A 6-
voice multitimbral analog synthesizer with a 49-
note keyboard. Produced between
1984 and
1986.
The Max uses
CEM 3394 chips. There is one
VCO per voice. Available
waveforms are
sawtooth,
triangle and
pulse. Each voice also has its own
filter, which is a 24
dB/
octave low-pass VCF. The single
LFO is
switchable between
square and
triangle waveforms. It can control the VCO picth, the VCF or the
VCA envelope. All three main
components have their own
ADSR envelope generators.
Two 6-track
sequencers with
real time recording and
looping are included. They hold up to 500 notes and 2
songs.
MIDI support on the Max is good for its time. It can
send and
recieve on any
channel. Also featured are a
mono mode, MIDI
program and
sequence dumping. A MIDI
thru is not included.
The Max is a
severely limited synth. There are 80
preset sounds and only 20
user programmable patches. Furthermore, the sounds can only be edited using a
Six-Trak, a
Prophet-T8 or a
Commodore 64 with the
Model 920 software, which can also
boost the sequencers' note
capacity to 3400. No
real time performance controls are available, not even a
pitch bend knob. To top this, the
construction and
parts are very
cheap.
The
Multi-Trak and
Six-Trak aren't nearly as limited and make a better choice for
serious musicians.
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