Maestro either was bought by or a division of Gibson, know for making guitars. They also made electronic effects and drum machines in Illinois, I think. They made Rhythm Kings mark 1 thru 4, a ring modulator, fuzz, and a phaser - from what I’ve seen.
Based from the Description, this feels like it's from an alternate fallout timeline where the bombs never fell and the so-called "World of Tomorrow" advanced further along with Music actually branching out from the usual old time jazz, blues, doo-wops, and country although with a retro-futuristic spin
Who knows how to perform a total restoration on these? I mean refurbishing/replacing the pads, buttons, everything. I see a lot of them modified to play multiple ROM kits like this one, but I never see them totally refurbished. I've owned three of them, including one I bought when it was new in the 1980s, and all three eventually failed due to the pads and buttons going bad. I don't own one now, but I would buy one if it could be fully refurbished to ensure the pads and buttons continued to work properly for years to come.
What you have to do is open it up and clean all the micro switches under the buttons with Deoxit or similar contact cleaner. Do that 2 - 3 times and the small buttons will work again. Usually the pads work fine as they are of better quality.
@@AnalogNoiseLab but there is a thin foam lining around the pads that deteriorates. I don’t know if that is essential to the performance. I took my second one apart, but I didn’t know what I was doing. I probably just caused more damage.
what i find weird is we are not in those typival 85 drum machine/module sounds. Very latin imo, very realistic too, but nothing like a ddd-1 (just to name a korg) there's not that energy, but still, sounds nice; i could get one if i found one under 100 euro, but not for 350+shipping like i saw on eb (you get a ddd-1 for that price lol....). would love to know more about it though...
This is a niche machine, it lacks programming. But the sound is why I like it, not that it’s versatile. I would recommend a DDD-1 if you don’t absolutely adore the sound of this machine.
I can really respect the "no talking" aspect of your video since I just finished one where I couldn't even partially listen to a drum machine without being distracted by the demonstrator's constant and annoying voice. Thanks.
I'd buy one of these - but it just looks so cheap (yeah, I know that's not a good reason) they basically got their 303 clone case and didn't change a thing, it's sounds 80% of the way there to a CR78, but looks like a cheap £20 eBay toy synth. I suspect if they put this in a nice CR78-ish case they would sell a tonne of these.
I agree it’s ugly and a redesign would benefit it. Right now it’s function over form. But on the plus side it is analog. I know Cherry Audio just released an emulator of the CR-78, but I haven’t tried it yet.
@@daniels_electronics The Cherry Audio one is pretty good, I'm only using the demo at the moment (white noise every now and then), the other thing on the way is the Behringer RD-78, which if their 606, 808 and 909 are anything to go by, it will be indistinguishable from the original, and it's analog like the TT78.
The construction article for this (as well as for all their other products) can be found on their website, under PAiA Talk/Documentation and User Manuals. Yes, they are still alive!
If it's PAiA you might actually be able to find the schematics online somewhere. A lot of their early kits used circuits published in electronics magazines of the time.
This mod uses the Tubbutec Unipulse, which converts midi to analog pulses. I’ll be honest, it is not easy and requires some delicate soldering but it is not impossible. It was one of the more difficult projects I’ve worked on.
@@daniels_electronics Tried to find one on eBay and Reverb, they seem super rare, there's just the one on eBay, it's in the US (I'm in the UK) and with the postage it's not cheap ! I'll keep my eye out for a cheap one if I can, until then could I sample / use some of the drums from your video ?
Agreed! Korg had some bizarre claps on their early machines. The MR-16 and DDM-110 had the same unusual clap but the DDD-1 had an “upgrade” with a new clap sounds. I found the best clap was actually using more than one clap layered. If you look around on eBay or Reverb the Clap ROM does come up every so often.
@daniels_electronics I bet you can get it to sound really classy if you use the separate outs for kick and snare and add some compressor, eq and reverb!
In a few days, I will (once again) get my hands on one of these. I had one when they were new. I am anxiously awaiting it because no other drum box that I know of has this sound.
Unfortunately, the drum machine does not store factory patterns in ROMs, you need to have the demo cassette to load via the cassette in. However, the audio file might be online somewhere which could be played into the cassette in just the same.
