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The Pro-One is a great analogue synth, offering more modulation possibilities than most others in its class. Three modulation sources (Filter CV, Osc. B Freq. and the LFO) can each be routed to either the oscillators or the filter frequency. Very nice, especially modulating the filter frequency with Osc. B with Resonance at full. I noticed someone warned off newbies, but I disagree. The front panel layout is very intuitive, grouping the sections (Oscillators, Mixer, Filter, Amp, Modulation, etc.) in a clear, sensical fashion that makes perfect sense after a little tweaking. Newbie advice: turn the sequencer to Seq. A, flip the record/play switch to record, play an 8 note riff, and flip back to play. Now just twist knowbs and listen to what happens. You'll have most things figured out within a single evening of playing around. The sound of this synth is outstanding, as distinctive in its way as Oberheim or Moog. It's a lot of fun to play with, especially for strange sounds. The external input is good not only for filtering other sounds through the Pro-One, but for trigering the Sequencer clock as well. Since it's not MIDI (at least not without a retrofit or CV/MIDI converter), you couldn't otherwise slave it to the MIDI clock signal. The trick I used, which I'm sure has other variations, was to have the drum machine's rim shot pulsing 16th notes, panned left and sent to the external input. The rest of the drums were panned right and sent to the mixer. This way, the drum machine ran off the MIDI clock and in turn drove the Sequencer. Caution - this may be how my Pro-One fried, as it was during one of these sessions that it stopped functioning, apparently due to a burnt-out power regulator component on the circuit board. Oops. Final note - the keyboard gopt a disparaging comment on the main page here. I disagree with that as well, my keyboard was always crisp and responsive, a typical springy synth keyboard. I'm pretty sure that my Pro-One was one of the last revisions released, maybe the problems only apply to the early revisions. My Pro-One was the floor model in a Sam Ash store in NY, bought in '82, and it took years of hard labor (constant moving, banging, smoke-filled environments, etc.) without ever letting me down (till I fried it myself). Tuning is explained in the manual and easily accomplished with a jeweler's screwdriver, and electronic component spray cleaner always irradicated any dirty pot problems like noise and jumpy incrementation. I'm really looking forward to getting mine back up and running. I'd say who's repairing it, but that might violate the "no commercials" rule here. Feel free to email me about this synth, I have the manual (and an extra, in fact) and the schematic.
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