As part of their 10 year anniversary celebration of their OP-1 synthesizer, Teenage Engineering has released a free update that adds streaming audio over USB.
This means you can now sample and record from USB audio, or record to your computer via USB.
Here’s what they have to say about the OP-1 update:
“OP-1 is now capable of streaming stereo audio over usb. using the knowledge from developing usb audio for the OP–Z, teenage engineering has brought this functionality to the OP-1.
features include sampling and recording directly from usb audio and live audio streaming to usb host. in effect, this is giving all OP-1 users a handy usb sound card, for easy recording straight to a computer. it works with both pc and mac, as well as with ios and android.
in addition to a range of other fixes and improvements, external sync stability has been greatly improved. OP-1 now offers tight sync to your OP–Z or other external midi devices using midi sync.”
OP-1 OS 243 release highlights:
- USB audio device in & out.
- External tempo sync stability improved.
- When tape is armed and OP-1 receives a play command, recording now starts.
Availability
The Teenage Engineering OP-1 update is available now as a free download.
When I originally bought this years back I wanted to use it as a midi sound module. It wasn’t capable of that. Has that changed?
You mean, can you play it with a midi controller. I sequence it from my Deluge. Ive always had the Kenton usb midi host so I assumed sending midi in notes would work, just didnt use that feature until recently even though ive had the op-1 since it was released. Guess no one can say it isnt built like a tank, I take it everywhere.
I use it as a “sound module” too sometimes with the Kenton USB hub that Randy has mentioned. Works fine.
That’s an impressive new feature for a 10 year old device. Way to go, TE.
That’s what I thought. I wonder which other hardware synths could potentially be upgraded like this.
yamaha montage wiith its pattern sequencer which came super late.
This email made me very happy this morning. I’ve doing some improv jams with the op-1 and bitwig this past month. I have a surface pro 7 but i always had to carry around my NI audio interface. To the living room, to the dining room table. Now i can just plug it in. Hopefully Windows 10 doesnt need some dumb drivers. I stopped using windows for a long time so now that im back, I realize why i left…Drivers and convoluted set-ups and install processes and registry editors.
So on Windows:
Got Asio4all to recognize it at one point but it kept crashing Bitwig. After multiple restarts, realized my op-1 froze. Gave up briefly.
On Macbook:
Tried it in logic, instantly recognized it. Was able to stream audio from the op-1 and record into logic. Was not able to hear it back through the op-1. Had to set my output device to headphones and plug them into my laptop to hear it. So op-1 input through usb, output to the op-1 didnt work.
Back on windows:
Same issue, asio didnt notice the op-1 anymore. Went to restart and got the Update and restart. After the update, pluggin in the op-1 doest even get that “i notice you plugged something in” sound. Like it doesnt exist when before th eupdate, it at least made the sound like i plugged in an audio interface, just couldnt get asio to work correctly.
…Windows.
nice one TE, bravo!
the op-1 is still overpriced toy for hipsters, it’s not a “real instrument”
no not really 🙂 great work te, i didn’t know the op-z can even do that, usb streaming make a brighter future and updating os for a 10 year old instrument is very respectable, go te go!
everybody is so supportive, I’m not use to it here
i have a friend who just got op-1 and he will love this news
The update is nice but yeah still overpriced.. by a lot. And the question remains why it took them 10 years to make this happen?
seems like you are glass half empty kinda guy? 🙂