I use it to bring sounds from the field into my modular setup. So i use mostly loops, grains, grains clusters, variable length loops, well anything that involves buffers and modulations/triggers. Think of all the strange tape machines from the early days (Schaeffer’s phonogene and morphophone, Hugh Le Caine’s magnétophone à application spéciale, etc.) except you don’t have to hire an engineer to solve the mechanical issues that get in the way of realizing your ideal multiple tapes and heads contraption.
Another great strength to me is that the interface (physical and GUI) is very intuitive (on receiving mine i was amazed by the fluidity of the first contact, like a succession of “how do i…? oh, here it is!” moments). It is quite easy to navigate between global chains, chains, sub-chains, and sub-sub-chains (more than that becomes unnecessary).
Most questions have already been asked and answered on the O|D forum and many use-cases of the machine are covered in details by Neil’s video, so i’d say the learning curve is very gentle. Once acquired the basics of the structure and how to navigate it, it is very fast to operate, and one gets quickly into flow.
To sum my take on the 301: it is a machine that leads me to try stuff with sound files in less time and distraction that if i had to do it on a computer (it doesn’t feature a web browser!). I only have 9 modules around it and all my needs are fulfilled. It’s all about imagination now.
edit: oh the joys of leaving a post unfinished overnight;) @x2mirko explained the machine clearer than me. And i concur that Teletype has a steeper learning curve (mainly due, in my case, to the need to think scripts elegantly (although nowhere near mind-bending as making a for loop in Pure Data :D) and thus depart from the habits of a non-programmer using programming languages in a haphazardly happy-go-lucky way.)
