EP–133

[capableweb]

The pricing is surprisingly low ($299) for being Teenage Engineering, wonder if they got tired of people complaining about their pricing? I guessed somewhere around $1000 before seeing the price.

[maxfurman]

From the Verge article[0] on this device, it was designed from the ground up to a) only need parts that they could actually get during the pandemic, and b) sell for less than $300.

I think this looks really cool and I want my in-laws to gift it to me for the holidays.

[0] https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/22/23965528/teenage-enginee...

[dmicah]

Their pocket operator series were inexpensive, at $60-100 per model, but were very basic with essentially a bare PCB and most of the electronics protected by being placed under the screen. I believe that much of the cost of their expensive products is due to a lot of custom parts like CNC machined aluminum enclosures. This product seems designed to hit a price point between the pocket operators (~$100) and their plastic OP-Z (~$500).

[op00to]

I'll put my comment about price here. I saw "teenage engineering" and immediately thought "no way I'd afford that", but I clicked anyway. Sort of like how I'd look at a Lamborghini poster as a kid.

[lifty]

It looks like it's made of plastic. Some of their other outrageously priced products are made of aluminium. Maybe that accounts for a chunk of the difference.

[yardie]

Wow, compared to some of their other products $299 for a TE sampler seems absolutely reasonable and much lower than I expected.

[aa-jv]

64Megs is only going to get you so far.

1010Music Blackbox is by bar a much, much better investment.

Screw Teenage Engineering. They degrade everything they touch.

[wavemode]

Beautiful device. Ugh. Coming across ads like this is like a bad drug.

I can hear the equipment in my closet that I already barely use, crying out to me "don't do it!"

[kstrauser]

Insert the meme of me turning to look at this, while the dusty Novation Launchpad sitting on my desk is looking at me with jealous anger.

I want this. I don't need it at all. But wow, I want it.

[mr_sturd]

Ha! I'm teetering on the edge of buying a MicroFreak. There's no way I could justify the cost of anything from TeenageEngineering - though £299 isn't as steep as I was expecting from these. Stay Strong!

[MDGeist]

Yesterday an expensive desk toy, today a reasonably priced sampler. Not sure if TE is YOLOing or it is all part of a genius marketing plan.

[deebosong]

Can't help but feel it's their gameplan. And I try to remain non-reactive, but I thought it was smart.

That toy car looked ridiculous, but not completely out of line with their shenanigans in the past. So it seemed somewhat "in character."

And then to immediately follow-up with a way more useful, beautiful, functional, cool and interesting product that's "only" $50 more expensive – with all the anchoring price point tactics and such dialed-in – and is like, 3x less than their OP-1 was (maybe even more), and "only" 2-3x more expensive than their higher-end pocket operators that essentially have similar functions... Then I do think they know exactly what they're doing.

All that being said, it absolutelye worked on someone like me and I bought one lol. I was so, so ready to be offended and be presented with more egregiously expensive-but-useless doodads. But $300 for a slick sampler... That's really not bad at all. Considering the Roland 404 is $200 more, and some other audio gadgets I bought with less functions are in the $200 range.

[tecleandor]

Yep! If you showed me that landing page hiding the price, and knowing TE, I would have said that it was going to be at least double or triple the price.

[merelysounds]

Absolutely both.

They have been successfully releasing extremely well designed and extremely frustrating devices for a while now.

And if anything, they’re getting more and more popular, working with ikea or panic and both iterating on old ideas and exploring new ones.

[driggs]

Curious that its got a nonstandard 46.875 kHz samplerate rather than 44.1 or 48.0 kHz.

Not that it matters since its only output appears to be on the analog side of the DAC.

This is a surprisingly well-featured sampler/sequencer for the price!

[tecleandor]

It might be because of the clock of the CPU or the dac being 24Mhz.

24MHz/512=46.875KHz

Edit: or 12, 6, 3...

  24MHz/512=46.875KHz
  12MHz/256=46.875KHz
  6MHz/128=46.875KHz
  3MHz/64=46.875KHz...

[porkloin]

Yeah, very weird. They have a sample prep tool that converts existing samples to the correct format, and obviously the internal sampling records to that rate.

[duped]

I've heard Lexicon used to use weird sample rates in its reverbs to make it harder to reverse engineer.

[lukeh]

It may have to do with part availability during the pandemic, perhaps?

[MrBuddyCasino]

"93.75kHz and 46.875kHz are the sampling frequencies Bruno Putzeys uses in all his digital products for Hypex, Grimm audio, KII, etc.", as outline here[0], for the following reason:

    5.2 Clock
    The clock circuit is the same as that used in the CC1
    except that the sampling rate is set to 93.75kHz instead
    of one of the more traditional audio rates. This is specifically
    done to improve the performance of the SRC chip.
    An uncommon clock frequency reduces the odds that mix
    products between the incoming clock and the internal
    clock fall inside the PLL loop bandwidth of the SRC.

[0] https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/w...

[yitchelle]

As I load up the website, it dithers for a moment before the full image comes up. I love this effect...Have I gone full circle from my dialup days? I think I have...

[mr_sturd]

> Whatever you now find weird, ugly, uncomfortable and nasty about a new medium will surely become its signature. CD distortion, the jitteriness of digital video, the crap sound of 8-bit - all of these will be cherished and emulated as soon as they can be avoided.

— Brian Eno

[agloe_dreams]

Not only is it a nice effect.... but the Muhammad Ali landing page is downright insane. That hero image choice is pure gold. It is insanely brave to not put the product in the hero too. Utter envy.

Edit: OH MY GOD, THE PACKAGING.

[ketzo]

It's so nice, actually. Great little effect that fits well with the rest of the page's aesthetic.

[stigi]

I don't know how they do their math, but they advertise it for 299USD but when I open the store it's sold for 349EUR which today converts to 380USD... That's a 30% difference that hurts.

[alanfranz]

Prices in the US generally don’t include VAT, and maybe there’s some exchange or import fee on top as well.

[6581]

The $299 don't include VAT.

[stigi]

Thanks for the pointers everybody. They make sense. The frustration of seeing a 299 price tag and then being hit with a 349 price after one click on the store link is bad.. Didn't stop me from buying though :D

[marginalia_nu]

Speaking in general, prices tend to differ between regions away from just basic exchange rate math, since shipping costs means you don't get proper arbitrage pressure, which is what would pushes prices toward (lowest advertised price) x (exchange rate).

[dubcanada]

Welcome to most of the world outside of US. I can drive 3 hours and pay 20-30% less for everything including exchange rate.

[Night_Thastus]

I have absolutely no use for this, but damn I love the aesthetics. That thing is just gorgeous.

[deebosong]

OK I'm commenting twice and have no affiliations to TE or The Kount.

But apparently, The Kount made a buncha sounds for this thing.

https://twitter.com/THEK0UNT/status/1727365475976216610

I'm not that good at making beats, don't have deep knowledge on tech specs, or even have good creative workflow (I'm a very enthusiastic dabbler). But The Kount's free sample packs are so good (IMHO), and the beats he makes are certified bangers (he uploads 1 min vids of them on Twitter/ IG/ YouTube). Just wanted to highlight this as well and makes me happy to know.

[patapong]

A long presentation and demo of the EP-133 is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjW6_BuXN_4

[simonebrunozzi]

The device looks gorgeous.

I did a little bit of music creation with an Amiga 500 and Soundtracker, ~30-32 years ago.

What would be an equivalent software-only thing to warm up to this again, before I decide I really need to purchase this thing?

[zoklet-enjoyer]

I love my PO-33. If I didn't have a SP-404 MK2 I'd be getting this. I still might be able to figure out how to justify it to myself. But really I don't need a 3rd sampler.

[bdowling]

The image of Muhammad Ali taunting Sonny Liston to get back up is one of the most famous images in sports. I can’t imagine how much it cost to license.

[dmd]

You think they licensed it, rather than just copying it from google image search? (Speaking as someone whose spouse licenses images and sees people doing that ALL THE TIME.)

[danwee]

I'm a total newcomer about this, but I would like to learn and start making "music". They advertise:

> MAKE USE OF THE CURATED SELECTION OF DRUMS, BASS AND KEYS THAT COME PRE-LOADED ON YOUR K.O.II.

Question: would I be stuck with their pre-loaded curated selection or is there any way I can "upload" any extra dum/bass/keys and use them?

[lq0000]

What is a "super segment hybrid display"? Looks cool, has VFD vibes, but I assume it's just an OLED with an overlay or something based off in the Verge article "Most of the KO II’s parts are just off-the-shelf components, including the display"

[jhbruhn]

That's my guess as well. Either monochromatic OLED (cheap!) and colored icons (not so cheap?) or the other way around. LCD with front panel might also be fine as long as it's bright enough, and the front panel is dim enough.

[masto]

I can't wait for Bad Gear to do this one.

[S_A_P]

Love that guy.

[cfr2023]

Teenage Engineering Syndrome, oppressive proprietary products with undeniably appealing designs. On the surface, this is their bet effort yet. Props for that, I suppose.

[capableweb]

> Teenage Engineering Syndrome, oppressive proprietary products with undeniably appealing designs

Kind of comes with the sector/industry, not a lot high-quality, standalone gear that wouldn't be considered "oppressive proprietary products".

[stets]

What have you made?

[art-not]

i use my po-33 constantly. it's one of my favourite things I've ever owned. it's crazy how good they are at making little devices feel easy to use

[noman-land]

How do these guys manage to create such damn cool looking stuff every time? It's really impressive.

[kazinator]

That looks too flimsy for pro audio; a month of gigging and it's toast.

No XLR or 1/4" TRS jacks.