Corg, 0-Key Mixer Accessory (MONOTRONDUO)

In terms of hardware synths, I have a microKorgXL and a Moog Slim Phatty which I love to pieces and use all the time... However I don't think either of them get as much use as my montron and I think that is purely down to the in built speaker... I have yet to use it in any of my productions and purely play around with it for fun, but I would like to include it in a tune soon. It is sooo much fun for when your chilling and wanna play around with the possibilities of what you can create. I bought this and my housemate loved it so much he went and got the original monotron so we now chain them together and run them through our guitar pedals and kaoss pads to see how far we can push the sounds... if you are a tech head you will know that although sometimes utterly pointless, this experimental process is a lot of fun. Specifically for the duo: I have found that it is definitely the only real monotron designed for playing melodic lines due to its quantizable ribbon keyboard. If you have a chromatic tuner at hand it is very easy to set a key and a scale and get some sweet lines and hooks out of it. The second oscillator is wicked for creating interval based sounds which are reminiscent of retro video game music and electro due to both oscillators being square waveforms. The x-mod on the duo is essentially a frequency modulation effect that routes the output of each oscillator across one another other (hence cross or x mod). The second oscillator can reach inaudible low frequencies and therefor the effect can also be used as an LFO using the square wave of oscillator 2 to modulate the pitch of oscillator one. When turned up to a higher frequency, oscillator 2 modulates the first oscillator to create harmonically rich tones not present in either oscillator creating some interesting distorted and metallic sounds. I am definitely going to buy more monotrons once my next load of pocket money comes in to chain them all together :)

This thing is great fun. Amazing quality and sounds for the money and I love having the built in delay. My almost 3 year old daughter loves it too!

Having had this a few days now I have to admit that after the initial play around I haven't picked it up again. But this is more a reflection on me than the instrument. I did experiment recording it into my DAW and found the result was rather more 'angular' a little rougher, than it sounds through the headphones. I am hoping it was the method I used. Having said all that the instrument itself is of the quality we have come to expect from KORG. A delightful little thing with great potential. For the price you couldn't do better. I haven't yet tried linking it into my other gear but realise the potential that lies there. I heartily recommend this to anyone who enjoys playing with synthetic sounds. Its great. Please note this reivew is for the Monotron DELAY.

I love this little machine. It makes some great sounds and is excellent value for money.

I play in a band (or two) playing garage rock in the old 60s tradition. In the studio, we have used a theremin for swoops and sound effects. That is impractical on stage as it is always too crowded and people stumble into the teremin's "force field". That is cool only the first three times it happens. Enter the Monotron Delay. The Monotron Delay differs from the other Monotrons in that it is virtually impossible to play. Those key outlines on the ribbon are purely decorative. The range is huge. This, it is almost as difficult to play as a theremin, and the resulting sounds are not too different. By balancing a fingernail on the ribbon and angling it ever so slightly to one side or the other, I can play melodies, but it's tricky. But then, I don't have to. The gritty delay makes all those swoops and seagull calls sound awesome, if a bit off key. And that is what you get: an inexpensive box that produces otherworldly sounds. You could use a theremin to the same effect, but it takes up space and costs ten times as much. Conclusion: don't expect to be able to play soaring lead lines unless you have perfect pitch and even better muscle control. Expect to give in to the fact that you don't have to.

Great range of sound manipulation

Hours of fun

This was great craic for about an hour and then stopped working. Changed batteries... no joy. Cheap rubbish really. Though not cheap for an hours entertainment.

I love everything about this synthesizer. Im known as the one who carries his synth everywhere he goes and its a really great device. As a single instrument you can make some really good sound effects. However it doesnt have enough on it to create a excision or skrillex sound but definetly something like deadmau5 or Mord Fustang is achievable on this. The fact it isnt a midi is something that not everyone likes but i actually prefer to have it with the aux jacks because im an on budget person and have some mild Daw's and Music creator 6 cant really make a electro or dubstep beat. You can run a song through it and play sounds over it and that feature is pretty cool. you can also find some pretty good combo's on this thing and its interesting every time you turn a knob. ALSO get a headphone splitter if you plan to record the sounds because once you plug it into your microphone jack you can hear hat your playing, this way you can hear and record it. Belkin Speaker and Headphone Splitter Overall a really great buy for the beginner and maybe even a professional who would like something to carry around and make sounds on. Really Fun, Very Portable, Great Device Korg!

Monotron Duo von Korg ist ein schönes kleines Gerät. Trotz der Kleinheit lässt es sich gut bedienen. Ich halte es in einer Hand, mit der ich zugleich die "Tastatur" (Ribbon-Controller, Bandtastatur), eine Oktave) bediene, mit der anderen Hand kann man die verschiedenen Knöpfe einstellen. Die Tastatur hat verschiedene Möglichkeiten: kontinuierliche Tonhöhenveränderung oder drei verschiedene Tonleitern (Dur, Moll, chromatisch). Die Lautstärke ist nicht allzu groß, aber völlig ausreichend. Man kann auch einen Kopfhörer oder einen Verstärker anschließen. Das Gerät hat zwei Tongeneratoren, hierdurch kann man Schwebungseffekte erzeugen. Für Kinder ist es geeignet, aber nicht für sehr kleine Kinder. Man kann von außen Signale zuführen, das habe ich aber noch nicht erprobt. Die Bedienungsanleitung ist etwas kurz ausgefallen, insbesondere werden die Effekte nicht erklärt. Trotzdem ist sie ausreichend, um das Gerät zu bedienen, benötigt man sie nur begrenzt. (Für mich war die Beschreibung zum Umstellen der Tonleitern wichtig - sie werden mit einem kleinen Knopf an der Hinterseite der Reihe nach umgestellt - alles andere habe ich auch durch Probieren herausgefunden.) Die Beschriftung ist englisch, das ist aber ebenfalls kein Problem. Es werden die üblichen englischen Bezeichnungen "Standby", "Peak" (Tonhöhe, Resonanz), X-Mod (Kreuzmodulation), Cutoff (ungefähr: Höhenbeschneidung) und Peak (ungefähr: Höhenverstärkung) verwendet. Die Lautstärkeregelung erfolgt mit einem Knopfregler an der Hinterseite. Ich kann das Gerät empfehlen, weiß aber nicht, ob man es auch für "ernsthafte" Musik einsetzen kann, denn der Ribbon-Controller ist recht klein. Am interessantesten ist die Möglichkeit, bei gehaltenem Ton die Effekte zu verändern. Man kann den Ribboncontroller mit einem Finger bedienen, aber auch mehrere Finger verwenden. Bei Mehrfingerbedienung kann man einen kontinuierlichen Ton halten. Bei Einzeltonbedienung (nicht bei gleitender Bedienung mit kontinuierlichem Ton) entstehen am Anfang und Ende eines Tones je nach Einstellung der Regler eine Art Knackgeräusche am Anfang und Ende des Tones, vielleicht eine akustische Täuschung durch den plötzlichen Einsatz bzw. Abbruch des Tones). Ergänzung: Korg schickt auf Anfrage mit E-Mail den kompletten Schaltplan. Das ist sehr interessant, weil man genau den Aufbau verfolgen kann. Außerdem könnte man auch Ergänzungen anbringen, natürlich unter Verlust der Garantie.

The Monotron Delay is tremendous fun, and I use it in a lot of different ways. It's great to throw in my purse and noodle around on when I have time -- it takes up almost no space, which is perfect. It's great to add as an FX instrument when I jam -- it gives great sci fi or other kinds of sounds to add to a mix, and adds something really distinctive. And it's great to use as a small, affordable delay effect to add to an instrument -- especially something like a Volca or something similar where the instrument's portable and you're already using a 1/8" jack, where it's going to be easier to deal with than a pedal effect. One good/bad thing depending on what you want is that the delay isn't a pristine digital effect -- there's some grittiness there and higher pitches will die off over time instead of being perfectly preserved. But this is pretty much by design -- perfect digital effects are available in many places if you want them, and this is intended to have a distinctive sound more like an old tape delay. I'm certainly not an expert in all the things this can do, but if you're not used to playing around with delay effects, it's pretty versatile. You can just put a decaying echo after everything, or you can turn up the feedback until it repeats everything rhythmically over time. Which is to say, you can use it as a sort of looper, though the high end will decay before long. If you can dial in sounds you like, you can even turn it into a weird sort of drum machine, repeating percussive sounds per measure or per quarter note, depending on the time interval you set. Also, like a tape delay, you can mess with the pitch as it's repeating by twisting the time knob, which yields some cool effects depending on what you're repeating. In my opinion, this is the best pocket instrument out there.

es un buen juguete, trate de utilizarlo en el ámbito profesional pero es demasiado ruidoso, busque hacer atmósferas para una obra de teatro pero el sonido se vuelve incontrolable si lo accionas y dejas de manipular, te ayuda a comprender los parámetros del delay y del "Low Frequency Osilator" la entrada y salida de linea es muy funcional y puedes jugar con sonidos de otros instrumentos (como guitarra) o reproductores, quizá con mas productos Korg puedas sacarle provecho.

So small but so much fun, the sound is thick and its fun to play around with the knobs once u connect it to a speaker it sounds even better. You can also connect any instrument to it with an aux cable which is awesome.