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Not a car, but my main gigging keyboard for as long as I've been gigging has been the Korg SV-1, and a big part of the reason is that there's no screens, only k

Not a car, but my main gigging keyboard for as long as I've been gigging has been the Korg SV-1, and a big part of the reason is that there's no screens, only knobs. It's a pretty great interface, all in all. 90% of the time I use the presets I made for myself the first week I got it, but whenever I need something else I have no trouble doing it within seconds. It's fairly limited, in terms of features and sound bank, but it's amazing at what it does.

dkersten 5y ago
Also not a car: I have a speaker bar and the touch volume controls drive me crazy to the point that I've decided I will never again buy a soundsystem without proper buttons or knobs for volume.
scarecrowbob 5y ago
I got the SV-1 specifically because of the limited interface. Not a big fan of the organs, but the other stuff all has worked great for me. It's paid for itself several times over. My usual live keyboard setup is the SV-1 under an ASM hydrasynth.
- jedimastert 5y ago
  Yeah, I think the organ is a pretty big missed opportunity, and it wouldn't have been so bad but the rotary simulator is really not great.
ratww 5y ago
I’m very happy that even the new generation of affordable synths is mostly analog with single function knobs. Arturia MicroFreak/MiniFreak, Korg Monologue/Minilogue, lots of Behringer clones. You can get productive with them in minutes rather than in days. Previous generations required either lots of menu diving (everything in the 90s) or had the pesky multifunction knobs (Microkorg).
cbare 5y ago
I love our very knobby Korg SV-2.
peterkelly 5y ago
Yep, it's super important for musical instruments. I recently bought a Hammond XK-5 organ. It has exactly the same control layout as the B3 which came out in 1955. Physical drawbars, dedicated on/off controls for percussion settings, a real knob to select which chorus/vibrato setting to use. The keys on the bottom octave are inverted black/white to select presents. It even has the separate switch for the leslie which gets tacked onto the front of the organ because Laurens Hammond didn't want leslie speakers used with his organs and wouldn't allow a built-in control so they had to do this as a hack. Totally unnecessary now, but still better than a button because you can swipe your hand quickly across it to change between fast/slow mode in a split second. It's just fantastic. While you're playing, and want to adjust settings on the fly (a common thing in organ) you don't want to be going into menus to adjust things. They made a few small affordances to cater for extra functionality like the fact that you can (optionally) program presets to include arbitrary settings; there's a menu system to customise, but you rarely need to touch it. The switches on the B3 (e.g. for percussion) are now buttons instead, since the on/off status is part of the preset and they use indicator lights for status. But this is a minor tradeoff and doesn't make a material difference IMHO. Before I had the XK-5 I was using the B3 simulator in Logic and trying to adjust all the settings with the on-screen controls, and trying to play with a regular MIDI keyboard. It just wasn't pleasant at all, esp. trying to adjust drawbars with a mouse. The Viscount Legend is another B3 clone that takes the same approach and from what I've seen looks just as good. Other clones have physical buttons too but don't follow the original layout and seem a bit more awkward.
- jedimastert 5y ago
  I just recently got a Crumar mojo desktop, which has all of the controls in one unit. Absolutely agree though, Hammond is an instrument all to itself, and if you're gonna truly play it you need the drawbars.

dkersten 5y ago

Also not a car: I have a speaker bar and the touch volume controls drive me crazy to the point that I've decided I will never again buy a soundsystem without proper buttons or knobs for volume.

scarecrowbob 5y ago

I got the SV-1 specifically because of the limited interface. Not a big fan of the organs, but the other stuff all has worked great for me. It's paid for itself several times over. My usual live keyboard setup is the SV-1 under an ASM hydrasynth.

jedimastert 5y ago
Yeah, I think the organ is a pretty big missed opportunity, and it wouldn't have been so bad but the rotary simulator is really not great.

ratww 5y ago

I’m very happy that even the new generation of affordable synths is mostly analog with single function knobs. Arturia MicroFreak/MiniFreak, Korg Monologue/Minilogue, lots of Behringer clones. You can get productive with them in minutes rather than in days. Previous generations required either lots of menu diving (everything in the 90s) or had the pesky multifunction knobs (Microkorg).

cbare 5y ago

I love our very knobby Korg SV-2.

peterkelly 5y ago

Yep, it's super important for musical instruments. I recently bought a Hammond XK-5 organ. It has exactly the same control layout as the B3 which came out in 1955. Physical drawbars, dedicated on/off controls for percussion settings, a real knob to select which chorus/vibrato setting to use. The keys on the bottom octave are inverted black/white to select presents. It even has the separate switch for the leslie which gets tacked onto the front of the organ because Laurens Hammond didn't want leslie speakers used with his organs and wouldn't allow a built-in control so they had to do this as a hack. Totally unnecessary now, but still better than a button because you can swipe your hand quickly across it to change between fast/slow mode in a split second. It's just fantastic. While you're playing, and want to adjust settings on the fly (a common thing in organ) you don't want to be going into menus to adjust things. They made a few small affordances to cater for extra functionality like the fact that you can (optionally) program presets to include arbitrary settings; there's a menu system to customise, but you rarely need to touch it. The switches on the B3 (e.g. for percussion) are now buttons instead, since the on/off status is part of the preset and they use indicator lights for status. But this is a minor tradeoff and doesn't make a material difference IMHO. Before I had the XK-5 I was using the B3 simulator in Logic and trying to adjust all the settings with the on-screen controls, and trying to play with a regular MIDI keyboard. It just wasn't pleasant at all, esp. trying to adjust drawbars with a mouse. The Viscount Legend is another B3 clone that takes the same approach and from what I've seen looks just as good. Other clones have physical buttons too but don't follow the original layout and seem a bit more awkward.

jedimastert 5y ago
I just recently got a Crumar mojo desktop, which has all of the controls in one unit. Absolutely agree though, Hammond is an instrument all to itself, and if you're gonna truly play it you need the drawbars.