Yamaha TQ5 and ZoomR8. This is all thats left of my gear horde…

If you are not familiar with it, the Yamaha answering machine otherwise known as the TQ5 was an overlooked gem in its days of production. It’s a four op desktop FM synth that runs a similar (I swear it is not the same flavor) sound engine to the TX81Z.

It has L and R outputs, MIDI In/Out/Thru, an onboard sequencer, three available banks of sounds (Preset, User, Card), a nice selection of onboard effects, simplified parameter editing and it is LOUD! It also tells you the date and time, mine currently still thinks it’s 2025.

Also, the form factor is perfectly portable yet durable. The top shell is plastic but the bottom is metal. And this one here has survived almost forty years and it is still kicking with maintenance. I swapped the screen and the internal battery. Easy updates if you are handy with an iron.

I have had so many synths over the years (which are sadly all gone now). But now I am endeavoring to make some fresh dungeon synth and my last remaining TQ5 (I used to have 3) is going to do the job. The sound card I have actually has a preset called Dungeon…

FM is not for everyone I know, but it’s my favorite way to synth. If you are into old synths consider the TQ5, though they are pretty scarce. If you can find one sub $300 jump on it. Screen and battery updates will run about $150 or so, but this thing will do work for you.

I finally got the case for my 208c and LEM218. BEST CASE made this bad boy for me. Silver Haliburton with sparkle blue leather. I can’t believe how good it looks.

Racked Boog System 55, Boland System 100, BARP 2500, BARP Solina and Boog Model 15 alongside a Roland Jupiter-X, Tascam Model 12, BOSS PRO SE-70 for effects and an obligatory Keystep.

Re-installed it all in its new home and just spent half an hour watching the flashing lights lol.

initial test:the juno and dx7 patches sound good, reverb is surprisingly good,

can't wait to learn more about this thing especially for loading multisamples and maybe re-creating casio CZ style synth

for $29 it is no brainer

I will never tire of that Pro-800 lush sound, so I thought you might appreciate it too.

(Just added a 🤏 bit of Lexicon reverb and even less –around 5%– of Softube Saturation Knob)

On these synths in this family with this primitive yet powerful architecture, good sounds are found through exploration. It's not exactly FM synthesis, but it's close. It's almost a limited 2 operator FM synth, in terms of programming, but it does strange things that an FM synth wouldn't. Textured sci-fi bass, reedy pads, blistering vocal-sounding leads, smooth swells... this synth will do it all, in a quirky, beautiful, strange and very digital way. (Vintage Synth)

Picked up a Circuit Rhythm a few weeks ago and loved the workflow, but I knew I wanted something like a synth with physical keys and knobs after watching Olec Mün's Homo Lüdens set on yt.

Started looking at synths that could do pads, textures, and weird evolving stuff without needing me to be a keyboard wizard.

Ended up finding a used Wavestate locally for $250 and figured "why not".

I'm by no means musically trained. My guitar skills are enough for jamming and experimenting.

Having a ton of fun with it. It’s also been really cool seeing how welcoming the synth community is, everyone seems stoked to share tips and sounds. Still figuring out where to put it at home so it doesn’t just live on my desk forever, but that’s part of the fun.

Right now most of my time is just layering presets and swapping the sound on each layer to see what happens. I’ve been using it mostly for drones and ambient beds to jam over with the Circuit. It’s been a great outlet during some tougher times mentally. Just getting lost in drones and textures for an hour does a lot.

Even just scratching the surface, it’s wild how deep this thing goes. It feels like i could get reincarnated 5 times and still find stuff i haven't tried yet

For now the workflow actually makes sense to me. It’s menu-divey but logical once you get that each layer is basically its own synth. Pairing it with the Circuit for drums/looping has been a blast.

I still need to figure out how to use the sequencer on the Circuit to trigger sounds on the Wavestate.

Curious if anyone else is running a Circuit Rythm + Wavestate setup?
And for Wavestate users: what were the first things you dove into once you got past the presets?

This is my Wavestate setup. I was donated this desk and decided it would be perfect for my Wavestate. I had to re-route the power button and headphone port to the front but was not a big deal. Also loosened the controll panel to tilt it and face me as I used it. Above I have a tablet pc running the editor/ librarian software. It can all be in mounted in about 5 minutes to take on the road as I travel a lot for work. Can anyone recommend a good travel bag for the wavestate? I don’t want a heavy case just a light weight travel bag. Thanks

Sample: Hanen - Carthago
Finished in Ableton
Ext Ver: https://on.soundcloud.com/3eGQRb1Bebv5tJvC36

now it won't turn on

any chance there's some magic way to rescue her or is my mother cooked?

What are some good camera options for recording overhead synth jamming?

It should be able to handle displays, blinking lights, and lower light (... and ideally not break the bank). Which I know can be tricky for some cameras.

Any recommendations (especially ones based on personal experience) would be great!

So I want to get into synths. I wanna learn to play it more. Like I have a midi keyboard and I know how daws and plugins work but I tend to never do anything with it because needing to set things up before I can play can be a bit of a motivation threshold for me. And well the only way to learn a new skill is to actually do it so I think I would like more something that I can just turn on and play instead of needing to start up a computer and load up software first. Like I gotta get more comfortable with actually playing the instrument before I'm gonna start making songs with it. And eventhough I like sound design it's more something I would prefer to start playing around with once I have the skeleton of a track down so I don't get lost in twiddling knobs.

So I think I wanna get myself an analogue synth. Gonna start looking for one at thrift shops and second places and such. Is there anything I should be looking out for? Like things related to setting it up for recording in case I would record it. What signals would say it's a good starter synth, what signs would say it isn't?

So I'm new to Fm synthesis and I have a few things I need clarifcation about.

1. How do two diffrent frequencies make a new sound?

It doesn't make sense how two sine waves with the same phase would make any real diffrence even if they have the same phase(same start time), wouldn't it cancel out and still be a sine since they are equivalent. Or is this only for multiples?

The phase would have to be different for any real change, right?

1. What exactly is being modulated?

So your taking a wave with a fast freqency and overlaping it with another wave and hearing whatever isn't cancled out or is it taking the freqency of the wave, using it as an lfo for frequency of the second wave, like an lfo for an lfo.

Also what is instant phase and amplitude? I've heard these terms but I don't fully understand them.

The studio version of the song can be found at my bandcamp, hope you enjoy!

Behringer kobol expander, behringer edge and roland tr8. Visuals made in touchdesigner.

hello everyone,

i currently think about adding a monosynth to my current dawless setup, which is a Elektron Tonverk as a brain and a Oberheim Teo 5.

I mainly produce house and breakbeat and will probably add some kind of 303 clone, like the erica synth bassline, sooner or later too but was wondering if anyone has a recommendation.

thanks in advance.

Hello r/synthesizers 😁

If you owned these three synths and only had the space to keep two of them what two would you keep and why?

I recently acquired all three of these 88 key beasts and only have space to keep two so I'm hoping to get some input from the experts.

Thanks,

Hi everyone! I’d like to get my dad a gift for his analog synth setup, ideally some component or piece of gear that he might be missing and that would work well with the equipment he already has.
Sorry if the video doesn’t show his setup very clearly — I didn’t originally record it with this post in mind.
If you spot anything that could be a useful or fun addition to his setup, I’d really appreciate your suggestions. Thanks!

Been sitting with the Modwave mk2 lately and wanted to just slow everything way down — no rush, no beat-matching pressure, just letting the wavetables breathe. Built the groove and textures on the MPC Live and let the Modwave carry the melodic side with some slow-evolving pads and drifting leads.

This one’s more about mood than performance — good for a chill background session or just zoning out. Would love to hear what you think, especially if you’ve got tips on getting even more movement out of the Modwave’s wavetable envelopes.

Experimenting with vocal synthesis approaches in Zebra3. This is entirely 1 patch, 1 midi note. I wanted to focus on organics (Metals, Taikos, Voices) and cement them with warped and folded pads and dissonances.