Electro-acoustic History – Theremins and moogs.

So in my posts I am going to jump around a bit and as a result chronologically these posts probably wont make make sense. However what I am looking to cover is the broad strokes of how various developments came to be.

In that sense what II am going to delve into today is Synthesis.

The Theremin

1928 – The Theremin, patented by the Russian engineer Léon Theremin… funnily enough, was a device that while no great synthetic masterpiece was one of the first to really start breaking the box on interactive methods. Up until then people where plugging in weird instruments to weird electrical amps and getting weird results but Léon broke the mold by devising a way that a performer could interact via the two major properties of sound. Frequency and Amplitude.
Interestingly Leon was an engineer and not a performer so he sucked at playing it. I have embedded a link below to show someone who could play it. A lady by the name of Clara Rockmore. Pretty virtuoso huh…

Anyways, It is a pretty cool instrument and these days you can pick up one (or a kit) for very little. It is a fun instrument I can assure you.

 

The Moog

ah… the Moog. Arguably the most famous synth brand in the world, named after Robert Moog (pronounced “Mohg”) – although I often slip up and say it phonetically. oops
Anyway Mr Robert Moog started out making Theremins… funnily enough and then decided to get a bit more into the synthesis game.
Around the 50′s he started making the moog modular. A (possibly) gigantic room filling thing that was awesome for many reasons. The first reason (that is especially important to those who use Propellorhead’s Reason) is the idea of patching cables.

The Moogs were giant things that sometimes filled rooms. 

The second reason – These modular synths (and others like them) Introduced discrete sections such as Generators, Filters, and Envelopes. In fact any time you look at your Soft Synth plugins within a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW), you will see a layout that was standardized back in the 50′s. Pretty cool huh.

It was pretty cool and all the experimentalists loved it. Up until these modular systems you really needed an engineering degree to make electronic music and this system put the music in the hand of musicians. However there was a problem. Because of its size there was an inability to perform with it. Musicians could not take it on stage. At the same time, Electronica was a pretty new genre and people thought it was all very weird! So as a result the most common use for Electronica was Sci-Fi movies.

Now. Next time I will talk about portable synthesis and how that drove electronic music into the mainstream.

Stay Tuned…

Electro-acoustic History – Futurism

So, one of the  great things about a formal education in electronic/electro-acoustic  music is the background history you get. Behind every filter, every synth, every piano roll is hours, days, years of experimentation in which that particular style was conceived to be the best. This EA history series will look at some of the Major contributors to synthesis, DAWs and the roots of Electronic music starting in the 20th century. Hopefully I will be able to make it interesting, unlike any history class… ever.  :)

 

So this journey begins in the earliest moments of the 20th century. As Orchestral music hits its peak and blues and roots music starts to take… root? *facepalm*  in America. Half way across the world, a small collective of mostly visual and (a few) musical artists smoke pipes, drink a suitably cheap alchoholic beverage in great quantity and most of all, consider loftily the world which they lived in. They took note of the fact that as the Industrial Revolution took hold, the natural world is being replaced by machinery and noise, sharp edges and grime. They (being a bunch of alchoholic artists… not much has changed, right???) go on a bender one night and think outloud.. very out loudly to themselves… Why is it that the music of the day reflects a natural environment rather than the mechanical and edgy world of the industrial landscape. Then they crash their car. This has no relevance. They are just that drunk.

In some ways you could say they created the first truly “urban” music. no. Actually. You can’t. But you are welcome to think it.

What they created was well… awful. It was an instrument called the “Intonarumori”

check it out here if you like ->

http://www.thereminvox.com/article/articleview/116/1/31/

if you don’t like, (many didn’t) please sit back and use your mind to imagine this picture that I will paint with less than one thousand words.
Imagine an electric grinder, or drill, or a circular saw. (sounds lovely right?) It is next to a string strung horizontally front to back in a box (this string vibrates with sympathetic resonance when the circular saw turns. Then the string is connected to an old school horn speaker. It has a lever on the side of the box which can be set to two speeds. It sounds terrible. It was terrible. check it out here if you like, or more to the point.. you hate your ears.

Now, All aesthetic considerations aside it was a monumental moment in Electro-Acoustic music and one that should not be missed as it set up the ideas later expressed by the likes of John Cage or even Mr Bill. It is the idea that a sound can be harsh and yet be musical, it can not be derived from a string or a stretched hide and can be musical.. It can not be a specific “pitch’ AND STILL BE MUSICAL. From this we can see Electro-Acoustic music begin to define itself, especially once brilliant and slightly less “sauced” musicians start to explore the rich tapestry of sound that we now take for granted on a daily basis.

Yep. And there you go. Lesson 1 over. I hope you enjoyed my rambling recollections…

Hungee

 

The Android Music Platform – Is it worth it?

So as tablets have become a common tool and touted as a viable music creation option, iOS apps for music have multiplied and slowly started to become more intricate moving beyond the original amateur do-it-for-you apps, to more complex professional solutions. However, those of us who think the Apple value proposition is poor, (e.g. iPad mini $425 vs N7 $250) or that their “elegant” user interface design is… well childish, have despaired to see android solutions stagnate and remain the province of indie developers. Not that there aren’t some very viable options (there are), but large developers such as liine, propellorhead, Imageline, moog, et all have seemingly resisted investing in developing for the droid eco-system.

In this post I am going to try and answer some questions about why this is and have a realistic look at the problems and also the solutions that are being presented.

 {  before I do, here is a link to a website which lists the current music apps available http://www.androidmusician.com/  }

Android – Pre Jelly Bean -

    I am a long time fan of Android, I like its open ecosystem which drives choice up and prices down. I also like the general methodology with its semi-open interface. However, there have been serious issues with Android devices in the realm of music making since its inception. Up until Jelly bean, using android as a real-time performance device was, well… you basically couldn’t. The commonly used audio API (Audiotrack) before Jelly Bean had a maximum recommended audio latency of 100ms which is essentially equivalent to the amount of time it takes for me to boil the kettle and make a coffee. By equivalent, I of course mean that it is just as useless…. Mostly this is because it is Java. Which is poop.

    Secondly, Android has a much larger processing and graphics footprint than iOS or even WinPho 8 and as such resources are tight. Best case, music app development tends to be sparse and include very little in the way of ‘pretty’ design. A basic case in point, Caustic 2, which is an excellent little program for making minimal tunes but one which looks pretty fricking ugly and boxes you in to feeling like your creativity is blocked except beyond minimal composition and about 8 different (simultaneous) tracks. Even more so, if you consider Alexander Zolotov’s SunVox – which is an excellent software to consider and is compatible (and free) with linux & windows, is well adapted to touch, but looks like the dark pit of hell you will definitely descend into if you want anything more than a basic psytrance or minimal techno track. It is not exactly the epitome of variety that is the modern DAW.

So what is a droid fan to do?

Well there is some good news and some possible better news on the horizon. Jelly Bean has created some new hope for developer engagement. Audio latency has shrunk to 12ms which is usable if not ideal, (ideal would be =<5ms). Also they have added support for USB audio which is a key step and USB midi is becoming more mainstream. “search midi monitor on google play” 

For more detail on recent audio developments for android check out the thread below

http://createdigitalmusic.com/2012/07/android-high-performance-audio-in-4-1-and-what-it-means-plus-libpd-goodness-today/

So Pretty…

   One of the issues with android tablets is the ARM standard “mali-400″ GPUs that most android processors incorporate which are well… shit. Samsung is an especially bad actor in this space using the stock standard boring 4-core GPU which any enthusiast will tell you is, not the greatest amount of cores, nor even created by someone . In fact when it comes to GPU cores; more cores with less hz is better than less cores with more htz.

  In to this space steps Nvidia. The best graphics combination in the Android ecosystem and a top tier contender for best out of all the mobile ecosystems, their long experience as the top selling graphics card producer from the PC sector brings a beautifully powerful 4big+1little core CPU with 12 GPUs to their Tegra 3 offering and with the newer Tegra 4 chip (due in May) they multiply the GPUs by 6 for a ‘sensual grunt’ worthy 72 individual processors. oh yeah…

So good news then for current Nexus 7 owners and future TEGRA 4 purchasers.

So quick…

   Project Butter was a concerted effort by Google to clear out the cupboard of dusty old bullshit code and move into a more solid codebase and with that effort they have created a clearer, cleaner system.
Jelly bean has quickly succeeded Ice Cream Sandwich, and while the majority of cheap no name brand less tablets seem to stick with ICS or even gingerbread, it easy to pick up a tablet running Jellybean for less than $250.

Looking to the future…

The issues contributed to the Android system are associated with its open ecosystem, which means that there is always going to be crap products pushed by dodgy Chinese manufacturers which can’t be helped. Having said that; to tar them all with the same brush is ludicrous as Samsung has proven recently, by becoming the biggest smartphone manufacturer in the world. Apple apologists will tell you that this is “because of their many offerings” but the reality is for Q3 last year their two flagships the S3 and the Note II outsold the iPhone 4S and 5. ~ (note: the iphone 5 reaffirmed its dominance in Q4 but we can expect the two to trade No. 1 status back and forth in the future) ~ Add to this the reality that the half baked iPad mini was mostly a reaction to the Kindle Fire(and partly the Nexus7). In fact what Google wanted to develop with Android was a larger pie in which the larger slice will be Android; with iOS, WP8 and Blackberry taking specific corporate and hipster demographics. They seem to be succeeding.

 As well as this the latest Nexus offerings take direct aim at the iPads/iPhones, (finally) offering a mature product comparison at a fraction of the cost. e.g.

Nexus 4 16gb – 50% of cost of equivalent iphone
Nexus 7 32gb wifi – 59% of cost of equiv. iPad mini
Nexus 10 32gb WiFi – 89% of cost of equiv. iPad

So what does this mean?

For a long time iOS has been known as the ecosystem where most music & visual creatives like to exist, yet as time goes by and the major improvements in audio and user interface solidify, more people will become natives of the android system and with the low low price of the tablets it will mean more users for developers to target. Naturally, Android musicians are willing to pay for music apps just as much as their iOS counterparts, so it will become a must for developers to develop for both systems in order to maximise revenue potential.

So… Is it worth it?

Yes! As an example of this check out the progress on Imageline’s FLStudio android app below. It should be out in the next month or two(as of posting).

http://www.image-line.com/documents/android.html

Like Imageline, other Pro developers will (if not already) find the value proposition for developing for android incredibly tempting so I predict that very soon we will be seeing more pro developer options for android tablets and phones arriving with much fun to be had for us droid fans.

That’s it from me friends,

Feel free to post comments below and I will endeavour to reply asap.

Prediction: The TOP 5 Consumer Technologies of 2013

Hey guys, so 2012 was a bonkers year for consumer tech and 2013 is shaping up to be a corker too. Here is my quick guide to some technology that (I think) will become common to either your living room, your backpack or your hip pocket.

1. $100-200 Android tablets.

Google shook this space up with the Nexus 7

Yep. 7″ tablets for cheap. There has already been 2 released this year by Acer and Asus. Recently a cool one by Hyundai (T7 for about $170 with quad-core) has appeared – that’s right.. that Hyundai??? This is mostly due to the Amazon Kindle’s runaway success and other tablets like (my favourite) the Asus Nexus 7 driving down the price point for high quality tablets to sub-$200. So expect to see Jelly Bean tablets for around that price point and 10″ tablets for $350 or $500 including 4G. Apple customers can expect their prices to go up…or stay the same as well as a refresh on the iPad mini so it isn’t quite so shit.  

2. Full-HD in 5″ or less. Retina-what?

 

HTC Butterfly with its gorgeous 5″ 1080p screen

I remember how shocked everyone was when I first got a Desire HD with its (then) mammoth 4.3″ screen. Then the S3 came out at 4.7″ last year. Well guess what? Expect 5″ to be the new norm with high-end smartphones this year, as it seems to be very popular with the display manufacturers. A lot of them are being announced as we speak. Definitely, expect 1080p FULL! HD! 5-inch screens to start coming out as of April->May. If you could be bothered to do the Math you would calculate that Full HD screens X 5 inches works out to be about 440 pixels per inch… For a bit of comparison, the iPhone (the world leader apparently…?) runs at around 326 PPI. That is an extra 114 pixels per inch for truly non-fatiguing text and naturally a whole lot of stolen hip-pocket real estate. Also expect phablets (phone+tablets) such as the Galaxy Note 3 or the Huawei Ascend to get up to around 6 inches…

3. Smart TV in-a-box aka Android mini PC.

 

My most recent and favourite tech purchase is GoogleTV. For the price of a nice pair of jeans, I recently bought what essentially is a mini-computer. It is a dual core ARM V9 1.2ghz, Android Jelly Bean, WiFi, HDMI out, USB drive compatible, powerhouse that turns a cheap monitor or your LCD TV into an Internet ready, productivity, video watching and gaming machine. You can plug a keyboard and mouse combo into it and type out a kick ass review   or you can watch internet TV, or stream from a central fileserver or NAS. If you are that way inclined you can download torrents to a laptop and watch it on your TV without the use of pesky wires. You have access to the usual Google play apps which gives you an enhanced Smart TV experience and you can even play music from a tablet (for example my Dad’s iPad) via airplay or DLNA using a wireless network.

All for a fraction of the cost of AppleTV or worse… having to buy a whole new TV.

For more info, check out my review (below).

4. Much Faster and more power miserly processors with (ARM only) embedded 4G

Cortex-A15 and Haswell series i3/5/7 

Soon you will start to see mobiles pushing the latest ARM chips, dubbed “A15″ which was first featured in the Samsung Nexus 10 with the Samsung Exynos 5, and which (no doubt) will also be in the new Galaxy S4 (due out in March/April). Also Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 series will be replaced by a new chip called the ’800′ as well as the 5 core (4big+1little) nVidia TEGRA 4. These are all meant to be very, very quick, supporting technologies such as 4K x 2K (UHD) resolution, embedded LTE and more secure cryptography. Oh and they will do it twice as power efficiently too. The embedded LTE means it will become the standard in any cellular device (including tablets) so that is exciting news for us all
Oh, and quick heads up… Go Tegra if you want better graphics, Qualcomm if you want snappier LTE. Apple will probably also move to the new A15 SoC so we can expect a new chip from them (most likely) in June-September-ish.

in the same bat town, at the same bat time…

As for Intel, their next-gen processor codenamed “HASWELL” will yet again remind us all why they are the number one chip fabricator; bringing significant performance, and power improvements over the current IVY bridge architecture. Due to appear in May-June this year, HASWELL will be seen in everything from mobiles through to servers, ratcheting up in cores and Gigahertz, (dependant on their usage) which means affordable Wintel tablet/hybrids with longer battery life. More power miserly with better parallel instruction sets, improved 4k UHD onboard video and class leading FLOPS performance means that with HASWELL, Intel finally may be able to put the cat amongst the pigeons in the mobile sector and start bringing their legendary chip performance to a mobile/tablet/hybrid near you…. Just don’t expect to see them in Apple or Samsung mobes as they design their own chips. 

5. Win8 – Ultra-convertibles with touchscreens!

The dell XPS 10(WinRT) for only $499

 PCs have had it a bit rough lately but the good news is that they may be about to get their act together again. While OEMs tried their best through 2012 with WinRT based offerings and the Ultrabook concept from Intel, this year is when some truly awesome Windows-based tech will start appearing at hopefully more reasonable price ranges. I am expecting that by around June you will be able to purchase (for around $800-$1,200), a 13″ 1080p detachable touch-screen Ultrabook running an i3/i5/i7. They should also have a decent battery life of 6-8 hrs (smart usage). As well, you will be looking at a full Windows 8 experience which means; you will have the ability to run full legacy applications. 

the Surface Pro (win8+i5) for around $999

With the introduction of the Surface Pro I think we are starting to see a real world example of what I am talking about. Hopefully the other OEM’s will start to see the writing on the wall and soon you should see 3 distinct classes of notebook. 1. Traditional form factor 2. Ultrabook style. 3. Small touch screen hybrids. Again. If they keep the first for around $6-800, the second for less than $1k and the third for less than $1k we shall see a vast improvement which I know will certainly tempt me to start saving my couch change.

That’s all folks. I hope you have found this interesting and feel free to comment below if you disagree with my analysis..

How to turn your LCD TV into a SMART TV for less than $80

Hey guys, if you don’t want to shell out for a new TV but are keen to get into the world of internet-ready television. If you are sick of plugging your laptop in to watch torrents or are sick of usb sticks. If you want to play temple runner using a keyboard, or want to access network files and stream online content. Hungee is here for you…

Here is my guide on how to turn your run-of-the-mill and humble LED/LCD TV into a SMART TV for less than $80      

What am I talking about? Google TV. Yeah baby.

Ignore dates on photos. new shitty camcorder.

So first off is a review of the device I bought personally. After that I have left a detailed “how to” guide on setting up your own Smart TV.

The Hardware.

{I bought an MK806 which is a slightly modified version of the MK809 which this review is based on. The only major difference is the case and the addition of a 3.5mm audio jack and the mk809 has a dual-antenna wifi.}

Like the MK809, my MK806 is based on a “Rockchip rk3066 Dual-core Cortex A9 1.6ghz System-on-Chip with a Mali-400 4-core GPU, which in laymen terms, means it has roughly the grunt performance of a Galaxy SII with the ability to provide 1080p video rendering. In real terms it means it is not the fastest little computer in the world but it does the job quite well and apart from the occasional momentary *think*, it performs admirably. The video is not super sharp but then again, I haven’t run any 1080p tests on it yet so it could be the Torrent “avi quality” as much as anything. Personally, I find it is an enjoyable experience, no different to HDMI output from a laptop for example. 1Gig of RAM keeps on top of your application needs easily and it has an onboard ROM of 8 gig(6 gig usable) for applications. The inclusion of a micro SD card slot and the ability to connect a USB storage device such as a flash drive or a larger hard drive rounds out your storage options.
Note: if you plug a USB hub into the MK80# the power draw may be too much, this means you will need to buy a powered USB hub for multiple usb connections or use a larger self-powered USB HDD.

The Mk806 has WiFI b/g/n whose performance is (to-be-perfectly-honest) a bit shit because it has no external antenna although I have seen tutorials on how to open the case and extract the internal WiFi antenna to get better performance. Unlike the MK806 (which I have), the Mk809 has dual-antennas so that should help with performance as well. All told, just make sure your Mini-PC is within 10 metres of your WiFi router and preferably not behind a brick wall for optimum performance, depending on your router. Either way, I find it easy to stream videos from my computer and copy data across the network while the interwebs runs as smoothly as it does anywhere else in my house. Streaming from youtube or even from ABC iView is a snap as well.

The Software

The best thing about this device is that it gives the user a ‘vanilla’ Android Jelly Bean experience (which is excellent) that includes many, many apps on the Google Play store (which is more than Samsung or LG can say with their bespoke Smart software) and delivering it all for a very,very, very low price. You can use this for Video, for Music, For internet browsing, for Productivity, for Gaming. oh the gaming. I forgot about gaming. Basically, it is a pretty sweet GPU and can do many things, however this is no Tegra device or flagship Smartphone so I wouldn’t necessarily count on super-excellent frame rates. Having said that, it is more than capable of running temple runner, or killing green pigs with excessive vengeance-based avians. So does it have its limits? yes. But without a touchscreen… who cares.

All in all, I am probably going to buy another one for my parents.

THE HOW TO GUIDE

What you will need.

1. A willingness to learn.

2. A TV with a spare HDMI input

3. Either a power point or a spare USB port on the TV

4. An Mk809 Android Mini-PC ($50)

“http://dx.com/p/cozyswan-mk809-ii-android-4-1-google-tv-player-w-1gb-ram-8gb-rom-wi-fi-tf-bluetooth-black-185736&#8243;

5. A wireless mouse and keyboard. ($25-30)

… for example, this one (it looks nice and compact)

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Black-2-4G-Optical-Mini-Wireless-Slim-Keyboard-And-Mouse-For-PC-Laptop-Mac-New-/181062369397?pt=AU_Input_Peripherals&hash=item2a28288075&_uhb=1#ht_7202wt_922

(don’t forget the batteries either)

or if u are feeling adventurous

“http://dx.com/p/mele-new-f10-2-4ghz-mini-air-mouse-68-key-wireless-keyboard-remote-control-for-pc-tv-black-173302?rt=1&p=2&m=2&r=3&k=1&t=1&s=179604&u=173302&#8243;

6. Either a USB Stick or a portable USB Hard Drive to plug into it.

7. A WiFi Router that is relatively close to the TV. (within 10-15 metres, no brick walls)

How to make it all work.

When you have received all the packages you should find your MK809 and do the following things.

1. Using the Micro USB port (same as what you find on Android phones) plug the appropriate cable (below pic) into that port and connect the charger to a power point or alternatively plug the cable into your usb port on the TV. (you probably wont need it any more anyway)  

 OTG cable with my MK806 (previous case, but same hardware + mini-jack audio port)

2. Plug the Mouse and Keyboard Wireless receiver into the OTG socket of the power cable.You can see (very vaguely) that I have connected my wireless receiver into the uncurled branch. make sure you have batteries in the keyboard and mouse. then turn on the mouse and keyboard. It should connect instantaneously and automatically.

3. Plug the HDMI cable into the MK809 and the other end into your TV.

4. Switch TV to the appropriate input channel. eg. “HDMI 1 or 2″

5. Enjoy your Android JellyBean 4.1.1 experience.

Now that you have plugged in your android device you are probably thinking… now what?

Here are my tips on how to start maximizing your SMART TV experience.

1. Connect the WiFI.

As I have stated previously.. wifi is not great. This is because the WiFi antenna is tiny and inside the plastic box and as such limits the range. So I hope you have your TV close to the router. Either way. Go to settings (click bottom right task bar, then the settings icon. It looks like a bunch of faders) and connect your WiFi using standard password settings.

2. Download some handy tools and optimize!

a) VIDEO Player – Check out MX player, it is the business.
b) WEB – chrome should be pre-loaded, Firefox is pretty good too.
c) AUDIO – Android Music is pretty good,
d) Utorrent – It is in BETA but it is still pretty tops and the best option (i have found)
e) Go into your APPS and uninstall/disable the apps that are in Chinese or seem to be bloatware. There are a couple and once you are done you will be better off for it.
f) Download Kingsoft Office and Evernote. Turn your Android TV into a productivity device.

3. Share your downloads folder to your TV.

Ok. So this is tricky, but doable. Just follow my steps.

(Windows only) Go find where your torrents downloads folder is, then right click on the folder, select properties. Once in properties click on the “Share” tab and then select “share” this folder. Next is a tricky one for the beginner out there but hang in there with me. Open a command prompt by a) pressing START+R, then typing “cmd”. Once you have done this type “ipconfig” and enter. Now. Look through what comes up for an entry that says “IPV4 Address” and a number to the right that looks similar to “192.168.0.X (where X is – insert the number you find). This is your computers address. OK. Now you will remember/write down the address and then go and start up your Smart TV

Once you have done that go back to your Smart TV and open the Google Play store. You may have to login if you haven’t already. Then search for an APP called “ES File Explorer”
which should look like the pic below.

Then once you have done that, open the software and click on the small tab at the top left of screen that says “local”. Once you have done that a dialog will come up, scroll down to “LAN” and select.

Once you have done this ES File Explorer will search for any computers on the network (using SMB networking). It will then show you a selection of addresses and you should select the address which you remembered/wrote down earlier.

Ok. Now (assuming your network is running smoothly) it will probably say something like: “username/password incorrect” this is good. Click OK and then enter your username and password for your computer. Assuming a correct entry, It will then come up with a list of your folders.

Bravo. You can now select the file and watch/listen/read at your leisure.

4. Lastly, Update your Apps, and enjoy your smart TV experience.

HANDS ON REVIEW: Nexus 7

Anyone who knows me well and have happened, upon occasion, to get stuck with their backs to the wall as I philosophise; will undoubtedly know that I like a good android device.

Imagine my delight then, to find a Asus Nexus 7 in my Christmas stocking   Thanx to an amazing girlfriend and a little hard searching for spare couch coinage of my own, it was here. Finally! Having desired this tablet for some time… It was exhilarating to stop talking specs and start actually using it. Below I have left a lengthy review of how it performs and how it has caused me much joy.

So, straight off the bat I’ll jot some hardware specs down,

Display – 7” 1280×800 (216ppi) HD IPS (about 20 less PPI than retina ipad)
1.2MP front-facing camera
32GB internal storage
1 GB RAM
NVIDIA® Tegra® 3 quad-core processor

Basically if I were to sum up the hardware I would say… If you chopped an iPad in half lengthwise, that is how big it is. Otherwise it looks “as good” and runs (at least) “as fast”. The camera is limited, with the front camera being good enough for standard definition Skyping and numerous selfies in well lit bathrooms. The mono speaker is loud and generally clear although if too loud an mp3 can distort. But good enough for movie watching/games and doable when making some rhythms. (I Prefer headphones myself). Oh, and battery life? Good 8 hrs of constant web/light use(4hrs gaming) I charge each night out of habit. Not because I have to.

OK, that is the dry bit. Which is not really important. What is important is the user experience and this is where we get to the guts of this review.

The Jellies in the bean.
What do you say about Android jelly bean? OS #4.2? Beautiful, fast but most of all, it feels like Android has come of age. Fast, responsive and on the nexus 7, very clean! Devoid of OEM crapware it is very pretty and with the tegra 3 powering softly along, it is snappy. Switching between programs is quick and effortless. Multi tasking is a must on a tablet and on the N7 it just… Works. I cannot recommend it highly enough, although I would not recommend the upgrade unless your phone or tablet has at least, AT LEAST, 1 gig of ram. Minimum. Oh and “Google Now”, is nuts.. Personally it feels ( like Siri is) a bit gimmicky but it is clever… Perhaps too clever… o_O

Hear my drums!
Latency. 12ms. Max! Those of you who are musos, take heart. Jelly bean was a big step forward for music with a maximum latency target of 12ms which is definitely useable if not best. Google have made sure their tablet delivers. Practically what this means is an inaudible difference between the drum strike and the soundwave and may we all rejoice at this   Sunvox is a particular gem as well as Caustic 2 and if you should desire an in depth midi/osc device there are plenty of options that are pretty easy to scale up quickly. It holds its own. Which for me, is quite a relief:-)  Also, I highly recommend “nodebeat”. I expect audio pro developers to take android seriously from now on because of these and future developments.

Games!

I play Fifa 2012 on the bus. I shoot zombies on the bus. I fly f22s on the bus. Nuff said. It looks absolutely Cuda too! *cue the eye rolling*

I paint good maaaaa?!

Ever wanted to paint a masterpiece. Ever wanted to click undo on that fail brush stroke? All I can say is… come get some! Artists should get in on it fa sure. It is fun, it is inspiring. It is truly, a New medium.

What’s important.

It is brilliant. The audio and camera could be better, but that was to be expected. And I barely use them anyway. To me it is about 1/3 the cost of the iPad, 1/2 the size and twice as good. It is light (bout 360g), so your arm won’t get tired holding it up to your face while you ‘stir the fry’ in the frypan. A fast web searcher and a perfect tool for work and play. While I will write no “high quality” mastered tracks, what I CAN do is keep innovating, and best of all, perform live. Also the thought of an infinite Ableton mixer is certainly devine. It is no Illustrator/Photoshop on the desktop but I have already put together some creative works I am proud o. It is also an excellent PDA. Calendar, note taking, saving pics on the web etc. Done and dusted. Haven’t tested the 3G yet but from what I hear it is capable of 21mbps HSDPA+ so that should be solid. Even without 3g it is nuts on WiFi, and hotspot from a phone works just as well after all. Also the size is actually not really that restrictive. 10″ tabs look huge and oversized now.

Basically if you don’t like fruity gear, and you want a tablet…
This is a great tablet. Well worth it. No compromise at all.
If you do like fruity gear and you want a small tablet, this will work AT LEAST as good, is 2/3rds the price and it also has the unique benefits of android’s open architecture and Google’s excellent native apps such as Youtube, Gmail and the equally populated play store. And a better screen. 16:9 all the way bro!!!
I can work, rest and play and it costs from $220-320(depending on the version). That is pretty mind blowing to me, I dunno about you.

(Written on a nexus 7)

PS. Get a stylus if you have a tablet. It is twice the fun.
PPS. The Tactile feel of it is brilliant. I am ashamed to say I like “just holding” it.

Windows 8 Review Part 1 & 3

• 3 Things I hate and 3 Things I love about Windows 8. One month later.

  This will be a long running series about the various bullshits and beautiful moments I experienced with the new windows. Each session I will give one Pro and one Con,

  Part 1 – initial experience and Audio lowdown

  Con #1:

  Audio Drivers: The way windows manages audio devices is not that much different to Win7. WDM still is a bit rough with long buffers but the automatic system of sensing different devices is almost superb. Any ASIO drivers you run should pick up everything smoother and quicker than before. Also it should pick the drivers up in real time (no more restarting your DAW).

  However. Due to a Toshiba let down on Win8 drivers, My Lappy Speakers & headphones has been designated the generic “HD audio device” drivers and this leaves me with a pickle. When using VLC if i plug my headphones in to switch to a quieter state so my girlfriend can watch 2 broke girls, I have to restart the video for it to pick up the headphones as default device. It is annoying but not life threatening but it is a glitch in an otherwise updated and smooth “driver” & “new device” experience.

  Pro #1:

  File management and Workflow

  I am a massive nerd. It is Known. The new windows 8 advanced options, file transfer interface and Task manager is just.. i dunno, Seriously mental good. Real proper shit. There is no other way to say it!  I have more information than is probably safe and if i click less details, i have a small box giving me a couple of the most important details in an attractive package. It is pretty, it is clean, it is functional. Massive tick from me!

  Workflow is an interesting one. First I think anyone should personalise their windows 8. Change the colour scheme, organise your start screen (you can do it by right clicking on icons) into a pleasing array of easy use icons. It helps, trust me. Secondly you should go into the app store and look for an app called “windows 8 cheat keys”. This app will give you an education on how to get around Win8 easily and smoothly.

  The START button + C for example sends you to your ‘charms” menu which is a one stop shop for settings devices and home. “START” + I will get you the settings bar and so on. These are helpful. If you press the start button on its own it will switch you between desktop and start menu.

  I remember back in the day, it was such a right of passage for nerds that you always customize from stock. That is the Windows experience in a nutshell. While Apple may be content selling you a unique experience 50 million times over, Windows is truely a place where you can edit your experience endlessly. With Win8 I suggest you do the same. Stock is good, customized is better. One such customization is the Classic Shell program which layers a skin onto your Win7 look-a-like desktop to re-insert the Start menu. This is a must for most people, and it is brilliant. Many such options are available to cover any deficit you find in the workflow experience.

  All up, I find i get around pretty smooth now, I find it a faster, smoother platform overall and a welcome advance in how I interface with the OS.

  So that is it…

  ps. Power Users, try right clicking on the bottom left hand side where the start menu used to be. …… Ok. pretty easy huh.

  **For some reason I cant find the second installment. But here is the 3rd to finish off.**

  Part 3

  So in this, the last installment of my windows 8 series, I want to wax a bit more philosophical and get a bit more general about how W8 sits in the market.

  Con – #frustration

  Recently I posted how it was my fervent belief that Microsoft’s product strategy with W8 is essentially an attempt to unify the touch interface into desktop computing and to do that by creating a unified ecosystem across PC/tablet/phone. Since then I have learnt troubling news that winpho/win rt/desktop apps are incompatible. In fact if a developer wants to write for the different platforms they have to compile three different sets of code. This is essentially… an own goal.
  What incentive do these developers have knowing that instead of costing roughly $20k to code a native app for all the platforms, it will cost thrice that… Or they can instead reach the vibrant Android and iOS communities for that 20k. It is a no brainer… This is not clever. With currently around 10 thousand apps in the Windows store compared to around 700 thousand in both Android and Apple stores… This is a significant negative and one that plays heavily on the sales of $500 RT tablets. The hardware is irrelevant if the user experience is limited. What this also means is unless you want to jailbreak your RT tablet (which recently was discovered) the only real alternative for a touch windows 8 experience is that you will have to buy into the touch convertible range of PCs that OEMs are now pushing. That means at least $900-1400 which is a hefty price in computers these days. While all indications are that these prices will definitely drop in the next 12 months, however… right now… The way i see it is, if you have a computer that generally does the job… It is much cheaper to buy a Droid/iOS tablet and experience touch that way and upgrade your existing machine to win8.

  Pro – Positives? Should I upgrade?

  Of course! So many reasons to upgrade. I have just upgraded a 3 yr old desktop (i7 1st gen) and it is interesting how it has improved due to the OS, as well as given me the tools to analyse its performance when it didn’t. When it has felt slow… (Which it has for 3 months) I have since learned that my primary HDD has had a good run but is now working very slow on transfer rates. This learning is due to an excellent task manager that tells me so much information that I can formulate plans to find and fix the problem. (In this case I am limiting its involvement until I buy an SSD for about $150.
  There are several benchmarks that have been published showing that windows 8 will improve your machines performance, although you need at least a dual core computer to run it and see benefits. Basically if your computer is still giving you good value and you are on win7 or vista, an upgrade is really a bit of a no brainer IMO. Despite its detractors (mostly IT pros who have large enterprises to deal with), windows 8 is a superior consumer desktop experience and while you may have a learning curve to overcome there are plenty of Google-able ‘how to guides’ and once you get the hang of it, it should be easier to get stuff done. I mean the search functions alone make it worthy. It is instantaneous to search files, settings, store apps, web search, etc. Compatibility mode is excellent for those random apps made by small developers, file management is more transparent with file transfer queues and pause buttons. It is all the little things that get missed in most reviews and they should be reiterated over and over.
  Anyways… More philosophical I said. Every time there is a new windows, the first 6 months is always full of a lot of doubting and nay saying. It is interesting that OSX tends to not have that. Generally because those who seek OSX out tend to accept the fact they will have to learn a new system. Also, more importantly (I think) it is because rarely do people experiment with the vanilla experience of OSX. You might customise the dock or desktop, but rarely will OSX let you look behind the scenes. Windows is different. The amount of customisation is WHY windows is on most PCs In the real world (outside starbucks anyway)…. It is because if you are a consumer, IT guy, Muso or film director you can make the PC do what you want, when u want it. Sure it takes a little learning, but hey, is that really a deterrent? Personally, i am happy to learn new metaphors and to own my experience as MY EXPERIENCE, untainted by Jobsian dictates on what i can and cant do with out opening my wallet every ten minutes. I like that i can use a dodgy work-around compiled by an IT guy who was fed up with this or that, i like that i can fiddle with the skin colours. Aluminium grey? When did that become stylish? Why is elegant minimalist design the equivalent to putting tin foil all over my screen? If I want my desktop to be shades of blue BECAUSE I like that colour and it compliments my eyes, why does that fly in the face of ‘CLEVER’ computing? It doesn’t make sense, which is why it is called ‘marketing’ I guess…

  Enjoy,

  Hungee