A Brief History of the Vocoder

The above video, via Noir Et Blanc Vie, takes a look at the history of the vocoder – and some things that commonly confused with vocoders.

The video is a prelude to his review of the Roland VP-03 – a synth & vocoder in the company’s Boutique line:

IF you’ve used the VP-03, leave a comment and let us know what you think of it.

9 thoughts on “A Brief History of the Vocoder

    1. @ Hashmoder :
      No EMS aren’t the best vocoders ever made even if these are good. The voice signal thru it is not as intelligible as it should be.
      Best are :
      -First is the Moog ( or Bode ) MBVO (16 channel vocoder ) wich is the warmest sounding one because of adding a lot of harmonies in the signal and voice thru it is really extremely intelligible..
      -Second one is the Sennheiser VSM-201 ( 20 Channel vocoder ) wich doesn’t add as many harmonies in the signal as the Moog does, so sounds a little bit less warm but still far better than EMS does, and voice thru it is also extremely intelligible.
      -Third is the Roland VP 330 for his intelligibility wich is still really superior to EMS, the Roland VP-330 vocoder effect is not so effective so it sounds very well and warm but not as good as Moog & Sennheiser. (SCV-350 is the same as VP-330)
      -The EMS-5000 comes in fourth. ( the differences with 3000/2000 are : components, size, actives parameters and number of frequency channel )
      -And the EMS-3000 & EMS-2000( two different versions exist : first 2000 have the same components than 3000 wich have the worst intelligibilty from the EMS serie, and second 2000 version have just three or four diff components, and is just a little bit better for intelligibility )
      -Korg VC-10 is really the worst analogic vocoder. It sounds very metalic and voice thru it is just non intelligible at all.
      All these vintage vocoders are analogic.
      There’s also the Korg DVP-1 wich is really better than VC-10 and sounds very well. But this one is digital.
      All those which came after are not as good as these ones..
      Some unique piece of gear are also sounding very very well but I’m only talking here about series models wich where marketed..

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