@udo-audio I didn’t see an answer to the earlier question about why Gemini is 5x5 instead of 6x6. I’m curious because, on the surface, it seems like an odd choice, given that you already have the architecture for the super6.
Having two layers IMO changes nothing about the amount of polyphony you’d like to have. At some point, you decided that the super6 should have that many voices, so I’m wondering why you thought that this time 5 would be enough.
Also, 6 voices seem to be a common minimum for poly synths, with the Take5 being an exception but marketed as a cheaper alternative to the Prophet sound, so reducing cost must have been a priority.
The Gemini was always going to be an expensive synth, given its specs, so I have a hard time imagining that the 6th voice would have jacked up the price by a significant amount.
I’d love to have a bit more insight into the decision-making.
Hi, it’s worth mentioning that the Gemini is 10 + 10, so 20 voices total. All 20 voices can be assigned to a single polyphonic patch for true 20 note poly without limitation.
The voice reduction only happens when you choose multitimbrality and binaural modes. So you can have a 20 note monaural (with pan spread), 10 voice binaural, or any combination of 10/10, 10/5, 5/10 5/5 etc.
It is not a cost saving measure, although analog voices need duplicating for every note and multitimbrality further complicates this.
By comparison to Geminis 20 voices, Moog One has 8 or 16 voice, Obx8 8 voices, prophet 5 5 or 10, Super 6 12 voices, Poly brute 6 voices, OB6 6 voices …
There simply becomes a point where an engineer must decide how much is enough, and how much is over engineering, and 20 was perfect.
I do a little forestry management with my family in Norway throughout the year. The saying there goes, if the chainsaw isn’t occasionally too small, it’s probably too big. This applies to most tools I think.
Thanks for your reply. I do understand the voice mapping options. It is a very powerful synth compared to the competition.
But since the S6 was designed specifically with binaural in mind, I reasoned that if you were to layer two “typical” S6 sounds you have only 5 voices, and that’s a surprising number given its heritage.
I take from your reply that you consider layering two binaural sounds a bit overkill. Or if you do, you likely won’t need much polyphony. You might be right. I will find out…
In any case, I’m very excited about the SG and can’t wait to try it out!
Good luck with the last phase.
PS: I do think it’s really awesome that you can freely assign the voices and have a 10-voice S6 equivalent.
Hello and congratulations on making such a desirable inner spaceship control deck. Will one be able to tinkle the ivories on the one hand and tickle expressive silicon on the other? Or in other words: could you play one split with the Gemini keyboard and the other via something else through midi?
Thanks! I’m still waiting for confirmation with Thomann as having to arrange a bank transfer. I’ll post if I get more info. It says 5-7 weeks at the moment, so perhaps different resellers are at different places with their batches.
Hi, I have a question regarding the voice allocation in MPE mode.
I tried the Super 6 Desktop with my Osmose and understand it limits MPE mode to 6 voices as the analog part of the instrument only allows for 6 separate CVs at once.
Is this the same with the Gemini though? Is it possible to assign one layer to an MPE controller with 10 monaural voices and still use the other layer with the built-in keyboard also with 10 voices?
I heard back from Thomann (France) end of November they say. Is the Super Gemini made in the UK, like I heard the Super 6s are now, does anyone know? That’s great if so! Regardless it’s nice to be getting a decent price compared to America for a change! Looking forward to seeing if I can answer some of many questions for myself when I get my hands on this synth! (My last synth was Korg Volca Bass so bit of an upgrade!) ((Wow! That was a lot of exclamation marks!))
@0x80 I pondered this, and came to the conclusion that it’s not so simple. In single mode, you’ve got 20 or 10 voices, which is way more than the S6, so that’s a win. You then have the split/dual nature where you can have a variety of voice combinations across the two layers. If you choose to have binaural on both, then I would wager that 5 and 5 voices is going to give you more than enough of a sonic palette to render voice stealing far less of an issue - certainly for me. Doesn’t make my decision on an S6 vs SG any easier though! lol
Just pre-ordered! Fingers crossed for a quick arrival to the US : )
Does the gemini have any feature to indicate where settings are in a particular patch? Like how a light flashes or dot appears (on synths with screens) if I sweep across the preset knob position? Super helpful when learning how to program and understand a new synth
I pre-ordered some time ago, a month or more now, and am only just over the water in France, and my family are Bristol since wayback and everything, but I heard the US is getting the next batch!
Thomann tells me it’ll be end of January, so I’m doing my best to just ignore everything Gemini now, and just wait patiently for my own indiviDual to arrive…
Playing with the Gemini for a few days now, it seems more tame than the Super 6 on a single layer, unless I am doing something wrong. On the Super 6 the first distortion was mostly enough for me to make it sound beefy, that seems a bit less powerful on the Gemini, the 2nd distortion is a bit too much now for me to make it sound pleasant. The perfect sound for me is if I use the arpeggiator in legato mode, which is very powerful and is almost exactly what I could achieve on the Super 6, but I didn’t need to use legato mode then. Is this something by design or is this a user error?
I believe UDO has said they tuned the audio path on the Gemini to give it a different character from the S6, so it seems reasonable to me that there would be a difference in how the two act and react.
I’ve tried this (was nicknamed the Battwave hack I believe) and it doesn’t seem to currently be supported (also not mentioned in the manual I don’t believe). Would be very keen for this to be added back in, in a future firmware update - was one of my favourite features on the S6.
