Gibson to Embed Guitars with Ethernet 474
caseyuw writes "Gibson is planning to roll out their Magic this year with the delivery of guitars using Cat 5 instead of analog cables to connect instruments and amplifiers. The debate over the quality of digital vs analog signal processing is not new, but using a 'Magic' Les Paul would force you entirely into the digital domain." We mentioned this last year, but the above article has much more information.
Uhhhh (Score:5, Funny)
Off Topic (Score:5, Funny)
Q: How do you get a bassist off your porch?
A: Pay him for the pizza!
(...sorry)
Re:Off Topic (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Uhhhh (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Uhhhh (Score:5, Funny)
- Nigel Tufnell
Re:But seriously (Score:3, Interesting)
Did you read the article? This will allow a lot of options, such as independant string processing, controlling remote equipment from the guitar, etc. If you're not a guitar player maybe this doesn't mean anything to you.
Not to say that there isn't a place for the good 'ol analog guitar, which will continue to be the mainstay of rock music. I sure won't be getting rid of mine.
Wireless? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Wireless? (Score:2)
Re:Wireless? (Score:5, Informative)
As a guitarist, that seems good enough.
Re:Wireless? (Score:5, Informative)
Might be that 54mbit wireless has good latency though.
One thing that annows me about the main post is the statement that Magic will 'force' people into digital. This is nonsense of course.
From the article: Those initial Magic guitars will also have traditional analog pickups. "It will essentially be two guitars in one: You don't have to go digital if you don't want to," said Arora.
Re:Wireless? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Wireless? (Score:3, Informative)
That's what you might get with modern cards and, say, ASIO drivers/Cubase VST.
Re:Wireless? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Wireless? (Score:5, Informative)
On the other hand, sound travels through air at about 1 foot per millisecond (roughly). So that 100 ft cable would put Jimi 100 ms away from the monitor speakers. At 4/4 time and 120 beats per minute that is almost a quarternote of latency. Clearly no riff-master would ever want to be off by that much.
Likewise, you can think of latency as "adding distance between you and the speaker". For example, 1 ms of added latency is like adding another foot between you and the speaker. For most applications 5 ms isn't going to be noticeable, but the signal chain for a concert or studio can be long. And all those 5 ms delays really add up.
Gibson Magic is really just a CobraNet wannabe (www.peakaudio.com). CobraNet has been around longer, is more of an established standard, and has more sophisticated network management and routing than Magic. In contrast to CobraNet, Magic is a latecommer that was developed by people who should stick with guitars rather than 100Base-T. More to the point, CobraNet is supported by more than 30 different companies while Magic has maybe one supporter if you don't count Gibson itself.
And isn't this just a repeat post? It seems that Gibson Magic pops up here every so often but that they don't have any real new news...
Re:Wireless? (Score:4, Informative)
You'll never get that across today's wireless LAN technology.
Haven't you ever been to a concert? (Score:5, Interesting)
Ever heard of a wireless microphone? Same concept, except connected to the pickups on the guitar.
same _basic_ concept...different demands (Score:2)
"New team member Alexei Beliaev will help rev the spec to version 3.0 by March, adding support for video and 1-Gbit/second speeds, up from 10/100-Mbit Ethernet today. Magic uses the Ethernet physical layer and Category 5 cables to provide thirty-two 32-bit bidirectional audio channels with sample rates up to 192 kHz, jitter less than 80 picoseconds and latency as low as 250 microseconds across 100-meter point-to-point links. The protocol uses a UDP-like packet held to a fixed packet length and transmission rate. Magic conforms to the 802.3af spec for providing power over Ethernet."
In terms of connection vs. usage, this particular concept is a bit ahead of the curve. As much as I endorse 802.11g, I don't think it will cut it for these guys. Wonder if they've tried FireWire 800?
Re:Wireless? (Score:5, Funny)
So where's it going to get power? (Score:2)
Now, I admit that this doesn't mention if the 'Magic' system is providing power, or receiving power, but well, something's getting power over the cable. I don't know how you're going to pull that off with wireless.
Ethernet, not Firewire? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Ethernet, not Firewire? (Score:5, Informative)
Also, the max length of a FireWire cable is 4.5 meters [firewiredirect.com], while Ethernet can do 100 meters [homenethelp.com]before needing a repeater.
Not sure how much bandwidth a gee-tar takes up, but I'd bet that cable length was the deciding factor in this design.
Wrong... (Score:4, Informative)
Also, the max length of a FireWire cable is 4.5 meters, while Ethernet can do 100 meters before needing a repeater.
Not sure how much bandwidth a gee-tar takes up, but I'd bet that cable length was the deciding factor in this design.
From Apple's Firewire 800 [apple.com] page:
"FireWire 400 delivers data over cables of up to 4.5 meters in length. Using professional-grade glass optical fiber, FireWire 800 can burst data across 100 meter cables."
-T
Re:Wrong... (Score:2)
Read the F-ing link before you reply next time. 1394b carries power, even over optical - bundled with the optical cable are a pair of wires for power.
-T
Re:Ethernet, not Firewire? (Score:2)
The parent post linked to a site that sells IEEE1394a cables.
IEEE1394b (or Firewire 2) uses 9 pin (rather than six pin) cables (in the Apple implementation).
1394b also defines a new high speed mode called S1600, with a data rate of 1572.9 Mbit/s. The signal can be carried by copper wire, glass fibre, or plastic fibre. The maximum cable length is now 100m, rather than 4.5m.
This is not to say that Apple computers can transmit at S1600 over 100m distances, but this article [e-insite.net] indicates that 1394b does not always imply 800 Mb/s over 4.5 m of copper.
CAT5? (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, there will surely be those who claim that since it IS a cable, it must be better. But with the same information being carried over, I hardly think that they can make much of a case, other than being pesky.
Re:CAT5? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:CAT5? (Score:2, Funny)
in a live or recording situation, you really can't have your guitar solo lagging behind the rhythm section
End quote
You obviously haven't been in a rhythm section before. I think going wifi would finally bring the guitarists back to playing on the beat.
Re:CAT5? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:CAT5? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:CAT5? (Score:5, Interesting)
If you want fast and realtime communication, you also get 2 extra conversion steps while using wireless transmission. Extra conversion is extra delay.
And reliability is a factor too. Wireless transceivers for analog audio signals have a bad reputation for reliability and audio qualitiy, and you should avoid them until you have the means to invest the monetary value of, say a medium sized car, into it.
No guitarist is going to ever touch that equipment if it fails him/her onstage, ever...
Re:CAT5? (Score:2)
Also, you're saying your cable TV can do things your (wireless) satellite media connection can't? Bluetooth, maybe...but since 'wireless' is a big topic, with lots of methods, you just might be wrong.
I seriously doubt anyone would ever want to defend such a clearly outragous claim
Re:CAT5? (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess that's why the vacuum tubes are so popular, right?
Re:CAT5? (Score:5, Interesting)
Utilitiding power-over-ethernet means that you no longer have to worry about dub batteries. That's a huge saving, and the reason that phantom power (essentially a power-over-mic-cable technology) exists in all mixing desks.
With wireless, you have to worry about power too. For a large stage show, you assign a tech to deal with that, and kick his ass if you run out of juice.
For people who arn't the Rolling Stones, U2 etc, power and signal in one cable is a good thing.
Additionally, cable gives a dependable signal. Note that this is not TCP/IP over ethernet, but a completly different protocol. What happens when you lose bandwith in your wireless connect? You'd get a click in the sound. That's speaker-wreckingly-ears-bleedingly unacceptable. 802.11 doesn't have badnwidth guarentes, whiles cable does (de facto, if not de jure - I don't know the ethernet spec well enough).
OH YEAH! (Score:2, Funny)
RIAA? (Score:2, Redundant)
Jason
ProfQuotes [profquotes.com]
Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:3, Funny)
But here's how it *could* work:
Has to be said (Score:5, Funny)
I would take one in a second (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course you will see all the "purists" noting that it doesn't have any tubes in it, therefore it must be useless. However I would love to be one of the first people to play one.
~S
Did Anyone Think...? (Score:3, Funny)
I didn't know Steve Gibson [grc.com] played guitar!
Not the problem (Score:3, Informative)
Hey there's a video presentation (Score:5, Interesting)
Apparently it's compatible with all existing ethernet devices. So in theory you could connect any kind of tranciever you wish. Want Fiber? Just get a tranciever, want wireless? Just buy a tranciever. Want to route it across the internet through a tunnel.. Holy sheep shit batman!
I know a lot of bands, the worst problem they have is finding a studio to practice in. You could set up a "virtual studio" just by tunneling and building VPN's between their houses.
Things like latency could be transformed into delay effects..
Anyways, sounds really cool. I'm gonna post the story on my site and try and get an interview.
Re:Hey there's a video presentation (Score:5, Insightful)
It is my belief that simply adding "digital" to the standard guitar design does little more than claiming my shiny red bicycle runs on java. In fact there may be more immediate negative consequences than positive ones.
The guitar pickups, as far as I can tell, will still be analog. Thus, every guitar must have an A/D converter in the body. Having digital output will limit you to digital signal processors, unless you first convert back from D/A. You will find countless arguments supporting analog sound quality, I won't even attempt to address that issue. However, what quality do you think the onboard converter in the guitar will be? I doubt (considering size, power, and cost constraints). that it will even begin to approach that of a hide end DSP effects box. Unless of course these are meant prohibitively expensive play toy gadgets. Not to mention these prohibitively expensive gadets will only work with other prohibitively expensive gadgets that are compatible with the same format. Using a guitar to control other devices is not a novel idea, there are plenty of midi conversion kits. With a little technical know how, you could replace the knobs already on your guitar with others to send midi signals (providing you have the appropriate card and install a midi output). The author of the article took a naive view of midi, making it sound like a total failure. Although it might not be the most beautiful solution for communication between instruments, it is successful. You'll be hard pressed to find any quality synthesizers or processing gear that don't utilize the MIDI standard. You'll be hard pressed to find any entry level synthesizers or processors that don't use the standard. A qoute also appears in the article that all instruments and related equipment will be digital in ten years. You'd expect synthesizers to be the first to bring about this revolution, considering the construction. I suppose that is why MOOG is still such a powerful name! The article seems little more than an ill informed response to the intersection of two fields that the author fails to comprehend as a whole.
Re:Hey there's a video presentation (Score:5, Informative)
Read the specs, it's all open. Biggest advantage will be user created software synths, better compression/normalization, it's adaptation of highly availiable technology and it's open sourceness (which I know the mods will love me for mentioning)
The one major weakness with midi is it's ring topology. This is just straight up ethernet, any topology that ethernet supports this new standard will.
Here's a quote from the PDF specification.
1.
Physical Layer
: consists of the mechanical and electrical specifications required
to form the physical network. This layer is compatible with the IEEE 802.3
Ethernet physical layer.
2.
Data Link Layer
: as defined by the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet protocol. It views bits
transported by the Physical Layer as defined sequences called frames that can be
transported across any standard Ethernet-compatible network.
3.
MaGIC Application Layer
: uses the frames transported by the Data Link Layer to
encapsulate MaGIC-specific information into packets that allow MaGIC devices
to exchange real-time bi-directional audio and control data.
The MaGIC application layer is independent of the two layers under it thereby providing
the ability to easily change the mode of physical transport based on available technology.
As you can see, it uses just good old 802.3 Here is a list of what Mechanical interfaces it works on.
2.4 Mechanical Interface
The MaGIC protocol is suitable for a variety of physical interfaces. Examples include:
the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet physical layer, the high-speed multi-link Optical Interface,
wireless interfaces, the Ethernet Gigabit-based physical layer, etc.
This specification only describes the MaGIC Link based on the IEEE 802.3 100-Megabit
Ethernet physical layer, which uses standard Category 5 (Cat 5) cables, and RJ-45
I could go on and on about why it's so much better than midi. Check out the pdf, it's got more info than the videos.
Re:Hey there's a video presentation (Score:2)
--jeff++
I'll be damned (Score:2, Funny)
OTOH, the only time I've ever seen screaming chicks is when they run away.
Digital can duplicate analog sound exactly. (Score:2, Insightful)
I mean, the only thing analog has going for it is "warmth". Of course this "warmth" is a result of the limited frequency and dynamic range of analog and can be easily duplicated.
Tell you what. Have an expert put on headphones and listen to an analog recording, then have them listen to a 32 bit 96khz digital copy of the analog recording. Do you think they are going to be able to tell which is the original? No, of course they won't because the digital copy is IDENTICAL in frequency and dynamic range to the analog signal.
The only difference is that the analog recording is using the full dynamic and frequency range of the medium to reproduce the recording and the digital recording of the analog recording is using a mere fraction of it's potential dynamic and frequency range.
So if one is a superset of the other why even use the other!?
Re:Digital can duplicate analog sound exactly. (Score:2)
also if the converts were of nice quality. but the wont.. because.. theyre expensive.
the cheap converts are pretty shitty.
Re:Digital can duplicate analog sound exactly. (Score:3, Interesting)
Does anyone still actually argue that analog is superior to digital?
Yup. Ever heard digital distortion? It's downright disgusting and would only be considered useful by certain Industrial-Noise outfits. My valve bass amp (Ampeg SVT) compresses as it reaches distortion, creating a fantastic sound.
On the synth front, my Korg Mono/Poly sounds far superior to the MS2000 digital synth that sits above it. Fuller bass sounds, more cutting leads and pad sounds that exude far more character and are so fat they need compression to fit in the mix.
On the drum machine front, it's more a matter of taste, but for me a Korg KPR-77 with everything but the kick run through a Roland RE501 tape echo sounds great.
Chris
Anyone know the over/under until... (Score:2)
And the first copy of Doom that is controlled by the guitar?
Can give a whole new meaning to... (Score:2)
Don't Write it Off Yet! (Score:4, Interesting)
RJ45 Connector Durability Issues (Score:2, Interesting)
All in all though, new technology such as this will create some totally wild new music and some awesome new stage shows. I am excited! (Big Kev excited!)
Some related technologies:
Yamaha mLAN [yamahasynth.com]
CobraNet [peakaudio.com]
Steinberg System Link [steinberg.net]
Please, lord. . . no! (Score:2, Flamebait)
And there's my big problem with digital amps. Jimmy Paige didn't need them, nor did B.B. or Eric Clapton. Why do you need a computer's help getting killer tone? Hint: It's because you don't know how to do it the 'real' way. It's expensive to get real good, real loud tone no matter what instrument you play, and this digital crap is just a shortcut -- a pretty lousy sounding facsimile of a shortcut for the most part.
In other words, this is for the script kiddies of the music world.
Besides, my cat5's connector inevitably snaps off after a decent amount of use. Could you imagine the number of connectors a gigging band would go through, plugging and unplugging those a hundred times a day? As said before, it's a solution looking for a problem. Unless Gibson has something else up their sleeves we don't know about... Hmm...
Re:Please, lord. . . no! (Score:3, Informative)
Try to keep up, like Jimmy does.
Cheap home recording!! (Score:4, Interesting)
'Till now, if you wanted to record on a PC (and some of this also applies to 8-tracks and tape systems), you'd either need a really good stack, a proffesional pre-amp, or one of those new-fangled V-Amps. But none of those come dirt cheap, so lots of people have to download software amp sims from Kazaa, and stick with that. Not great.
In a few years, if this tech makes it into low-end guitars, beautiful, full, well equalised tones for everybody! And I also imagine that when this becomes common place, it will bring the quality of cheap & expensive axes much closer together.
Nowadays, alot of rich kids, or kids with parents or brothers or whatever in the industry make it because they are the only ones that get to prove themselves. Even without being conscious of it, the A&R rep at the studio will prefer a real nice sounding, well produced demo than something cheap, because it makes the songs sound better, and in music, what else is there? In the long run, this technology could be really beneficial. But for now all the struggling artists will have to keep hearing audiophile elitists crapping on about how anything mastered at anything less than perfect 96khz audio hurts their ears.
Re:Cheap home recording!! (Score:3, Interesting)
I have a little experience in home recording, and I have to disagree.
Since it's little use to plug a guitar straight into a soundcard, you'll need some pre-amping. I use a zoom gfx-8 to get the right signal strength. This baby cost me the equivalent of $500. It can do some compression (which it shouldn't) and a hell of a distortion (even though it's digital, it beats a lot of analog equipment I've used, including my current choice of amplifier),and some other fx, if you'd like to. (Every el-cheapo amp with a line-out will also do fine, in my esteem.)
When you've pushed you signal through this thing, any decent sequencer software can finish the job, provided it is equipped with a compressor and a parametric equalizer. These are available for under $200. You can use the fx-processor for bass too, but I personally perfer the line-out of my old 25-watt bass amp, because it's got all it's need, and anything I need to alter, I can do with some EQ.
The moral of this story:
Gibson MAGIC will NOT make home recording cheap, because these babies will be
Re:Cheap home recording!! (Score:2)
I can see it now - Screw the Marshall stack, (Score:5, Funny)
I can see it already... (Score:2)
Line6 already won in this domain (Score:4, Informative)
Now, the laziest could also check out Steinberg's Virtual Guitarist [harmony-central.com]...
Think of the possiblities when they add memory... (Score:4, Interesting)
It would be just like adding a sequencer to a drumkit.
The guitarist can play lead and rythm parts on the same guitar.
No more problems when lip synching or playing the music off a tape. Simply save the packets on the guitar and send out. How would the audience or the anyone know?
You could actually buy a guitar that played EVERY Stones or Rush song perfectly.
Cover bands everywhere are celebrating.
Re:Think of the possiblities when they add memory. (Score:2, Funny)
Does this mean... (Score:2, Funny)
*rimshot*
Thanks I'll be here all week!
Is Ethernet the best choice? (Score:4, Insightful)
I guess what I'm wondering is, why did they chose Ethernet rather then Fire wire, or even S/PDIF? Do you need to use special switching hardware that insures real-time communication? What about packet loss?
Personally, I'd like it if everything used Ethernet, it really does seem to be the most convenient form of networking out there. Hopefully all the work put in by Gibson will be adopted and we'll be able to plug our stereo, TV, VCR and everything directly into our home gigabit LAN. It would make things a lot easier, that's for sure.
Re:Is Ethernet the best choice? (Score:2)
That guy just rules!!! (Score:2, Funny)
I mean, you can go to his website and get your probes ported, and get your testes shielded, and get your zip drive fixed, and get a screensaver, and get some really 31337 advice on stuff, and even get a tool that tells you your IP address. And it's all in "hand-crafted assembly code!!!"
And now he does stuff with guitars!!! And it's Ace Frehley's brand of guitar. Wow!!!
nuts (Score:5, Insightful)
I've been a musician all my life and I'll tell you right now what seperates the really good players from everyone else is PRACTICE, not gadgets.
I think probably the marketing division staged a successful coup over at Gibson.
The gadget freaks are gonna love this though, so I can't blame Gibson for trying a new way to bring in some cash.
Someone posting something about the "purists... blah blah blah blah"
Excuse me? Purists my *ss.
There's a real reason that the best guitarists lust and drool over 90 year old technology: It is because it is impossible for solid state electronics, no matter how tweaked, sampled and modified, to duplicate the odd harmonics the come by nature out of the plasma in a hot vacuum tube.
Musicians care about *sound* and nothing else. If the best sound came out of a old transistor radio running FreeBSD modified with DDR ram and put in a hollowed out cardboard box, they would use that.
I'm a violinist. Once upon a time I thought that all the hoopla surrounding Strat instruments was just complete BS and that with the right combo of tech, lutherian technique and materials, that the sound could be reproduced. And then I heard one in person.
Perhaps another problem is that lots of *engineers* work for the instrument manufacturers, and they stare at an oscilloscope hooked up to a tube and think "it can't be so hard to reproduce that" as well as "I need to do something new around here to keep my job!"
Now I have heard some solid state amps that sound pretty good. But they still don't come close to tubes, even after all these years (40+?) of trying.
And if you personally cannot hear the difference, might I suggest you work on training your ear a bit better? The difference is glaring to folks with well trained musical ears.
Re:nuts (Score:2)
'Original' 3O year-old technology?! (Score:3, Insightful)
It is because it is impossible for solid state electronics, no matter how tweaked, sampled and modified, to duplicate the odd harmonics the come by nature out of the plasma in a hot vacuum tube.
The 'natural' sound of the electric guitar was a quirk of the technology that was around at the time. And a lot of people hated it, compared to the 'natural' sound of acoustic instruments, most of which had only been around in their current compromised scale form for a few hundred years. When the compromised scale was introduced, in order to make transposition and keyboard instruments possible, I'm sure the purists said that the compromise was just that, and that nothing that would ever replace a flute that only plays in E flat.
If Gibson had gone digital from day one, people would be posting about how now analogue system, however tweaked, can never reproduce the clean precision of digital. Or something. And in 30 years' time, when someone comes up with another way of doing music, all the digital 'purists' will bang on about how nothing can approach the 'natural' beauty of a DX-7...
You ear get used to whatever sounds you feed it within reason. If you don't believe me, try listening to some Indian music, for example. To a Western ear, it is all out of tune, before we get on to the melodic component, but half a billion Indians would disagree...
Re:nuts (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, I totally agree with you on the performance vs. gimmick issue. I think there's no fact more telling than the mere musician statistic: there are a lot of people making music.
It's better, live. If Gibson can give a better experience - functionally, what's different about protocol types to a guitarist if he's *still* plugging a cable in, either way?
I haven't heard a better 'sound' over Gibsons magic. I only see easier recording potential, and thus: easier editing.
From my current standpoint, editing is crap. Protools gave us Britney Spears.
It's time for performance to reign supreme again. Does CAT5 give that, somehow?
tubes from an engineering standpoint (Score:5, Informative)
Now, here are some reasons why tubes might sound better:
first of all let's start with some tube basics: you heat a plate (cathod) and electrons jump off it. the electrons pass through a grid, and gets obsorbed at another plate (anode). You can vary the voltage on the grid and control how much eletrons pass - hence the amplifying.
The difference between a tube amp and a FET amp is that tube amps have some insane amount of dynamic range that is very nice and linear. somethinge like 40V (or more, depending on the tube). It goes by the name "high voltage, low current."
Now, for the same power, FETS can't touch this range because most fets don't operate at that high voltage level - and if you push it then it will saturate / turn off and you won't be linear anymore.
So for the same power, FETS would go toward "low voltage, high current." This is cool and all, and theoretically if you stay within the linear region you are all good, right? wrong. All the EE books teaches you one thing that you never do in the real life - that is to assome a nice ground.
ground is never nice - especially when there is a lot of current, ground tend to float here and there - which would give you crap and distortions that we all know and love. Of course, throughout the years engineers (hey we don't have a life, after all) figured some ways around it - but AFAIK all of these are either 1) very expensive, and 2) not completely effective (usually it's both). (btw, one of these is to make as much of the system digital as possible.)
So... In the end, tube amps still reign. I heard that RCA made the best tubes, no confirmation on this, though.
Just for the few who thought "well when we get lots of superconductors then finally FET amps will be better!" That's not correct either. Unfortunately superconductors we know of are only good for no resistance at DC, and the ground does not play nice because of AC concerns.
So, there you have it. For the record I don't know any engineers who thought "oh yeah I can duplicate a tube response through other means," but they might have told their bosses shit like "I can make it damn close and you can't tell the difference" (which is usually a lie) so to keep their jobs.
And Tubes are considered solid-state. A tad fragile (there are stainless steel ones for the military, if anyone is interested), but still solid state last I checked...
Re:sounds like you're just boosting your imago (Score:3, Insightful)
I take it you're not...
Clapton playing a $99 guitar would sound like... Clapton.
If you played one of his Strats, you'd sound like...you.
It's something of a truism in guitar circles, but It's All In The Fingers.
Gibson quote: (Score:2)
Umm . . . yeah. So where do I get digital vacuum tubes?
You can argue, if you want, about whether analog actually does sound better than digital -- all of us purists will still be dragging around our out-dated, cost-ineffective, heavier-than-sh!t gear anyways until we're convinced it's been improved upon.
And as long as I can still fret a note, I'll be gutting cats myself for fiddle strings . . .
Let's wait and see, it's Gibson after all (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, Gibson's shotgun-like litigious actions within the music industry within the past decade have caused the music industry to put little faith in its supporting a technology standard of *any* kind. The past actions of its current management will make music instrument manufacturers think twice (or more)before they adopt or even license Gibson technology.
Some history:
1) Gibson completely blew their opportunity as once-owners of the Oberheim name (which they inherited as part of a purchase). Poorly-defined and ill-marketed products killed the Oberheim brand; meddling by ownership didn't help...(recently the Oberheim name returned to its rightful owner, Tom Oberheim, who is nicely rebuilding the brand).
2) Gibson bought Zeta Violin (a very innovative manufacturer of electronic violins and basses), and with it the services of the gifted engineer who who started Zeta. They had this engineer cobble together a MIDI substitute called ZIPPY. This at a time when MIDI was just getting a head of steam up. Gibson's ownership wanted to replace MIDI and collect license fees. Forget about helping to nurse a just-getting-off-the-ground standard, or MIDI). Talk about bad timing. ZIPPY died, and the engineer had a hand in regaining Zeta (a fine company these days).
3) Next was Gibson's infamous purchase of Opcode Systems, a few years back. Opcode was a primary manufacturer of music software and hardware at the time - one of the best. They created the OMS standard, which the Mac music community was widely dependent on. They promised Opcode's then-owner an opportunity to start a little R&D Group and come up with a few new things. The whole thing died in an acrimonious lawsuit, and in the offing, Gibson destroyed Opcode, and OMS. What a waste.
4) Unrelated to technology (at least computer technology) is Gibson's recent purchase of the once-renowned Baldwin Piano Company. Gibson has chosen to take even this famous music industry name, and make it a laughingstock. At this year's NAMM (National Association of Music Manufacturers) show they presented Baldwin pianos in gaudy, bright colors with graffiti-like drawings on them (for instance, one bright yellow grand had a desert scene painted on it with a Hummer riding across the desert floor in the the background - unbelievable!). I can see doing this to one piano, but the whole damn line? The instruments are laughable, and a blight on the once-reknowned Baldwin name.
5)Gibson is run like a personal playpen and funhouse by current management, who is out of touch with market reality (and a few others); however, Gibson has good, dedicated people. For their sake I hope this technology cathes on.
6)Other companies will be coming forward with technologies like this, and others. Let's wait and see if Gibson maintains its consistency in things having to do with technology, and screws this one up.
Certainly, if this technology did catch on, *any* music instrument manufacturer licensing it would have to be *very* wary of Gibson's current management's penchant to sue fast and hard for any real or even (and especially) perceived violation of licensing or other agreements. This company is vulture-like when it comes to the law. Gibson is a great example of a company who is purchased by a management with a few crazy ideas and a lot of money. They come in, buy a well-established company with good products and dedicated peopl,e and make it a personal plaything. Gibson, and the music industry deserve better.
Re:Let's wait and see, it's Gibson after all (Score:3, Interesting)
Almost everyone in the music industry is well aware of Henry Juszkiewicz's history and do not put any faith in his gee-whiz high tech products. He is quickly becoming the laughingstock of the music business.
point-to-point (Score:3, Interesting)
Especially knowing how the music industry drives technology, I suspect we'll be seeing these sorts of links in the near future.
Hmm. Infrared LEDs on the guitar strap?
Guitarists hate digital (Score:4, Interesting)
As far me, I'm really interested to see how this goes. With all the noise introduced in analog effects pedals the business has been needing something like this just to get a clear signal.
Re:Guitarists hate digital (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, part of the point of electric guitars are that they are noisy, and that's part of the whole sound. I heard one eminent musicologist declare, "music is just pure tone plus noise, and each genre expresses one particular noise preference." Even a virtuoso like Segovia would sound like crap on a guitar with no noise in the signal.
Re:Guitarists hate digital (Score:5, Insightful)
However, the "sound" that an audio cable imparts to music (in the form of hum and interference) is not something I find desirable. In this case, the digital version is superior to the analog version.
I'm sure there are a few extreme-odd-audiophile-luddite musicians who don't want any analog to digital conversion happenning at all between their instrument and their ears. This, of course, means that they can't put their music on compact disc, which is the de facto music distribution standard (or at least was). I find this attitude wholly unreasonable and impractical. Musicians who eschew the DAT, the mp3, and the compact disc must, in my estimation, be in the minority.
Most musicians, I think, are like me. I might prefer a quirky old tape delay or analog phaser to their digital equivalents, but, at the end of the day, I know my music gets fed into my computer at 24bit-96kHz digital. I'm an analog fan, but not a snob; I switch to digital when it's better/more practical.
Why don't people read the articals? (Score:2)
If you read the fucking artical, you'd see that the Guitar will also have anlog pickups and outputs. It won't force you to do shit.
musical locks? (Score:2)
Famous last words (Score:5, Interesting)
Doesn't this just sound like one of those famous quotes waiting to be reused over and over again in 20 years time - like the "there is a total world market for 5 computers" and "rock and roll is a fad, Mr.Epstein".
(Please don't reply with the Bill Gates 640K quote - he never said that)
A Good Reason Not to go Wireless (Score:4, Insightful)
[OT] MIDI over Ethernet - DMIDI (Score:3, Informative)
The original UDP version, from a performance timing perspective, was tight and the network was transparent to musicians. The Ethernet version seems to be even tighter!
http://www.dmidi.org [dmidi.org]
It goes...On and On and On ... Stop the madness!!! (Score:4, Funny)
1. MS announcing an embedded version of NT for the Gibson.
2. The developers of products such as Soundforge,Cakewalk *& Protools get preloaded in package deals.
3. Slashdot features an article showing how easy it is to Mod the gibson with the latest Gforce card & monitor, mouse & keyboard connectors.
4. Not satisfied with only supplying the OS for the guitar, MS purchases Gibson.
5. All songs after this will begin with that happening and eternal windows startup wav file.
6. Slashdot post an article featuring the first Linux build for it.
7. A custom neck mod made with a slot for scanning your guitar tab in. (Embedded LED's light up green on frets and turn red on wrong notes)
8. The first Worm makes its rounds looking for predefined sequences and modifies the output based on it. (Ygnwie capped at 12 notes a minute or possibly the always unheard Church guitarist will have their volume adjusted to an audible level)
9. A small number of freshly networked guitar players attempting to break from the norms of society will stop speaking and develop a riff-only based form of communication. (Coincidentally following a profound LSD experience)
10. Actually the previous item may have already happened.
11. Terrorist are accused by homeland security as using embedded messages within a guitar which is reveiled when the correct 80's hair band solo is played.
12. Humans realize their diminishing fun while playing these devices and get back to their musical roots (Fart, Burping & beating on things with sticks)
13. Slashdot post its final article on the subject on the greatest MS Gibson guitar mod of all
Almost Sober,
SuperGlueBooger
Beware of the license (Score:4, Interesting)
The spec (...) is now available online in a version 2.8 for a 10-year royalty-free license.
So what happens after ten years? Huge fees those manufacturers who can afford, lawsuits for everyone else? The fact that Magic is not a open standard may prevent it's wide acceptance.
Only a matter of time.. (Score:5, Funny)
I can only imagine your traditional rock band roady will think of this - can you imagine:-
"Oi! Dave, make us a cuppa tea - I'm jus con-figging dur main switch"
"yeah alf a mo John, gotta unpack da amps and those er.. 'rooter' things you was talking about"
"Noice one, don't forget the bootp server"
"er... John.. what's this 'effernet' anyway?"
"not now John" (taps microphone) " Testing, testing..er I mean 'Ping 12.12.123.12'"
"No response from bass guitar"
"is it da cable?"
"Nah thas normal - he's bladdered, innit".
New opportunities for 1337 hax0rs (Score:3, Funny)
I can just see it: a worm that turns the output of a Nine Inch Nails show into the treacly slop of Kenny G. The horror, the horror! (Although vice-versa might be interesting...)
Re:1st p0st (Score:5, Funny)
Easy, quit smokin pot and it's pretty simple.
Or. . . (Score:2, Funny)
Re:1st p0st (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Shhhh. . . (Score:2)
There is room on this earth for so much cool music, I don't understand why one has to be at the expense of the other. I mean, it's not like five companies own all avenues for music distribution, and do their very best to make sure we don't hear anything else.
Oh, wait...
Re:1st p0st (Score:2, Interesting)
If digitizing of the analogue signal can be perfected at the instument end of equipment, the possibilities for signal loss/distortion are greatly diminished. A digital signal from the guitar can be sent directly from the guitar to the recording equipment.
This allows for a more pure signal to be recieved, and recorded. While there are people who object to digitizing music (give me a 'pure' analogue signal!), it is hard to deny the reality that ALL recorded music (on CDs) is digitized. By digitizing earlier on in the process, Gibson is mearly allowing for the listener to hear a sound that was sampled from a more pure origonal than current methods allow.
I don't really see how someone can object to studio use of technology like this, and as another poster pointed out, there are plenty of uses for such tech in things like the addition of live effects during concerts, etc..
And maybe, just maybe this will help to get us away from the current bland techno beats, as this *does* give better access to instuments to the button pushers.
Re:d/a converters. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:d/a converters. (Score:2)
should read as:I'd reccommend you let the studio do the a/d converting.
Re:The latency on this is unacceptable. (Score:2)
Re:No way! (Score:2, Insightful)
What the heck is the matter with making something new? How does this change your life?
Re:cool possibilities (Score:2)
Uhh...your guitar pickups are analog.
In fact, with this new system the simple process of playing your guitar through an amp goes between an A/D and a D/A converter, versus straight analog now.
The only benefit to this I see is if you were going from the guitar to some digital effect or directly into a digital recorder.