Behringer CAT vs Octave CAT: comparison demo and review
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- čas přidán 30. 06. 2024
- A look at how the Behringer stacks up against an original. ** It's not the same revision as the Behringer is modelled after *** just an FYI supplied and demo'd by Jim Heywood
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This is so cool, the collaborative comparison is a really neat idea! Kudos to both of you for putting this together.
Thanks, Starsky, for your hard work and effort in putting this together for us ( and thanks to Jim, too!). You did an amazing job on this. There are, indeed, differences, but the Behringer still holds its own. There are, however, two areas of concern - the tuning range and the Osc sync. Behringer needs to get these right - especially the sync. That's such a key element of this synth. Ok, rant over! Thanks once again for a fabulous video.
Got my CAT this weekend and I love it. Great synth and love the modulation options.
Really nice job on this and thanks for asking me to team up with you on it my friend.
Excellent review thanks. You answered all the questions I had!
For me, the best reviewer on CZcams. Thanks!
Starsky and Jim... Thanks so much for your joint efforts in this comparison... Very, very well done, bravo. ❤️❤️❤️Sweep, lol...Where's Sooty?
I saw/heard on other forums/channels that the Sample&Hold weren't really the same. I didn't saw your whole video, so if you mentioned it, excuse me. BTW, I love your channel, keep doing what you are doing!
Ha brilliant! Nice one Jim... Will be scrutinizing this later!
Great work, cheers !
as always nice one fella
Best demo for the Cat in the Net. Thanx man
Wow, thanks!
Loved the ‘Sooty and Sweep’ cut 😂🤣😂
The Original Cat (in your video the left one) sounds way brighter as The BCat. Great Video! Love all your videos! Especially at minute 4:00
Thanks :) I think it’s an issue with the octave switch acting in VCO1 when it shouldn’t- checking it out now.
Great comparison. I would really want to see a video like this with the Wasp.
Me too! I could only get hold of a WASP clone, so it would probably ask more questions than it answered!
The Cat synth! I use to own an Octave Cat back in the late eighties. I bought it used at a pawn shop. Took the back cover off and cleaned the key contacts (some were not sounding). I sold in 1991for about twice what I originally paid. Wish I had kept it since an original Cat is worth a few thousand dollars now. Thanks for demonstrating both versions of this amazing synth.
Lovely sounds.
My two neutrons don't even sound the same. Analogue fun
Funny I thought the same about my two Neutrons. I have a buddy in LA in an 80's cover band with two original Minimoogs. One for bass and one for leads. Bass sounds better on one and leads sound better on the other. They are NOT interchangeable to his ears and I can believe it.
Yup.analogue is never identical. Had the same experience with Pro-ones...
@@drsamurai009 I think the Moogs probably sound different because they may be made of different wood. Apparently, maple doesn't have the sustain of mahogany :-)
@@rexterrocks Hah! Yep, that must be it!
Thank you Starsky and Jim for this fascinating comparison. I have the same vintage Cat (pre SRM ) since the 70's, with midi retro fit, and managed to calibrate back in tune recently. Lovely fat sound, especially the sub octave, which has a hollow sound like a clarinet. Great fun to use osc1 as sequencer like Stansky's "purr" video - try reducing pulse width to get a swing feel. The Behringer synths are great value. I have their 2600, which can do every thing the Cat can with patching.
But I noticed some (quantizing?) distortion on the Behringer Cat (and also model D) on modulation depth, that makes the filter sweeps sound dirty.
Great comparison. Both the Wasp and the Cat make some interesting tones. Is there any word when there might be an update?
Sound great, thanks for the comparisons. I have a Behringer Odyssey and Pro 1, I want the model D, and this CAT, lol.. How many monosynths do I need? 😻🙀😂 The good thing is they are quite affordable just to have laying around to play with. Good work fellas.
gotta say, the triangle and square sound much better/more character on the vintage imo.
Blablabla
Sound much worse to me
square on vintage sounds broken- horrific & interesting, but harsh & out of spec-like going thru a trashy overdrive pedal
Same or not, I am in love with this synth. Has such a unique character and all kinds of analog gnarliness.
So far the only thing that has bothered me is the note triggering bug... If they'll just release a firmware update to fix that, it'll be just about perfect.
The sync is indeed glitchy, but that doesn't bother me because I love glitchy sounds. Get the oscillators intermodulating and crank the sync right in the glitch zone, and it creates these awesome mangled up textures.
I'd also recommend putting it through an overdrive/distortion pedal... the Cat LOVES distortion. :)
fantastic
Thanks for the comparison, well done. I have an early version Octave CAT like Jim's in this video, so I've been curious to find out how close Behringer was able to replicate it. There's plenty of evidence in this video to make me think it comes up short in some areas. The Behringer is still an excellent analog synth for such a cheap price. But it can't replace my vintage one 100%.
The early CATs did have a different filter chip, the OTA based SSM2040, which in my experience makes a world of difference when you begin to turn the resonance up. It sounds a little bit more like a Roland OTA filter, where the resonance is an more integral and vocal-like part of the sound. The CAT SRM II (which is what Behringer copied) had an SSM2044 filter chip (same chip as used in the Korg PolySix and some others). Still a great sounding filter, but to me the resonance sounds a little less fluid and natural.
Early The Cat's (non-SRM) filter is based on 4x CA3080 OTA's.
The Cat SRM's filter is based on 1x SSM2040 chip and the SRMII's filter is based on 1x SSM2044.
They all sound different and I'm pretty sure Behringer's is a clone of the SRMII.
I was lucky enough to own all of them at some point and I kept only one: the early non-SRM.
To me nothing comes close to its rawness.
Nice! At this point, if the Behringer CAT sounds different enough from the Boog Model D, Bro-1, Neutron or K-2 or Wasp, it's a success.
Sounds a lot different . I have all of the others you mentioned
Great video and very interesting comparison. On playback on my iPad with good phones, the original is a lot louder.
Thanks... its always a pain to get levels correct all the way through a video. Things sound different/louder/quieter on different systems/headphones... add to that they constantly change while tweaking parameters,.. and monitoring levels don't help with perceived loudness its always a roll of the dice whether it'll sound level on someone else kit. So much so that I used to spend hours and hours trying to get them perfect .. and would still get comments about volumes - so now I get them about right and move on :)
Will be my next one, behringer new gear arrives in Portugal very late
Raw vs Flutey :) My guess is that Octave's CAT uses old transistors in the amplifier's tract. Would be really interesting to compare "guts" of these two!
If Behringer uses SMD (and they do now often!) then these components sounds different. Of course it's noticeable only in the parts which generate cycles (as OSCs) and which amplifies.
Moog Mini recreation doesn't sound very different because Moog's components were superior for those years. As far as I know, they've used germanium transistors (pretty expensive now) and they almost doesn't deteriorate over time.
I even noticed that Korg's MS-20 re-issue sounds very different to the old. And K-1 is much better! Need to compare "guts" as well.
If you dare to do this, Starsky, you could place links to photographs :)
Thank you for the comparison review!
Seems that Behringer didn't checked CAT before starting to produce batches! This Sync behavior is very weird and I don't like it.
Overall it seems that they sounds completely different. I like Octave CAT the most: the sound design is very solid, mods can be added (although I'm sure nobody in a good mental condition will drill an old Octave CAT :D )
Did you try the last note priority setting (in the Synth tool's polychain tab). This improves playability a lot.
Yeah, it doesn’t really work though. I’m hoping for a firmware fix.
@@StarskyCarr Did this fix happen?
@@fusionistaaaa yes
Hm, I was thinking about this behringer. Glad I saw this comparison first. Others have been nice tributes to the originals, but this one needs a bit of work.
I wish Behringer would be more on top of there over seas customers. Still waiting on my TD-3
I was going to buy the new one but after this video I don't think so the old one sounds so much better! :D Thanks!
It’s mod doesn’t sound as sharp in this as the octave select acts in a different way to the original, but playing around I’ve found it can get much closer. I’ll probably make a short video to show what I mean
I had an Octave Cat very briefly in 2006. I ordered it from eBay, and then my car died while the Cat was still in transit. So I got to play the Cat for a few hours when it arrived, but had to immediately turn around and sell it again. Oddly enough, the guy I sold it to gave me a Korg Poly-800 as part of the deal.
But I just ordered a new Behringer Cat! Woo! Looking forward to playing it. Sure, there are differences, but they both sound great. I do wonder, though. Part of the difference is likely due to the original being 40 years old. What will the Behringer version be like in 40 years?
Either way, great demo of the two side by side!
You mean you needed the cash to fix your car?
Why no Behringer Neutron unboxing/review?
I had an original The Cat back in the late 80's early 90's but it's tuning stability was rubbish so I had to let it go. Couldn't depend on it for live performance. Seems like Behringer has a few bugs to work out of this one compared to some of it's other releases. My Model D has no issues, and your review, along with a synth repair CZcams'r Synthpro, show the Behringer versions amazingly close to the original. I was very excited to see the news about this clone, but I may hold off for a bit to see if the sync issue gets fixed. Your other video mentioned a duophonic quirk on the other Behringer video that I'm hoping also gets fixed in Firmware. It does sound really, really good, but it's a bummer to put out a piece of gear that has a couple operational flaws. The synth isn't totally unusable, but it's like buying a car and 3 of the 4 door windows work but one doesn't or occasionally gets stuck open or something silly. You can still drive it, but you'd always know you shouldn't use that window.
I noticed you mention midi triggering problems (Arrrrggg). Is that because you're using a Bluetooth keyboard? How are they even connected?
Thanks,
The Aaargh was due to the note priority issues. It’s really difficult to play it because it holds the lowest note you’ve played. ie Not the lowest note you’re playing but the lowest played while playing anything else. So it can play a note your not playing. Firmware updates should sort it out but it’s a bit annoying when messing around.
does anyone know if there's been an update iin firmware for this that's corrected some of these problems? I'm kinda bummed about this one as I liked what it did (or would do if it worked better).
The main differences in FM tones turned out to be due to the octave switch working differently on the 2 synths. I was following turn by turn and switch by switch, which was quite difficult, so didn’t realise the dull tones from the Behringer were due to the switches putting into different octaves. It does sound great though.
Some of the missing rasp might be added by a germanium transistor guitar distortion box and some of the range improved by a keyboard with more octaves???
Haha... it does have octave buttons ;) but some of the range issues where die to the CAT is gave switch acting differently to the original. So trying some cross mod with the switches in the same position actually gives different octaves from the oscillators which really affects the FM. I wish I’d noticed this when making the video I’d have got it to rasp more.
How do you think the current synths will sound in 40 years compared to the clones of the future?
The original feels a lot more gritty and in your face, almost slightly saturated in an awesome way. Behring should have put on a soft saturation/vintage knob on it!
Hard thing i guess is that might be so different between Vintage units as well.
this is a great sounding synth!
youre so right. and its kind of what i like about it... it sounds awesome, but dunno if the cat is a worthy replacement.
like you said, it should have "vintage knob"... but i think it could use just some thick tube gain knob.
I'll bet it sounds closer to the actual unit they copied. For me it sounds great. Noisefloor is probably lower and reliability and cost of dropping it at a gig is more ameanable to using it live.
Yeah I bet it’s closer to their unit. The strength of the CAT lies in the modulation and mixing waveforms which the Behringer does pretty well. It gets a bit noisey with layers of modulation (as in the patch became more of a noise than a ‘sound’) which is where the original seemed a bit more musical - but maybe tuning in in smaller knobs coming into play again?!
Hi, I know you've compared the Crave to Mother 32, which is the obvious comparison to make. And the Behringer Cat to the original, also the obvious comparison. But I'm probably gonna be buying either the Cat or the Crave soon, attracted to both from what I've seen and would love a comparison from you with as much music as possible. Not sure if it's something that's interesting to your audience though but if it is would love to see it.
A mono vs dual osc comparison could be interesting g and useful. I’ll have a think.
by the way.... the "beringer units" also drift a bit... :)
thanks and greetings...
What is the tune playing between 0:16 and 3:06? I can't place the melody.
Just me noodling round, it’s probably similar to load of things.. but fun (ish) fact it’s a 10 bar loop, so probably not exactly the same as anything else. Listening again the first 3 notes remind me of Robert Miles Children but just looked it up and not so sure now :)
Until the osc sync gets fixed on the Behringer somehow I'm gonna have to pass because that Cat sync sound is like 90% of the reason why I even want one.
Get an Odyssey then, the Oddy does that sync sound perfect.. 😉
You probably need to throw the Behrbie around a bit to compensate for a few decades of use.. 😋
How do you managed to use Korg Microkey Air in the Behringer Cat?
via my laptop (not direct).
Does the Cat do anything that the Behringer Pro 1 doesn't do? I believe they share the same oscillator and sound similar, but the Pro 1 seems more tweekable.
There are similarities, but the main differences I suppose are the Cats sub oscillators and cross modulation of VCO1 with VCO2 (as well as modulating with VCO1). It has the loopable envelope, but no sequencer. There are only so many monos anyone needs ;)
the pro 1 cannot get the gritty, moogy sounds the Cat can get. And the Cat cannot get the sweet, '80s brassy tones the Pro-1 can get.
I didn’t notice until 5:44. Not all of the switches are set the same. Was this intentional? Was it necessary? If so, how or why?
At that point the switches aren’t affecting anything. All the modulation is turned off. The switches select the modulation sources. The modulation only affects the sound once the the knobs below them are turned up.
Starsky Carr ooookay. If you say so. No Argument.
Question: How are you controlling the CAT without the keyboard being connected to it via MIDI?
Via a laptop.
On the scope isnt it just the phase?
I just saw sweep!
You certainly did
Got a Behrringer. Ok, envelopes suck. Ok, the glitchy oscillator thing. Ok, many other issues. BUT the modulation thing is there, which is awesome, and cat get you to unexpected places, far from the classic moog-like sounds and closer to west coast harmonic richness. Not your regular synth and takes time to reveal its strengths, but an amazing sound device if you like tweaking more than playing
It should play really well when the key priority issue is corrected.
@Starsky Carr Has there been any word when this might get fixed?
How does that midi keyboard work? No cables ?
It’s a Bluetooth Korg Microkey Air
Starsky Carr. Who won the Octave Cat a few years ago?
thos fresh caps and hardware of the behringer sound almost gamboyie
what oscilloscope do you use to monitor the waveforms?
Meldaproductions freeware
@@StarskyCarr thank youuuu
Now I want to buy a Cat but the original
Can the click with short attack be fixed?
adding a little attack time sorts it out. But it's a character of the synth. Sometimes its really useful for some tones. It really adds some punch to organ style tones for example.
I think people should judge these by how they sound on their own, not by how closely they resemble the original. It is cool if they can perfectly recreate a vintage synth, but even if they miss, the result is still a cool synth with it's own character. ... At a very low price.
They are completely different. What a shame.
The og sounds way different and lot better too.
The OG one he’s using is the first version w a totally different filter. The behringer one is a clone of the SRM model w the curtis chip filter I believe. So if you took that OG cat and a cat SRM they don’t sound the same. These two synths shouldn’t be compared
@@shanestt I think Behringer's is rather a clone of the SRMII, not the SRM.
The SRM was based on SSM2040, SRMII was based on SSM2044 filter chips.
No Curtis chips were used in any The Cat revisions.
The og’s a puma; the behringer’s a bobcat.
That's one way to compare the Jupiter 8 to the emulations
Put the word on the street!
@@StarskyCarr Might be worth trying the facebook 'Roland Jupiter 8 Owner's Club'
tame vs. wild
I didn't feel this one held up nearly as well as the Pro 1 vs Bro 1 comparison.
It was much harder to do with the synths in different sides of the Atlantic! But one major difference that I found after making this was in the controls. The FM style tones didn’t have as much bite in the Behringer because the octave switch acts differently, so when Jim is clicking switches and I’m following his every move the oscillators are playing different octaves which makes a huge difference when using them as a modulation source. It could be a revision difference in the synths, but I think it’s more likely Behringer haven’t modelled the exact behaviour of the originals.
Behringher Is great sound friend
Can they fix the sync on the behringer? It's terrible!
No idea. The Dave Spiers video has some glitchy sounds with sync but not to this extent as far as I can tell.
If I know anything about electronics, no... Pretty certain that's a circuitry issue so firmware won't effect it. Could probably be modded though... The pros and cons of analog.
Fortunately it's not bad for me...I happen to love glitchy sounds, so I'm finding cool stuff to do with that messed up sync.
They just do not build like , but can not complain with the price s of behringer stuff just on sync tough I think
After owning 5 hugely disappointing Beh synths I was considering giving this "Cat" a try since my real Cat has some J-wire issues. After watching this video and hearing that terrible sync sweep and that reduced osc frequency range I'm really glad I didn't just order one. I'll just wait and get my SRMII fixed at some point.
18:24 HAHAHAHAH :)
if look at the faders the Octave CAT faders is bigger and it has 9 lines. Behringer CAT has 7 lines and smaller its like impossible to get same results
Very, VERY hard sell for the Behringer, as the modulation would be the main point of this synth. Though I'd like to be corrected if I understood that wrong. Compared to Pro-1 that clones Pro One properly, and adds a bit more with the CV, the Behringer CAT seems more of a kitten, as it's not quite there yet.
I think the mod isn’t as brute as when in the lowest octave the pitch of VCo1 is lowered, and I don’t think it should be. Possible firmware update needed??
@@StarskyCarr I am actually addicted to any form of audio rate modulation, and I believe it is a matter of the modulator signal. Using OSCs that have less sudden peaks, less bite, might be the reason why the modulation ends up muddier.
I do really like my Behringer Cat, but not going to deny the original sounds much better.
There was a weird difference in the way the octave switch worked in the Behringer so the demo didn’t show FM at its best - the settings were different.. just an FYI for that section.
but its good that for the "first" time people can hear that not all about the retro craze is bs (inculding me)@@StarskyCarr
To me, these clones sound good enough. At this price, if the sound is pleasant to you, buy it. Anyway, original ones are no longer on sale (except ms20, Odyssey).
The problem about Behringer is the quality control and the durability.
Eh dont listen to the trolls, the behringer synths are built very well and solid. They will last
@@pkarvo Eh, quality control is a legit issue with all Behringer clones.
Don't listen to Behringer fan boys.
@@Brendan-Black I have an entire room full of Behringer equipment and it's all built fantastically well! Especially the Odyssey and the VC340.
Synth Memes!
This sync problem is very bad. I think it's a no buy for me...! But i like Behringer...
This is more like Lion vs Hello Kitty
Yeah… there’s less bite in the Behringer in this - mainly because the octave switch works differently in them so the Fm sounds week. I was copying all switch and knob positions. It’s got much more bite with the correct settings.
@@StarskyCarr i originally saw this vid a few months ago when i was looking into a synth with some interesting modulation possibilities. and i thought the behringer would be cool.... but you did a great job showcasing why i ultimately made the choice i made. i scooped up a NOS Octave Cat SRM2. it was sitting brand new in a box for 40 years. its a dream synth and i use my Novation SuperBassStation for the midi/CV 👌 and your very kind to say the behringer has less bite...kinda like how my grandpa has less bite when his dentures are in a cup next to the bed 😉
@@hanzvolt I saw som NOS on Reverb in the states. I’d have jumped at the chance if they were in the U.K. lucky you 😀
Yes! That was probably the one you saw. Cheers! Thanks for the awesome vids!
a clone from a clone. How different is the Behringer Cat from a Behringer Odysee?
Watch this space ;)
I've been wondering why people compare them, because they sound entirely different to my ears. Very different set of controls too.
It seems like the least accurate out of all of the clones they've made so far. The odyssey can pretty much do all of the sounds the cat does, doesn't it.?
Watch this space for an odyssey vs cat coming soon ;)
@@StarskyCarr Oooh looking forward to that. Thx!
I hate meat cats, but not synth Cats
Looks like Behringer didn't put a lot of effort into cloning the Cat, at least as much as they did the Model D.
They are different revisions so I expected some differences, but there are definitely some puzzling ones, like the keyboard octave switch affects osc1 when keyboard mode is off on the Behringer, but not in the original. It made trying to copy the patches difficult... as I wasn’t sure why they sounded so different, particularly with the FM. I discovered this and other things after making the video, which could have sounded so much closer... but odd that Behringer didn’t pick them up when testing. Firmware updates will probably catch all the glitches.
does not sound close... Behringer is missing all the excitement, bite and grunge
Think I’ve discovered why... I think the octane switch button is acting different to the original. Just checking now. It means you can’t get the high freq mods while playing low bass tones which is what Jim was doing in the video. A firmware update should fix this... watch this space I may make an update when I get confirmation.
Have you seen the price of an original? 😳😳😳
that synch is horrendous, deal breaker to me, good luck im broke :)
Yeah the sync is amazing on the original
I don't own this yet, but looking to buy. Reading on alot of forums it seems that the Pro 1 is the one that is closest to the origianl. So i'm going for the pro 1, shame about this since I loved the O.G when I tried it.
Sync is broken! No thanks
Meow
another boring mono synth
Personally I think that the original doesn't sound as racist as this clone.
I don't want subscribers. My videos are private.
Come on the behringer sounds like an octave hamster , 1977 tech wins
That's because the original was being played by a half-Mexican