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Ensoniq Corporation
Type Corporation
Founded 1982
Headquarters Malvern, PA
Key people Bruce Crockett, Al Charpentier, and Bob Yannes (founders)
Industry Musical Instruments and Technology
Website http://www.ensoniq.com (closed down)

Ensoniq Corp. A corporation is a separate legal entity usually used to conduct business Year 1982 ( MCMLXXXII) was a Common year starting on Friday (link displays the 1982 Gregorian calendar) Malvern is a borough in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. For other uses of this term see Industry (disambiguation An industry (from Latin industrius, "diligent industrious" A website (alternatively web site or Web site, a back-construction from the Proper noun World Wide Web) is a collection of Web pages was an American electronics manufacturer, best known throughout the mid 1980s and 1990s for its musical instruments, principally samplers and synthesizers. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the Electronics refers to the flow of charge (moving Electrons through Nonmetal conductors (mainly Semiconductors, whereas electrical The 1980s was the decade spanning from January 1 1980 to December 31 1989. The 1990s collectively refers to the years between and including 1990 and 1999 A musical instrument is a device constructed or modified for the purpose of making Music. A sampler is an electronic musical instrument closely related to a Synthesizer.

Contents

Company history

Ensoniq was founded in 1982 by former MOS Technology engineers Robert "Bob" Yannes (designer of the MOS Technology SID chip for the Commodore 64 home computer), Bruce Crockett, and Al Charpentier. Year 1982 ( MCMLXXXII) was a Common year starting on Friday (link displays the 1982 Gregorian calendar) MOS Technology Inc, also known as CSG (Commodore Semiconductor Group, was a semiconductor design and fabrication company based in Norristown Pennsylvania The MOS Technology 6581/8580 SID (Sound Interface Device was the built-in Programmable Sound Generator chip of Commodore 's CBM-II, Their first product was a software drum machine that ran on a home computer. For the early "drum machine" computers that used a rotating cylinder as their main memory see Drum memory A drum machine is an A home computer was a class of Personal computer entering the market in 1977 and becoming common during the 1980s

In January 1998, ENSONIQ Corp. was acquired by Creative Technology Ltd. for $77 million. Creative Technology Limited ( is a listed manufacturer of computer Multimedia products based in Singapore, where the firm was founded and now under the executive The fusion with E-mu and Creative Labs sealed Ensoniq's fate: their products and support vanished soon afterward. E-mu Systems is a Synthesizer maker and pioneer in the manufacture of low-cost digital sampling Music workstations History Founded Creative Technology Limited ( is a listed manufacturer of computer Multimedia products based in Singapore, where the firm was founded and now under the executive

Musical Instruments & Digital Systems

Ensoniq entered the instrument market with the Mirage sampling keyboard in 1985. The Ensoniq Corporation's Mirage was an 8-bit sampler introduced in 1985 Year 1985 ( MCMLXXXV) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link displays 1985 Gregorian calendar) At the price of USD$1500 it cost significantly less than previous samplers such as the Fairlight CMI and the E-mu Emulator. The United States dollar ( sign: $; code: USD) is the unit of Currency of the United States; it has also been A sampler is an electronic musical instrument closely related to a Synthesizer. The Fairlight CMI (Computer Musical Instrument was the first polyphonic digital sampling Synthesizer. The Emulator is the name given to a series of disk-based digital sampling keyboards manufactured by E-mu Systems from 1982 until 1990 Starting with the ESQ-1, they began producing wave table based synthesizers. Ensoniq ESQ-1 is a hybrid digital-analog Synthesizer released by Ensoniq in 1986 Wavetable synthesis is a technique used in certain digital music Synthesizers to implement real-time Additive synthesis and Direct digital synthesis with Following the success of these products, Ensoniq established a subsidiary in Japan in 1987. For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. Year 1987 ( MCMLXXXVII) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link displays 1987 Gregorian calendar)

Ensoniq products were highly professional; strong selling points were ease-of-use and their characteristic "fat", rich sound (generally thought of as being an "American" quality, as opposed to the "Japanese" sound which was more "digital" and somewhat "cold"). After the Mirage, all Ensoniq instruments featured integrated sequencers (even their late 80s and early 90s samplers) providing an "all-in-one" "digital studio" production instrument concept. A sampler is an electronic musical instrument closely related to a Synthesizer. High-quality effects units were included, along with disk drives or RAM cards for storage needs. A data storage device is a device for recording (storing information (data The manuals and tutorial documents were clearly written and highly musician-oriented, allowing the users to quickly get satisfactory results from their machines.

The company's heyday was in the early 90s when the VFX synthesizers offered innovative performance and sequencing features (and terrific acoustic sounds), along with the ASR series of 16-bit samplers which also integrated synthesis, effects and sequencer into a single-unit digital studio. The TS synthesizers followed the legacy of the VFX line, improving several aspects such as the polyphony, effects engine, sample-loading capabilities and even better synth and acoustic sounds. Polyphony is the property of an Electronic musical instrument which describes how many notes it can sound at one time The DP series of effects rackmount units offered parallel processing and reverb presets on a par with Lexicon's offerings but at affordable prices. Reverberation is the persistence of Sound in a particular space after the original sound is removed

Despite these strengths, early Ensoniq instruments suffered from reliability problems. The company didn't manage to reinvent its workstation concept in order to survive the mid and late 90s, and no lower-budget versions of their keyboards were offered. Excellent synthesizers like the VFX or TS models lacked cheaper rackmount counterparts. Finally, while the competition's products were continually evolving and newer technologies such as physical modeling were introduced, Ensoniq failed to follow the late '90s market orientation, often recycling old concepts on their new products. The incorporation of an arpeggiator and a resonant filter on the latest products (such as the MR synthesizers) could have made Ensoniq a desirable alternative for the dance and electronic crowd (which was almost entirely responsible for the late 90s synth market), but that feature was apparently noticed too late.

Timeline of major products

Multimedia Sound Cards & Semiconductors

Ensoniq was known not only for their innovative musical instruments division, but also for their computer audio chips. The Ensoniq Corporation's Mirage was an 8-bit sampler introduced in 1985 Ensoniq ESQ-1 is a hybrid digital-analog Synthesizer released by Ensoniq in 1986 The Ensoniq SQ-80 is a synthesizer from Ensoniq. It was basically an update to the original Ensoniq ESQ-1 but included more waveforms a Floppy disk drive The EPS ( Ensoniq Performance Sampler) was one of the first few affordable samplers on the market The Ensoniq VFX Synth was initially released as a performance type Synthesizer in 1988 The Ensoniq ASR-10 was a sampling keyboard produced by Ensoniq between 1992 and 1994 The Ensoniq TS-10 was a Synthesizer / Music workstation introduced by Ensoniq in 1993 The Ensoniq MR61 is a 61-key Music workstation Synthesizer that Ensoniq released in 1996. The Ensoniq Fizmo was Ensoniq 's last attempt at creating The perfect Synthesizer. In 1986, after making an agreement with Apple Computer, the same Ensoniq 5503 chip utilized in the Mirage and ESQ-1 keyboard was incorporated into the Apple IIGS personal computer. Year 1986 ( MCMLXXXVI) was a Common year starting on Wednesday (link displays 1986 Gregorian calendar) Apple Inc, ( formerly Apple Computer Inc, is an American Multinational corporation with a focus on designing and manufacturing Consumer electronics The Apple, the fifth model inception of the Apple II, was the most powerful member of the Apple II series of personal computers made by Apple Computer. The Ensoniq ES5505 (OTIS or OTISR2), ES5506 (OTTO) and ES5510 (ESPR6, ESP stands for Ensoniq Signal Processor) were used in various arcade games. An arcade game is a coin-operated entertainment machine typically installed in businesses such as Restaurants Pubs Video arcades and Family Entertainment They were all manufactured on the CMOS process. Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor ( CMOS) (pronounced "see-moss" siːmɔːs ˈsiːmɒs is a major class of Integrated circuits CMOS technology The OTTO was licensed to Advanced Gravis for use in the Gravis Ultrasound card. Gravis Ultrasound or GUS is a Sound card for the IBM PC compatible System platform, made by Canada-based Advanced Gravis Computer Technology In 1994 production began on PC sound cards for home computers. Year 1994 ( MCMXCIV) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link will display full 1994 Gregorian calendar) A personal computer ( PC) is any Computer whose original sales price size and capabilities make it useful for individuals and which is intended to be operated

Ensoniq's sound cards became immensely popular, no doubt due to their many wins with the big OEM system manufacturers. An original equipment manufacturer, or OEM is typically a company that uses a component made by a second company in its own product or sells the product of the second company Towards the end of the DOS gaming era, every game supported the Ensoniq Soundscape. DOS, short for "Disk Operating System" is a shorthand term for several closely related Operating systems that dominated the IBM PC compatible market In fact Ensoniq was the first to come up with an ISA software audio emulation solution for their new PCI sound cards that was compatible with most DOS games. Industry Standard Architecture (in practice almost always shortened to ISA) was a Computer bus standard for IBM compatible computers The Peripheral Component Interconnect, or PCI Standard (commonly PCI) specifies a Computer bus for attaching peripheral devices to a Computer It is likely that this was a big motivator in the Creative/E-Mu purchase of Ensoniq because Creative Labs had not developed a high-compatibility method to support audio in legacy DOS software. Creative Technology Limited ( is a listed manufacturer of computer Multimedia products based in Singapore, where the firm was founded and now under the executive According to one source, because of the wide range of patents Ensoniq had involving the PCI bus support for the sound cards, and the fact that Ensoniq wanted what E-mu's technologies, the buyout of Ensoniq became the best of both worlds.

Soundscape

AudioPCI

References

External links

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