Announce when you receive your Solaris!

[matocaster]

Fantastic!!!

[qtuner]

For everyone who ordered a Solaris, it was worth the wait. I'm so happy with mine. It sounds better than it looks. The action feels great. The encoders do not feel like encoders. This truly is an instrument.

[alexg]

Hello !
I'm new on this forum, and very very lucky because I received my Solaris this morning !
Dark one.
Too early for a real first feedback but I'm very excited by what I hear.
A little lost to understand and "visualise" the way of the signal in the synth for the moment.
Sorry for the english mistakes, I'm french...

[scope4live]

Alright..
Let's go Mon Frere..

[synthwalker]

alexg, tu m'as grillé !

[BF]

This thread is bad news for me. The last 3+ years have been fine, the last 2 weeks have been agony. Congratulations to the early recipients, please don't think less of me for playing your Solarii in my dreams.

[John Bowen]

Two more units were shipped this week...and now starts August Holiday month. Production will restart in September.

jb

[Neotrope]

And God said "Let there be white."

IMG_1327 by qtuner, on Flickr

AWESOME! I've also got the white one on order, which to me communicates the old Oberheim vibe more than the Madonna club vibe (ala Bruce Forat doing "white out" on their tour gear one year...). Also complements the Andromeda nicely, too. Thanks for sharing ... my warm and fuzzy quotient for the week has been filled!!!

Great job John B. on getting your baby "birthed," and sorry for all the "drama" some of us (ahem) have saddled you with over the last round of almost-almost-almost ready delays. Putting out a $6K device for the lower than it should be price you've charged us early "faithful," is amazing for what the final product actually will be. Thank you also for NOT doing another PC in a box like Neuron, and creating something that is a little like a Virus Ti meets an Oberheim Mx, meets a Wavestation, meets nothing else out there. Simply cannot wait. I think it's quite possible THIS YEAR I'll finally have this under my music tree at xmas

Goodspeed Dr Bowen!!!!

[vince66]

Looks like I'm in good company!
My white Solaris arrived a little while ago but I haven't had a chance to take a pic.
Here it is with a few 'friends'.
I'm really glad I went for the white.
If anyone is interested, I'm in the UK on the south coast.
This beast sounds incredible!
Fantastic job John

[Neutron]

Thanks people for posting pics of your solari, I cant wait till September or whenever i get my white one.

I did not realize quite how deep it is, i might have to rethink my space for it.

[scope4live]

Brotha' Man Neutron.
You should look at the Standtastic stands.
The angles are all adjustable, the handles extend as far as you want, a totally customizable 3 tier stand that's always been way ahead of the others.
I bought mine back in the early '90s' and had the Oberheim MC3000, Oberheim Matrix 12/XPander all on a single stand.
Solaris basically replaced the M12/X and I use those cheap pieces of shit from M Audio. They really are excellent controllers though. But guys like me who play everyday and everynight need replacements after 2 years, as the keys start sending velocities of 127 only after they're beaten for so many weeks, months, years...

[heliotrope]

Greetings All,

This is my first post.

I received my (black) Solaris on Monday August 1st, and have had only a little bit of time so far to play with it due to various personal interruptions. I will be spending the rest of the day with it after I've completed this post.

I'm in the midwestern United States.

For you pre-order customers who are still waiting--and that's still most everybody, I can sympathize with you. Hang in there! It *will* be worth it! Don't give up the faith. Take a deep breath. Go on vacation for a few weeks in August. You might as well.

As for my reactions: I think the machine is magnificent! The build quality is absolutely first-rate. The Fatar keyboard has a wonderful tactile feel. It plays better than any other keyboard synth that I own--and I own quite a few of them.

The sound is big, huge, expansive, clean. Very clean. It is unlike any other synth that I own or have ever heard. The Prophet VS might be vaguely the closest that comes to mind.

There are some surprises: no cursor controls for example (none are needed apparently). It is very intelligent but sometimes non-obvious in it's design philosophy. You will need to read the "getting started" PDF. You will need to spend some time learning the rational behind what John has built and why. The encoder knobs move to a very light touch, you have to be gentle or you can overshoot the value you are aiming for. The synthwood LED lit wheels are beautiful, but contain a lot of mass compared to those on some other synthesizers, plus they have a stiffness due to being brand new. The five smaller displays have a slight greenish tinge when viewed *off-axis*. When viewed on-axis however they match the center graphic display perfectly. The ribbon controller surprised me in being better than I had anticipated. I love the feel of it and the obvious durability that the material exhibits. In the past I have only experienced ribbons with a fuzzy covering that always seemed to shed over time.

I chose to place my Solaris on an Ultimate Support Apex stand--the kind with the triangular cross-section. If you are going to do this also then you will need to invest in some cables with right-angle connectors--as all of the quarter-inch connectors are right in the middle of the synth. Straight connectors would keep the synth too far away from the stand (and possibly jeopardize the jacks).

You will need to buy a CF card reader if you don't already own one. I bought an Apacer Sieno AM400 for about $22, which works just fine on my Windows XP computer.

I don't yet know what type of sustain pedal will work or is recommended, but I will try a few.

One pleasant surprise was when fiddling with filter cutoff and resonance while play a note. No zipper noise. No stepping. None. It sounded and behaved like pure analog.

That's probably enough for now. I barely know the machine at this point. But I can tell you for sure, there is no buyer's remorse here. And those of you still waiting--when you do receive yours--you will have something truly special that will make you the envy of all your doubting synth-head friends.

I had unwavering faith in John throughout--though it has seemed like a long torturous process. I took a lot of good-natured ribbing from some of my buddies for being so "naive" as to put down money on a synthesizer that hadn't even been built yet. Well, they won't be laughing now. (Nor will they be able to buy one for a while until we all get ours.) I am starting to see the tremendous amount of time and engineering effort that went into designing and creating this instrument.

Congratulations John. Thank you for all of your hard work and keeping us honestly informed throughout the long birthing process, and, well-done!

[John Bowen]

Heliotrope,

Thank you for the nice words of support! Those of you on the pre-order list know all the ‘trials and tribulations’ that this project has seen....and it may have been hard putting up with the naysayers and skeptics during the years of waiting, but I’m really happy to finally be able to fulfill the promise I made to all of you. Thanks so much for everyone’s faith and confidence!

John B.

[nachtsmeer]

I took Solaris on a weekend field trip to the "Hands Off 2011" theremin event in Scarborough UK
http://theremin.tv/category/hands-off-2011/

We had quite a few particiapants from Vermont, Michigan, Colarado, Georgia, Massachusetts and also from various countries around Europe. Folks said the sound from Solaris was really impressive for a digital synth.

...It sounds awesome tracking pitchbend from the theremin. Unfortunately I didn't have anything to make recordings, but am hoping some will turn up soon as cameras and soundcrews were about for the duration of the event.

[alexg]

For those who are waiting, I did a quick demo from my own bank of presets.
These presets are mainly edited or created from factory presets.
The sounds are quite simple but corresponding to my tastes (analogue)...
Some are recorded with a very little bit of reverb (Protools Air plugin).
Sorry I'm a bad keyboard player...
http://soundcloud.com/alexg2/solaris1