Processing voltages

There are sexy, unusual modules that can be very interesting. Then there’s utility modules. Not so interesting, but useful. Here’s one: The design for this started out as a clone of the voltage processor from the ARP 2600 synthesizer. There are two voltage summing sections and a lag circuit. One thing that always bugged me […]

ARP 2600 (-based) envelope follower

This is an envelope follower (EF) module in Kosmo format with mic and instrument preamplifiers. I looked, in simulations and on the breadboard, at several envelope follower designs (you can read about some of that by following the envelope follower tag) and ended up deciding to go with a design based on the ARP 2600 […]

2600

The ARP 2600 was introduced in 1971 — fifty years ago. It was made by a company called Tonus, which later became ARP Instruments, that had been founded by Alan R. Pearlman (hence ARP) with David Friend two years earlier. It was a semi-modular synthesizer with three VCOs (switchable between audio and low frequency), one […]

ARP

Alan R. Pearlman died on Saturday. He was the founder of ARP Instruments, which together with Moog dominated the synthesizer business in the early to mid 1970s. Some unfortunate business decisions (which, as I understand it, Pearlman opposed) cut the company’s success short and ARP went out of business in about 1981, as analog subtractive synthesis […]