Zynthian has introduced v3 of their Zynthian ‘open synth’ kit.
They say that the new kit is a big step forward for the Zynthian project, for several reasons:
- Pre-built: It’s completely pre-built using SMD technology, so you don’t need to solder anything. Just plug the wires and screw the bolts.
- Zynscreen: The new official display has been specially designed for zynthian and integrates the controller interface, what simplify the assembling process.
- Zynaptik: The new zynaptik circuit integrates the 3 standard MIDI ports (IN/OUT/THRU) and some new optional features.
- Audio Input: The Hifiberry DAC+ ADC is the new official soundcard and integrates audio input, allowing to use zynthian as a powerful FX processor or stompbox.
Here’s a demo video for the previous version:
Pricing and Availability
The Zynthian Kit v3 is available now for 275.00 €.
Looks really cool! Nice design! Excellent connectivity!! Price isn’t too bad.
Site is a little light on details.
Glad it’s reached a milestone. It does sound like a nice setup. Not that cheap but probably worth it for some people. And the project has contributed to other Open Source/Hardware projects.
Been using the Blokas Pisound HAT for a while. Cheaper than this full kit but more expensive than the HiFiBerry on its own. Something I like about Pisound is that it’s well integrated with software. You can use Pisound with different Linux distributions for Raspberry Pi, download a full image of Blokas’s Patchbox OS (a special flavour of the Raspbian distro), or emulate a MOD Duo “virtual pedalboard” setup using MODEP (MOD Emulation for Pisound). That last one is my favourite because I can run it headless (without a screen) and change patches using a web browser on another device. Very clever and quite convenient. Brought that setup to jams and used it for demos in museums.
The Raspberry Pi 4 with 4GB of RAM will likely improve any kind of Pi-based setup. In my experience, RAM can be a serious bottleneck in musicking situations.
MIDI DIN input? and can I map CC’s to specific functions inside of this? Also.. I saw RCA outputs – Any 1/4″ outputs?
Yes to both. There are stereo outputs on 1/4″ Jack’s (left and right) and balanced mono in on a stereo 1/4″ jack. Midi din in out & thru with led echo and status display. For midi learning http://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_UI_Users_Guide#MIDI-learning
Maybe I don’t understand the concept, but are there any win over compared to SM Pro Audio V-Machine or Muse Receptor?
I don’t know other than a quick search about the machines you mention but I believe the zynthian’s unique offering in this space is the open source element. All the source is out there, and is heavily influenced by it’s community.
Just the ability to optimise features like audio level display . .
http://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_UI_Users_Guide#The_Status_Area
A feature contributed by a zynthian user, demonstrates the true value of the device.
The environment takes standard components (Raspi /hifiberry & other cards) and implements them into a stage tested environment with an obvious option for MUCH mechanical manipulation by user imagination…. (We’ve got someone who has bolted one to a harp) https://discourse.zynthian.org/t/zynthian-harp-i-promised-it-to-wyleu/3118.
With this new release we have removed the soldering requirement which allows people to easily construct a stage ready synth for themselves, but the community is actively keen to turn linux based audio kit into sound samples!
Honestly I’m not the marketing department just a fairly piratical contributor to a project that did far better at a project I’d been trying to write until I’d found what jofo had done. 😀
Also Zynthian is fanless, whereas V-Machine has a quite noisy fan.
Expensive, but cool. I like the idea of using the Raspberry Pi as an embedded synth engine, and the hardware design with MIDI, knobs, audio, and screen is nice.
One question I have is: how did they get the Pi to work in USB gadget (i.e. device) rather than host mode? That’s the biggest road block I’ve hit trying to use the Pi as a USB MIDI synth module. IIRC the Pi 0 and original Pi can work in USB gadget mode, but the current Pi3/Pi4 don’t (sadly!)
Side note: making USB asymmetric may have made it easier for users, but it destroyed its potential as a general purpose, bidirectional, high-speed data connection.
Studio Production…. Hahaha….. with this creepy user interface…. make my day…