Bad Gear - Donner B-1

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Welcome to Bad Gear, the show about the world's most hated audio tools. Today we are going to talk about the Donner B1 Analog Synthesizer and Sequencer. Can the Donner B-1, inspired by the legendary Roland TB-303, keep up with the competition of affordable acid synth clones like the Behringer TD-3, Roland TB-03, Cyclone Analogic TT303, DINSync RE-303 or Mode Machines x0xb0x? Is it yet another affordable mono synth? Who's the mysterious company behind it?

Chapters:
00:00 Intro tune
00:57 Overview Donner B1
01:27 What/Who the hell is Donner???
02:27 Oscillator
02:38 Basic Tones
02:56 Filter
03:08 Distortion
03:16 Delay
03:23 Sequencer Basics
04:07 Added Sequencer Features, Realtime FX
04:26 Arpeggiator, Hold
04:32 Limitations
04:41 Connectivity, Sync, Donner Synth App
05:08 Interesting Videos, Pricing
05:38 Hate
06:06 Jam 1
07:00 Jam 2
08:02 Finale
08:30 Verdict

[AlexBallMusic]

Love that Fatboy Slim tune: Everybody needs a

[raistaparta]

Back in the days, some movies were so bad that they went straight to video. Now we have “straight to bad gear” synths.

[IzopticMusic]

"The synth Patrick Bateman would be using if he wasn't into Eurorack" - omg this is funny on so many levels, pure genius

[zecchouband]

Personally love the who is Donner section. I'm a sucker for the history of devices. Keep it coming.

[kidkique]

Donner revolutionized the guitar pedal market making soooo many pedal circuits availble to anyone interested instead of just rich pedal snobs. SO HAPPY TO SEE THIS!!!

[SlightlyNasty]

Honestly, that oscillator sounds pretty solid, and the interface / sequencer has a lot going for it. I feel like if they'd made it into a more general subtractive bass machine they'd have something much more interesting, rather than being the johnny-come-lately to the 303 party. Add PWM for some thicker sounds, go for a more versatile filter voicing, I'd be into that.

[nojuanatall]

This is my first bass synth/sequencer. Personally I think it is pretty good. I can see how it is limited in some ways. Let me say that running this into my boss GT1B is a game changer. This synth doesn't have the best tone on its own but with a little help it can sound amazing.

[surrealchemist]

Donner seems to ship out of the US when I ordered a couple things, so they must have a US office and distribution. I like how weird and cheap it is. I hope they keep making more synths

[ianmcmurchie]

Feeling sad nobody is trying to clone the Soviet oddity audio tools. I agree with you, the UI/sequencer on this looks awesome and intuitive but nothing else stands out from the saturated competition.

[danieklerr]

In 2009, I sent my Digitech DL-8 pedal to China, to a friend working at the newly-formed NUX company, with the hopes they could do something similar, but with deeper features. Specifically, I wanted to add various FX before the looper, so I could add layers of different types of sounds to a loop, and I wanted them to add MIDI. I had dreams of including this hybrid loop pedal to my product catalog. A few short weeks later, I get a prototype in the mail, loved it, and immediately ordered ten of them. A short while later, NUX released the first version of their Time Core loop pedal, without my requested MIDI interface. A short while after this, other companies began making pedals. I've attempted to do business with several of these, and to my knowledge at least share the same factory. JOYO/Harley Benton/Ammoon also share a different factory. It's nice to see these guys are entering the synth market, but of course I don't work at one of the huge manufacturers, lol.

[Vitoprimero]

The level of editing in your videos is sublime

[SynGirl]

The 303 is one of the easiest synths to emulate. Any single osc synth with a sequencer and a reasonably resonant filter can do the job.

[gavinholt]

I'm surprised you did this one so soon but I'm glad you did ! I've seen a few reviews of these and yours was the most straightforward, funny and honest of them all ! Well done audiopilz 👍

[Floralshoppe_]

It arrived barely two days ago and now I see a Bad Gear episode. You gotta love it :D

[Toolsquatch]

My Fridays are never complete without a new episode of Bad Gear, fantastic as always!

[maceobot]

Thanks for making my Fridays better, you're a legend.

[brianwilliams]

Hi, despite the Donner B1 going straight into "Bad Gear" I actually bought one!
Straight out of the box and without even bothering to read the instructions manual I was writing patterns within minutes.
I had a Roland TB-03 and a Behringer TD-3-MO-AM but sold them both as I found the pattern writing on both of these simply too complicated and frustrating.
The pattern writing on the B1 is so much easier.
Yes the B1 sounds different from the Roland TB-03 and Behringer TD-3 but actually pretty good.
I will probably use it just as a sequencer to drive my other synths and if I want full on acid, then my MAM MB33 will be at the other end of the MIDI cable.
Treat the B1 as a really simple (and cheap) sequencer with some added good sounds.

[stuartcarter]

I got mine for £100. Using with a Polyend tracker and TR8 and it works perfectly everytime. You can't CC any of the controls but overall I think it sounds superb for the price.

[mgregory]

It's so funny how much you love the TB-3. You need to keep that up because you're the only youtuber I know who uses it. We can't forget the TB-3.

[frankliebe]

nice to see that AudioPilz has created an new Video about the Donner B1 - I already had checked the package in my studio today, but does not power on it for reason of low time. so great that I can here catch AudioPilz expertise about that gear now.