The True Power Of This Fully Operational Death Star...

Got the Roland CMU-800R all up in this bitch. This unit essentially completes the Complete Professional Musician’s Apple //e System. This Apple //e now has a pair of Mountain Computer synthesis cards, a Decillionix sampler card, an alphaSyntauri keyboard and software, and the CMU-800R. There were, as far as I’m aware, no other “pro” pieces of music-making gear for it, other than the Passport Soundchaser system, which also uses the Mountain Computer cards, and thus is the same additive synthesis as the alphaSyntauri.

I’ll put up a full workup with sound samples and what-not as soon as I get balls-deep in the step editing heaven that is the Compu-Music software. Suffice to say that the following things are true:

1. People that have written that the CMU-800R contains a complete TR-606 are off their fucking rocker. It is a full analog drum voicing board, but it ain’t no 606. In looking at the schematics, it’s kind of its own thing. I compared it to the 606, DR-110, and TR-808, and found very few similarities other than a general Roland-ness. It is much thinner than any of those.

2. People that say the bass voice is a complete 303 are really off their rockers. The bass voice is coming out the same voice source as the other 5 voices; it and the melody voice have an envelope structure that is somewhat different than the 4 “chord” voices, and the bass voice is the only voice that has a filter, a simple Sallen-Key 2 pole LPF. But it ain’t no 303.

Anyhow, I’ll put up samples and maybe a short video when I’ve got it sequencing like a champ, but suffice to say it works fine, and if you’re in to 80s computer-based music making, you can’t touch this rig.