An interesting looking new Kickstarter that might interest some people here: Hyve Synthesizer. Looks like it may be amenable to eurorack integration as well…
5 Likes
for me this looks interesting as a control surface.
(Im thinking along with Axoloti could make a really nice instrument)
Ive asked Skot (via Facebook) if he could publish some details of the connections, and he said more details will be released.
one thing, thats odd, its $34 for shipping to europe, for a $79 bare board, same cost as a fully built Hyve … I hope he can reduce this.
1 Like
Yeah, the $34 shipping is pretty steep and a bit disappointing. Well, I backed it anyway 
. It’s an interesting control interface, with a crazy amount of polyphony. And I like the sounds…
1 Like
I backed it and would love to hack it into eurorack and have it output polyphonic cv/gate. But I’ll be happy even if that turns out to be hard/not possible. It’s a lovely looking instrument.
1 Like
I like the gestural interface. I like the tactile discovery of chords, the expressivity… But the more I see videos about it the more I have doubts about the sound. I want to back it, I just need you to tell me something that flicks a switch into my brain. Would you try?
here is a good video of the back side of the board.
from what I can see, its using CD40106 (schmitt triggers) for the oscillators, with 74HC393 (counters)
Im familiar with the CD40106 as Ive been playing with the OMSynth from Bastl ( you can see how CD40106 are used here if your unfamiliar and interested , its cool stuff ).
there appears to be a set of resistor/capacitors and a pot, for each note of the scale… (R/C/P) the resistor/capacitors Id assume are for the basic tuning, then the pot will be for fine tuning…
Im intrigued to know what the counters do, I’m assuming something to do with the poly count… 8 ‘oscillators’ in the 40106, and there appears to be 1 counter for each ‘note’ (2 on each 393)
(presumably the surface changes resistance, as you move in the note, by a known amount?!)
thoughts?
1 Like
I’m not experienced enough with this sort of thing to have anything to contribute. But my hope is that my desire will be common enough that Skot will end up providing some hints to us.
He has said that the BOM and schematic will be open sourced…
Perhaps the counters act like a clock divider to generate lower octave square waves using the overflow bits?
1 Like
actually I think its just using the counter bits (Q) this could give 5 octave, so theres your 60 notes.
then the output is connected to the L & R of each ‘pad’ accordingly, which act as attenuators.
so there you have your 60 notes poly in stereo.
this explains why I wasn’t enamoured with the sound, its a pretty basic square wave.
to use as a controller, its going to come down to how accessible the contacts on the pads are…
which is a concern, since most of the trace lines are covered…and the only exposed points, are where the ICs.
I guess you could solder to the counter outputs, but that will only give you mono output.
what would be really useful is if Skot could expose the contact points on the pads, this would make life really easy.
just connected these via multiplexers to gpio on an axoloti/rPI/Bela and your good to go
2 Likes
Very tempted to back it… I actually love how it sounds, almost harmonium like. But funds are currently elsewhere sadly 
Also: shipping november, ugh. Wondering if it will be available after the campaign…
I just saw the video for this through some other channels, and one of the really intriguing things about this for me is that it’s also apparently pressure sensitive… I wonder what the constraints are on that, and how it’s done, especially in the context of the touch thread
1 Like
Yeah that and the ‘pan’ is what interested me as a control surface. I think it’s based on the surface area of touch rather than pressure/force, but no idea how sensitive it is - the videos don’t show it as particular nuanced but that’s doesn’t mean much.
I’m waiting to see final schematics to see if it’s going to be a reasonable project for me, I fear the SOIC pads maybe too small for me to successfully solder 120 connections 
1 Like
I wrote an iPad app (never released) back in 2010 that was an infinite hex hive:
It could get a little out of control:
I think it just sent an OSC message for something else to pick up.
2 Likes
WOW
that is a lot of hexagons!
Yes, it’s unbounded, really. I think it was going to drive a granular synthesis app (just intonation, of course). For all I know, it might work if I recompile it!
Got an update that the project will be open source. Preliminarily schematic here: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B93D74RZ8bmYX2l0eWxpOWlIUjQ
2 Likes
cool, Skot said he was going to open source it.
this schematic is what id figured out/modelled on my OMSynth, the bit I’m waiting for is to see how he connects the oscillators to the pads to get the panning, and also a physical board layout to see where all the connectors are for the pads.
hopefully he’ll release this soon enough.
A nice stretch goal: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/skotwiedmann/hyve-touch-synth-make-the-future-of-musical-expres/posts/1847981
2 Likes
I just checked back on the status of this project. 33 hours to go, and the stretch goal (2 PCBs instead of 1) will be acheived if 3 more hyve hacker pledges are made.