So you study electronics, start reading schematics of devices that you really like, stumble upon strange symbols that you can't find, notice weird values that seem odd and you never ask yourself "why?"

I have studied, "why" for at least 20 of my 50 years in electronics. The problem is not that nobody ever asked, "why", the problem is that this kind of discussion has been had so many hundreds of times that there is no, "why" left, except maybe why so many uneducated people swear they can hear the difference between 2 apparently identical parts buried in the middle of a machine that has hundreds of other parts in it. Fortunately, the Internet was invented and you can find hundreds of people that will tell you dozens of reasons, "why", mostly contradictory, and all vehemently supported with testimonials about feelings and subjective perception. This conversation is so worn out that I think it belongs in the Banned category, right next to Perpetual Motion.

 

Way back in the 1970's and 80's I worked for the company that owned Moog Music, Bob Moog was still working there back then. There was nothing really special about the components used in the synths. We used mid-grade components, not the absolute best available but not the cheapest available either. The white box caps you are refering to are/were? made by a company called Plessey "Plessey box caps" They are a high quality mylar capacitor. Those are used in filters where we wanted tighter tolerances. We also liked them because they were space efficiant, High capacitance value in a small size.

 

Way back in the 1970's and 80's I worked for the company that owned Moog Music, Bob Moog was still working there back then. There was nothing really special about the components used in the synths.

Eye witness testimony that Bob Moog did not do A/B listening tests in the process of selecting components?

 

think of this squeaky box designed by a japanese, TB303- and all the mythology invented long after its disappearance from the market.

Hoarding lists with the part numbers which for sure are no longer fabricated.

I've calculated it costs about $50 to build a replica.
I bought the critical parts such as some ICs for the VCO.
That was 2010. Then after 2011, I didnt want to build it anymore.

Inside the TB303 actually there are just ordinary cheap parts from the 1980s, and a not so powerful MCU.
The programming is quite limited and akward but for its time, it was a clever comprimize to be able to sell a programable percussion machine at low price.

Not really getting excited about these part numbers, and elaborating about the high market price for used units.

 

Thanks all for your contributions! Seems I've touched a nerve with some though, which wasn't at all my intention...

Look, I'm a musician, I studied Music Production for about 5 years, I teach it now for about 5 years, I love maths, physics and science and since this year I've started studying electronics, because I happen to like synthesizers. I've had and have read dozens of gearslutz.com discussions with people having opinions about gear, tubes, whatever, based on no scientific background or no objective parameters at all, so I'm as tired of those discussions as most of you are since they're pointless, because in the end it's almost always a matter of personal taste, of which you don't need to convince other people.
But the thing is: I never stated such opinions in the first place in this thread. I simply opened up an old device, discovered parts that I didn't recognise with values that seemed a bit odd and I thought: let's ask what they are. That's all! I never for a second thought I had discovered the "holy grail of capacitors", I never said I thought these caps were sonically superior or whatever, I only asked: "what do the numbers mean?" and "what's the brand?" I might have opened up an old typewriter machine and asked the same question.

Now if most of you say these caps were around back in the days and they were probably picked only because they were cheap, that's a perfectly fine explanation. I never wanted a discussion about "vintage superiority" or whatever, so this topic shouldn't be banned at all; I asked a simple question. And luckily some people just posted some simple answers to that simple question, which was all I was looking for.

Way back in the 1970's and 80's I worked for the company that owned Moog Music, Bob Moog was still working there back then. There was nothing really special about the components used in the synths. We used mid-grade components, not the absolute best available but not the cheapest available either. The white box caps you are refering to are/were? made by a company called Plessey "Plessey box caps" They are a high quality mylar capacitor. Those are used in filters where we wanted tighter tolerances. We also liked them because they were space efficiant, High capacitance value in a small size.

Brevor, thanks a lot; that was all I was asking for. Nice to know the brand, nice to know the main reason was space efficiency and that the caps in the filter had higher tolerances and were high quality.
(to all you sceptics out there: don't worry, I won't start looking for "those amazing Plessey caps" now, I'm convinced that new caps can achieve the exact same thing. But it's still nice to have some background information about the guys who built it back then, which was the only reason for this topic).

 

Thats correct from these other forums the OP didnt get relieable information.

There was never a statement supporting the requirement for "special" vintage parts or insisting they must be used or saying "I believe they are better somehow".

The foil caps with a triangle are made by Mitsubishi actually. Its representing the "Black Diamond".

 

Now that I have my feathers smoothed back down...
and I have quit seeing the word, "why"...

This is how it goes: A fairly smart person with some education and more knowledge about money than I have, sets out to either build a business or "invent" some new ways to connect circuits and/or well known functional blocks of circuits. They follow the rules of electronics, which are really a variation on the Laws of Physics and they get some circuits working. Then they listen. When they deem it good, they gather the parts to make several copies for advertising, demonstrations, and submission to UL Laboratories. This is not where they get samples of each brand of resistor and capacitor and do listening tests. This is where they pinch every penny out of the design and the parts vendors, usually in a desperate bid to avoid bankruptcy before the rest of the world discovers their product. They have finished the, "smart". Now they are doing the, "work hard" and hoping for the part about, "lucky". If I may quote my friend that worked beside Leo Fender, "The only reason Leo ever changed a design was to save a penny". And that's how the magic gets in the box, Timmy.

Good results are not about what color your capacitors are. Good results are about the configuration of your circuits. Perfect example: Tone Emulators. A well fed microprocessor can fake the tonal characteristics of a hundred speaker cabinets and vintage amplifiers, but there are no orange capacitors in the box! It's the design that works, not some peculiar property of a part that was made on the same machines as another Name Brand part and came out of the production line with Elfin magic.

 

Eye witness testimony that Bob Moog did not do A/B listening tests in the process of selecting components?

Im not sure what you mean, there were a lot of listening tests done some of them may have had an A/B type of format. The nature of a synth is different from other musical instruments so a lot of the testing can be done with test instruments. However a good set of ears is always used as a final test.

 

That's OK. Leo Fender pulled my chestnuts out of the fire.

I'm sure Bob Moog listened a lot, and well. After all, he was a musician in the first place.
The question here is: Did he demand a particular brand of a part on the production line because of the way it sounded, or did he find the right sound by designing the circuits and then pick any old brand that had the right specifications for electrical size, guaranteed accuracy, and compatible temperature characteristics?

In my book, a ceramic NPO is a ceramic NPO and a metalized polypropylene film cap is a metalized polypropylene film cap. They are different from each other, but they are the same as themselves, from New York to Taiwan, or they wouldn't qualify for being called, "NPO" or "metalized polypropylene".

 

That's OK. Leo Fender pulled my chestnuts out of the fire.

I'm sure Bob Moog listened a lot, and well. After all, he was a musician in the first place.
The question here is: Did he demand a particular brand of a part on the production line because of the way it sounded, or did he find the right sound by designing the circuits and then pick any old brand that had the right specifications for electrical size, guaranteed accuracy, and compatible temperature characteristics?

In my book, a ceramic NPO is a ceramic NPO and a metalized polypropylene film cap is a metalized polypropylene film cap. They are different from each other, but they are the same as themselves, from New York to Taiwan, or they wouldn't qualify for being called, "NPO" or "metalized polypropylene".

there can be differences but thats more about current delivering capability. and recovering from faults.

if the caps are too sensitive to heat there will be difference if the unit beccoms hot

The parts seen heree are just ordinary and can be substitued almost freely

 

Did he demand a particular brand of a part on the production line because of the way it sounded,

No

or did he find the right sound by designing the circuits and then pick any old brand that had the right specifications for electrical size, guaranteed accuracy, and compatible temperature characteristics?

Yes

 

I'd say that takes care of the, "why" of it. Excellent sounds are created by excellent circuits, not by some peculiarity of one (or all) of the components because they are, "somehow special" have, "fairy dust" sprinkled on them, or were produced by Elves who are secretly working the third shift of a Name Brand factory.