This is an audio demo of the Waldorf Microwave Wavetable Synthesizer, a rackmount synth based on Waldorf’s Wave synthesizer.
This classic rackmount synth features 8-voice polyphony, and an interesting mix of analog and digital style synthesis.
If you’ve used the Microwave, leave a comment with your thoughts!
via retrosound72:
Waldorf Microwave Mk1 Revision A with curtis filter CEM3389 (Revision B CEM3387) from the year 1989, the direct successor of the PPG Wave
demo: analog and digital pads, wavetable sounds, bells, sweeps, fx sounds…
up to 8.12 bass and sequencer sounds, sequenced by the MFB Step64The sound of the Microwave Mk1 (real hybrid synth) and Microwave Mk2 (DSP based synth) is absolute different.
Absolute different, indeed… the Waldorf synths are great for doing side-by-side comparisons of how much good analogue filters change the sound. Being a born sceptic, I never really believed that there was so much difference in analogue, until I heard a side by side comparison between the Waldorf Q and Q+ keyboards. Like seeing one in black-and-white and the other in blazing colour…. yes, its the same picture, but one's just pretty while the other is truely breath-taking.
On the Microwave, the analogue filters take a lot of the thin harshness out of the top end of the digital wavetable sounds. I would love to own a mk1 Microwave, but I've made do with my mk2 (XT rack model) and putting it through the Curtis filters on the DSI Evolver desktop. Or putting together a wave monster by running the output of the Microwave XT into the inputs on a Korg Wavestation A/D and then through the filters on the Evolver, for a huge wavetable/wavesequence/vector-mixed evolving sound (but really complicated to plan out).
So, anyone owned both revisions A and B of the MicroWave Mk1? These have some different components. I'm ordering a Mk1 Revision A at the moment. I haven't heard really good comparisons of the two though.
I read somewhere that the full featured Wave (keyboard with all the knobs, lots of voices etc) was more like Mk1 Revision B – not sure if that's true though.
It sure would be nice to have all the knobs, and modulation of an XT with the analogue filters.
I think I may build a MonoWave (X) some time too. They're just that bit different.
I've got a Mk1 that I use with a BeeCard memory expander in the slot on the front. I use Emagic SoundDiver on the Mac to design wavetable waveforms, and save them to the card via sysex. Lovely! I'm not sure about some of the sounds demo'ed in the video above though. A lot of them sound quite 'dated'. It's capable of some pretty slick stuff, even by today's standards, if you take time to program it.
I've got a Mk1 that I use with a BeeCard memory expander in the slot on the front. I use Emagic SoundDiver on the Mac to design wavetable waveforms, and save them to the card via sysex. Lovely! I'm not sure about some of the sounds demo'ed in the video above though. A lot of them sound quite 'dated'. It's capable of some pretty slick stuff, even by today's standards, if you take time to program it.