The latest developments on the equipment scene

Speaking Sanyo

Sanyo (UK) has just announced the introduction of a new budget-priced personal stereo unit which — in addition to being provided with lightweight headphones — is also supplied complete with plug-in speaker boxes.

The new Sanyo MG7SP personal stereo kit includes the cassette player, headphones and two speaker boxes and, with an anticipated market price of less than £25 including VAT, offers high quality sound reproduction at a budget price. The cassette player features separate left and right volume controls to achieve optimum balance, and a locking fast forward control button. The unit also offers 'auto-stop' at the end of the tape.

The player delivers a power output of 25mW per channel and operates on four 'ZZ' size batteries or Ni-cad rechargeable equivalent, or alternatively can be operated from an external DC supply such as a car battery. In addition to being supplied complete with headphones and speaker boxes, the new Sanyo MG7SP cassette player is provided with a useful shoulder strap. Further details from Sanyo UK, (Contact Details).

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For even more listening power and also new from Sanyo (UK) are booster speakers which can be used with personal stereo players to give 15W per channel of high quality sound. The speakers effectively transform any personal stereo unit used for leisure and holidays into a high quality sound system for use in the home.

These new Sanyo booster speakers — model B10 — incorporate an amplifier which drives a 2-way speaker system in each unit — a 10cm free edge cone complemented by a 10cm passive radiator speaker. The speakers are capable of handling a frequency range from 50-17,000Hz and have a nominal impedance of 6 ohms. They are simply plugged into the headphone socket on a personal stereo unit, the in-built amplifier being mains driven.

The master unit in each pair of speakers incorporates a power on/off switch, a twin position tone control and an audio 'mute' switch. The new Sanyo speakers are available in a classical silver finish or bright red finish, and each unit has dimensions 130mm(w) x 280mm(h) X 207mm(d). Anticipated market price for a pair of Sanyo B10 booster speakers is £69.95; further details from Sanyo UK, (Contact Details)

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Carlsbro continue to make available a wide range of spares and accessories intended for solving equipment problems where skilled technical assistance and test equipment are not required. These include a selection of plugs and sockets including jack, XLR and phono designs; mains connectors including Bulgin and Eurosocket; readymade speaker leads from jack-jack, jack-XLR or XLR-XLR; and cabinet spares including corners, handles, straps castors and vents.

There is also a range of electrical spares including fuses and holders, sliders, footswitches and speaker units. Carlsbro's name has largely been made in the amp/speaker field, and the Powertone range now includes models handling from 25 to 100 watts, with detailed figures on frequency response, impedance and sensitivity available.

Four different High Power speakers for 100-200 watts are available and there are three horn HF units with details of crossovers needed. Further information on the Carlsbro 'On Tour' spares range is available from Carlsbro (Sales) Ltd, (Contact Details).

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Eight From Octave

Octave-Plateau, manufacturers of the popular Cat and Kitten synths, have come up with a surprise in the form of the Voyetra Eight, a programmable 8-voice polyphonic synth with a huge range of microprocessor-controlled facilities. Although it's been available in the States for some time, along with a now discontinued monophonic module, the Voyetra has only now come into the UK due to the efforts of London-based Computer Music Studios.

The Voyetra Eight consists of an 18" rack mounting voice and microprocessor unit, together with a remote 5-octave keyboard. The VPK-5 keyboard is both velocity and pressure sensitive with a spring-loaded joystick giving a fifth of pitch bend on the Y axis and programmable effects on the X axis. There are Program Forward and Reverse buttons above the joystick, a pressure sensitivity control and facilities for a three-pin XLR connection to the main module.

The synth module has analogue oscillators, filters and amplifiers for a warm sound and microprocessor control for versatility. One hundred memories are accessible via a keypad, and programmes may be edited, transferred or dumped to cassette. The keyboard can be 8-note polyphonic, split at any point, layered, arpeggiated or locked in unison. Polyphonic glide and glissando are available, and the multifunction controls give two ADSRs per voice, 24dB/octave filters, mono and poly modulation, stereo capability and a 1700 event sequencer in two independent tracks. The Voyetra also includes various footswitch controls and the very wonderful MIDI which allows easy connection to a Prophet, Roland or Yamaha synth equipped with the same system.

Retail price for the Voyetra Eight is £3,750 and further details are available from Computer Music Studios: (Contact Details).

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Pick Up A Hohner

During the British Music Fair in August German manufacturer Schaller, well-known for his machine heads, introduced a number of new pick-ups and bridges to the UK market. Hohner, Schaller's UK distributor, displayed the whole range of Schaller products at their stand in the Russell Hotel. Two pick-ups in particular caused a lot of interest: The new Schaller Western II pickup (Model 210) and the Schaller Golden 50 Humbucker.

The Western II has out of phase dual coils individually screened to suppress hum and noise and a new specially designed magnet to ensure uniform volume balance on all six strings. A four-position switch allows the player to choose between full humbucking sound, out of phase, single coil and stand-by. A unique mounting system is designed to fit the pick-up in the soundhole of all flat top acoustic guitars quickly and easily. The pick-up carries a three year warranty by the manufacturer and is distributed in the UK by M. Hohner Ltd. Recommended retail price for the Western II is £35.45.

The Schaller Golden 50 Humbucker is built around a specially designed Alnico magnet. The pick-up responds very quickly and has a warm, full sound. Schaller has with this pick-up achieved exact reproduction of the old Humbucker sound of the fifties. To compensate for the volume difference between neck and bridge pick-up, the resistance of the neck pick-up is different to the bridge pick-up. The Schaller Golden 50 retails at £17.40. For further information please contact Michael Kommer Associates, (Contact Details).

After entering the small keyboard market last year with the Hohner Family P100, Hohner is this year launching the P120 portable electronic stereo keyboard.

The P120 is a four octave (C-C) keyboard with full size keys, mains powered with battery or car lighter power source option and two built-in speakers.

The P120 features 12 fully polyphonic voices, four solo voices and offers effects such as Stereo Chorus, Vibrato, Sustain and Transposer. Twelve auto rhythms ranging from Waltz to Country are available as well as two-mode auto arpeggio. The 'Auto Bass' consists of one finger bass, finger chord, bass split, bass (variation) and memory. A programming facility (55 Bits of data) offers 'Play', 'Record' and six further functions.

The P120 portable electronic stereo keyboard retails at £385. For further information please contact Michael Kommer Associates, (Contact Details).