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Comment by armitron | Hacker News Reader

Like NTS-1, super-overpriced garbage but plenty will buy because it has KORG written on it.

To me, the value lies beyond the hardware, which is likely just off the shelf parts.

The documentation looks really nice, and it’s extremely rare for a company to provide any printed material with their hardware, other than the multi language safety card. Many will just provide a basic how-to support page to get you along your merry way, but this looks superb, and a great way to get people learning. I wouldn’t be surprised if the bulk of development costs lie in that book.

The will also be providing firmware updates, patches and quality enhancements, which are likely to be much better than your open-source project in GitHub with a moderate client base.

That book costs $70 and just inflates overall price of the device. You can buy it separately on the page of its author.

Not disagreeing, but what’s the non-overpriced alternative for an affordable oscilloscope with 4 CV inputs? The Mordax Data is almost twice the cost and takes up space in a modular rack.

i’d check the list of hardware supported by sigrok and see if any of it is cheap enough, then you could use a PC for the display which would be much more convenient.

something like the labjack u3 would probably suffice with a bit of signal conditioning. (and learning how to do that would be way more educational and relevant than snapping together a no-solder kit.)

Yep. I'm selling my mordax data for this

Sell it to a fellow HN user?

I am not familar with audio oriented solutions and it will be hard to precisely match all the audio features and price with electronics scope. But as reference point 200$ is the price point where you can get some of the proper lower end electronics oscilloscopes. Even for low end electronics scopes most of the specs will be orders of magnitude better (except 4 channels and some of the audio oriented features), also better screen and enough engineering budget to create proper case. Lower end 4 channel scopes will start at the 400$ range. You can get some of 4ch Hantek USB based scopes in the 200$ range, although no LCD and must be connected to a computer. Some of the DSO200 series from Miniware are in the 100$, only up to 2 channels and less audio oriented features but much nicer LCD and case. The firwmare for DSO200 is semi open source so it might be possible to make a version which is more optimized for audio usecase. Note some of the listings for DSO200 series mention 4ch but it's 2 analog + 2digital channels

At the end of day for people who will actually use it convenience probably beats other factors and having exactly right set of features, ability directly plug audio connectors, UI and software optimized for audio workflow can be preferable even if comparing raw specs and build quality to electronic tools makes it feels like a cheap DIY/kit or toy.

Or you can buy a used HP 54600, which is a bit large, but doesn’t have a Costco look and feel and comes with a pleasant to use interface, with knobs for everything important and zero latency.

The point of the KORG display is to give visual feedback of audio signals on someone's modular synth without having to fuss with triggering, scaling, channels, and timebase. It's a very narrow problem space and it can be done with something compact and focused for the context in which it operates.

A 100MHz instrument scope like that HP is way overkill for such a purpose and will have an overwhelming number of controls and features. Worse, it will be easy to get it in a state where nothing is appearing and you have to fiddle with buttons to just see a waveform-- this is NOT something a musician wants, not ever, and especially not when live.

What you are saying is true for many scopes, but there's another reason I've mentioned this particular one: you just press the "Auto" button. It's not only easier to use than some digital scopes, it's easier than analog ones. IIRC Auto even takes care of showing the right inputs.

There is the vpme Zeroscope which is ~180€ built and takes 6hp for 2 channels.

Compared to it and the Mordax Data, the Korg offering is interesting.

Personally, I use an Expert Sleepers ES-9 connected to my laptop with VCV Rack scopes and spectrum analyzers. The ES-9 is a great Swiss army knife module, albeit greedy on the +12V rail and somewhat costly. I'm still longing for a proper 4 channels scope.

Just as a value comparison - the Rigol DS1054Z is a real 4-channel oscilloscope and is $429 MSRP. The target markets are different, of course.

"overpriced" is likely, "garbage" is a very long stretch, to me.

you don't get to define "garbage" for everyone.

The NTS-2 is overpriced. The NTS-1 is ok-priced.

the korg is actually fairly cheap for the market. the current market leader (mordax data) is 50% more expensive.

Yes, $230 such overprice. It should be given as a gift with child meals in McDonalds... /s

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