Ti Desktop, Polar or Snow?

[pinetar]

I don't play, just punch the keys. I have a Korg wavestation SR and O1Wpro.

I liked what I heard on the Ti 61 at Sam Ash, went back and coulndn't knock anything out decent.

Which one shoud I consider. I have a new M-Audio Axiom 49.

I may even order today, b 4 6.

[Doc Jones]

Since you just picked up the axiom 49, my guess is that you are going to use that as your keyboard for controlling the virus, so I would say it doesn't really make sense to pick up a Polar (unless you just really like how it looks). Other than that, I am not quite sure what the spec differences are between the TI and snow. All I can say is that I have a TI and love it.

[Timo]

As far as I'm aware, the differences between the TIs (Polar, TI and TI kb) and the Snow seem to mainly relate to polyphony (the number of notes you can play until it starts dropping out), multi-timbrality (the number of simultaneous patches you can play at once, like bass, chord, and lead sounds all together), the number of physical audio output jacks, the number of presets available, and the UI.

DSP chips: Snow is single-core (1 chip), the TIs are dual-core (2 chips)...

... Therefore polyphony of the Snow is approx half that of the TI. The figure quoted is >50 voices for the Snow, and >80 voices for the TIs, but how that equates to real-world values given varying complexities of patches requiring more/less power is anyone's guess. I guess it's quite variable.

Multi-timbrality: Snow has up to 4 part-multi, the TIs have up to 16 parts. (Not that you'd ever get to use that many even on the TI, due to polyphony etc.)

Hardware audio outputs: Snow has 2 x 192KHz/24bit balanced (+4dB) analog outputs on 1/4" TRS, whereas the TI has 6 of them.

Both the Snow and TI have 6 (3 x stereo) additional streams of audio via USB though, but these are limited to 16-bit/44.1KHz usage (for both TI and Snow equally).

Presets: Snow has 512 RAM and 512 ROM singles and 64 x 4-part multis, whereas the TI has 512 RAM and 2048 ROM singles and 16 x 16-part multis. (..At least I think).

The user-interface differences between the Snow and TI are obvious. Less knobs and buttons and smaller footprint, but Access claim they've made it as easy as they can do to navigate.

Otherwise, the actual sound mangling engine between the Snow and the TIs are identical.

So it just comes down to specifications, sizes, and your working habits. They both sound the same, just the TIs have a greater quantity.

[pinetar]

Thank you for your indepth report.

I placed an order today for a TI Desktop with a respected sales agent with guitar center. He agreed to a quote he gave me 2 weeks ago.

[4NDRW]

also i noticed in a local music store,
the snow is much much lighter
whereas the desktop is a fair bit heavier than i expected
which is only a factor for people who want to carry it around in a bag

(me because i dont have a car and need to take it between home and band rehearsals on a train)

but i'm getting the desktop anyway lol
i'll just get strong shoulders :P