Wow, this still isn’t out? I remember one of their reps(?) announcing to me at SuperBooth that this was (/would be?) the “world’s slimmest synthesizer”
I guess if it’s vaporware then…?
It’s not vaporware. ( At least by my definition of that. ) It was clearly there at Superbooth. Where it is now, is the question.
And while there have been worse on Kickstarter – outright swindles – the record there is mostly on the good side.
( Reference : The Crowdfunding – The Good the Bad & the Ugly thread )
There is still a better than snowballs chance with this though.
Ah true, I was more joking than serious, but I guess it does exist - I even played it with my own hands lol.
I learnt a lesson from somewhere I briefly worked - as soon as you allow for pre-orders, make sure there’s stock ready to start moving, the thinking here being that you want to capitalise on the initial buzz/hype of the announcement. I wonder what the state of play will be once the SB1 does actually start shipping. Din-Sync have done their 101 clone kit now, and there are more recently announced alternatives that achieve that 101 sound/feel on the market too.
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Especially now with the significant bump in the SB01 price.
Another valuable lesson in product development is ...
when you start a design, you need to design for what the competition will be when you ship, and that is a moving target. So you need to move as fast as you can while still having a very good product.
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Superlative gave an update on January 3rd.
The plan is to begin manufacture in the spring. They do give some detail on specific changes.
It sounds like the non-volatile RAM change is to fix a design goof made much earlier. But the manufacturing test jig modification is much more the sort of unanticipated late problem that is part of design. The tiny circuit board photos at the bottom show both changes.
My feeling is this is actually going to complete, though we’ll see how close to spring this actually lands.
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August 31 update.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/superlative/sb01-analog-synthesizer-of-the-future/posts/4187210
The short version is: some progress and boards are being assembled, but still waiting on some plastic and metal parts? I’ll let you read it for yourself if interested.
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Fuck me, are they still pretending they’re gonna release this?
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Shame on this dude, he posts random stuff instead of updates and showed that (admittedly gorgeous) new instrument he was working on before this.
Things aren’t guaranteed, and people backing knew that- but I dunno, I feel bad for backers of this.
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How long has it been? nearly 5.5 years now. I wonder if it will ever come out. It would be cool if they could iron out all the issues. The concept was always nice even when the execution has been half-baked at best.
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You’d think so now. Why would they keep stirring the pot ( ashes ? ) otherwise. They even have the follow on product in development. ( Monolab )
When and why it has taken so long is beyond my understanding though.
It was a good idea, especially 5.5 years ago and at the original price. The 200 backers deserve something special.
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they really took the “synthesizer of the future” part seriously, right? as in “this synthesizer will be available in the very distant future!”
I’ll show myself out…
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Just looked back through the campaign (had forgotten some things since I first saw this, haha) the keyboard section doesn’t mention velocity sensitivity? Anyone know if that’s a given? Because if not…
No velocity from keyboard. At least as per original design.
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Oh no! Welp I’m out on that alone.
With, at least, velocity (don’t have much need for after touch with a nice bender like they’ve designed) then I could have used it as a serviceable, battery powered keyboard for other gear and it could potentially claim a spot on the desk, but it loses that multi-functionality for me and that’s a compromise I (personally) can’t afford.
Thanks @Jukka for the info, I can peacefully lay the SB-01 to rest for me after 5.5yrs lol
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Man, this thing is gotta be way more expensive to manafacture now than what he asked for it 20 years ago.
tight spot!
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sheesh, you can get an actual SH-101 for less. damn near two of 'em, if you’re lucky.
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And a wall of MS-1 MK II.
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Feels like about the amount of time to get an engineering degree. This really feels like a person with ambition learning how manufacturing works on the kickstarter funder’s dime. Maybe one of these days they will get it all figured out.
Is Kickstarter the new scholarship?
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“I dropped out of a full-ride engineering scholarship at Stanford to launch my innovative product kickstarter! Fully funded in less than 5 hours!”
More seriously, this highlights some interesting elements of the Kickstarter platform, namely the potential for unsuccessful projects.
You can’t back out of this can you?
A lot happens in 6 years, some people that placed kickstarter orders (god forbid) could literally no longer be alive. To not deliver a product throughout such a long time period feels very reminiscent of… a scam.
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