Members program_insect Posted March 14, 2010 Members Share Posted March 14, 2010 I seem to have a bad habit of turning on some of my synths at the start of a session, get working on something else, then end the session without having ever used some of the synths, even though they were powered up. aside from wasting electricity, does this have a long-term bad effect on a synth? Should I be trying to avoid unneeded power up/down cycles? Is just being turned on going to slowly wear out some analog components? feels like a dumb question but then again I'd hate to be silently murdering my precious synths, one second at a time... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nos Posted March 14, 2010 Members Share Posted March 14, 2010 I don't know about that, but I do know that not powering them on for a long time is bad for the electrolytic capacitors. And not turning knobs for a long time is bad for pots. Analog synths just want to be loved, and will die from neglect. Digital synths are cold and probably couldn't care less whether a human touched them for a thousand years. They have some electrolytic caps, but I don't think they are usually in the signal path. I think they belong to the power supply which is a lot less touchy about being left alone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members clusterchord Posted March 14, 2010 Members Share Posted March 14, 2010 that is the catch , capacitors and pots love to be used, or dry out, and start crackling, respectively. whereas proprietary ICs (like CEM, SSM, IR etc), transistors, OTAs n such, love not to be power-cycled, or used more than necesarry. their lifetime is a function of how long, and how much, have they been exposed to (working) temperature and shock of power-up. this is theory, reality usually aint as conveniently predictable. i opt for middle of the road solution btwn these two extremes. i tend not to power up anything i don't use, but every once in a while i do give em a rundown. and capacitors are MUCH cheaper, and readily available then proprietary (sometimes long gone, rare) ICs. and besides, something you don't use for several years, should probably be sold anyway.. ahem... but im guilty of exactly that , with my dusty MKS70. used it last in '02 or '03. but keep it for nostalgic reasons (jx10 was my first big poly), and it got no pots, so with new caps for PSU its pretty much in good shape. my 0.02 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Spleencage Posted March 14, 2010 Members Share Posted March 14, 2010 Are these new analogs or old ones? Power supplies changed a lot over the years.Is you power source spike protected? Conditioned? Voltage regulated? Most of the older synths "popped" when turning them on. Older synths usually needed a warm- up time too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Diametro Posted March 14, 2010 Members Share Posted March 14, 2010 I've 'sessed about this, too, and have started a couple of threads here and there about it ... (I'll try and find them ... Here's one about "wearing out analogs through use of MIDI" ... may sound strange but it's related ... ) What I've taken away is that there's no real right or wrong except blatantly turning them on and off all the time ... So I'm very careful as to when I turn on my vintage analogs ... If I do, I use them like there's no tomorrow ... There are many times, though, that they just sit, covered and unpowered as I practice on Fabtom ... (Though I'll often take off the dust covers to admire their design and construction)... Usually the analogs are mostly for recording at this point as I know more or less what they are capable of ... Sounding fantastic, that is; esp. in a recording ... Some people apparently leave them on all the time due to the shock of powering up/down ... But for a number of reasons, I just can't do it ... "Too bad she won't live ... But then again, who does ... ???" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members madprof Posted March 15, 2010 Members Share Posted March 15, 2010 Does this mean I need to play my Yamaha CS-01 more? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members The Real MC Posted March 16, 2010 Members Share Posted March 16, 2010 whereas proprietary ICs (like CEM, SSM, IR etc), transistors, OTAs n such, love not to be power-cycled, or used more than necesarry. their lifetime is a function of how long, and how much, have they been exposed to (working) temperature and shock of power-up. this is theory, reality usually aint as conveniently predictable. No it is a function of how well the power supply is designed. ARP power supplies (Omnis especially) had a habit of going overvoltage on power up, taking tantalum caps and ICs with it. 1970s CMOS tend to be sensitive to overvoltage surges. My 1970 RA Moog minimoog - forty years old - never blew anything. Most of my vintage moogs have 1970s CMOS and none of them ever got toasted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members augerinn Posted March 16, 2010 Members Share Posted March 16, 2010 Whilst I did enjoy the sound and Wow factor of my vintage Junos, I grew tired of worrying about crap like this. I just re-capped my ESQ-1s power supply, so I don't have to worry about here anymore. Even if she does crap out, I can get another one, cheap. Same with my Alpha Juno 2.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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