the way so some HF roll-off was noticeable on raw waveforms. If so, several people have remarked recently on this board that the problem was fixed on later models of the Phatty (and as well on the Tribute with an upgrade). I really don't know if that's true or not, but either way I'm usually programming sounds that involve at least a bit of filtering anyway, so I expect the high frequencies to be rolled off.

[clusterchord]

nope, mine was a stage model.

sure you can wind up resonance and get up there. but when i say shaven off, i don't mean no sound passes at all in HF range (like an extemely steep filter is set there). i mean the highs are attenuated compared to rest of the frequency spectrum, and progressively so going xtra high. as if a shelving eq was placed there.

when you play simple sounds on LP, with open filter, or filter env hitting max... and then do those on minimoog, sh2, source, se1x, jp8 or just about any other analog i had in the studio at the time, it is was obvious right away there's lack of spark, sizzle, liquid on LP.

whether this problem is created at the VCO level, the filter, or maybe in the output VCA stage, that i don't know.

[audslu]

Originally Posted by pointsource

Not until we hear some A B comparisons, I'm not sold...

I wonder If the sonic difference is subtle...

You can get more low end from the phatties by EQing a bit...

I think eq is another thing, you can boost bass but the timbre remains, so oscs, filter and envs is what really counts. Like you say an A B comparison is the best way to judge, nevertheless i think (so far) minitaur sounds better for bass than voyager and of course lp.

[davydka]

Phatty has patch memory and full midi implementation. Minitaur does NOT have patch memory, I'm not sure if the knobs transmit or receive midi.

[The Real MC]

The Minitaur knobs receive MIDI CCs.

Minitaur has MIDI IN only, no MIDI out so knobs do not transmit MIDI.

[Cicatrix]

Does anyone know if it's possible to use a usb/midi keyboard with Minitaur? For example usb/midi controller with usb splitter cable? One end of the usb cable going to a usb power adapter, and the other going into the Minitaur? Would that work?

[FX23]

yeh if they had stuck a little 2 octave keyboard on it would have been a winner

[Black-Man]

Originally Posted by RANTARAVE

the oscillators stay in phase with eachother better.

I'm glad I read this forum... this is the second thing that had driven me crazy w/ my LP - and I thought it was just me. LOL.

[controlvoltage]

Originally Posted by The Real MC

The Minitaur knobs receive MIDI CCs.

Minitaur has MIDI IN only, no MIDI out so knobs do not transmit MIDI.

USB Midi on Minitaur is both in and out. All knobs and switches DO transmit MIDI out the USB. So you can record your knob tweaks that way.

You can also custom-map the CC assignments for all knobs/parameters, which is nifty...

[ohmicide]

Originally Posted by golden beers

Fit in a man-bag

[The Real MC]

Originally Posted by controlvoltage

USB Midi on Minitaur is both in and out. All knobs and switches DO transmit MIDI out the USB. So you can record your knob tweaks that way.

Yoiks, missed that USB socket

[Susceptor]

Originally Posted by soundxplorer

Do painting forums get questions like "Which color is prettier to look at, blue or green?"

I like green for acid* and blue for LEDs.

*sometimes I like blue for acid as well