Ensoniq Corp. was an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
electronicsElectronics is the branch of science, engineering and technology that deals with electrical circuits involving active electrical components such as vacuum tubes, transistors, diodes and integrated circuits, and associated passive interconnection technologies...
manufacturer, best known throughout the mid 1980s and 1990s for its
musical instrumentA musical instrument is a device created or adapted for the purpose of making musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can serve as a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. The history of musical instruments dates back to the...
s, principally
samplerA sampler is an electronic musical instrument similar in some respects to a synthesizer but, instead of generating sounds, it uses recordings of sounds that are loaded or recorded into it by the user and then played back by means of a keyboard, sequencer or other triggering device to perform or...
s and
synthesizerA synthesizer is an electronic instrument capable of producing sounds by generating electrical signals of different frequencies. These electrical signals are played through a loudspeaker or set of headphones...
s.
Company history
Ensoniq was founded in 1982 by former
MOS TechnologyMOS Technology, Inc., also known as CSG , was a semiconductor design and fabrication company based in Norristown, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is most famous for its 6502 microprocessor, and various designs for Commodore International's range of home computers.-History:MOS Technology, Inc...
engineers Robert "Bob" Yannes (designer of the
MOS Technology SIDThe MOS Technology 6581/8580 SID is the built-in Programmable Sound Generator chip of Commodore's CBM-II, Commodore 64, Commodore 128 and Commodore MAX Machine home computers...
chip for the
Commodore 64The Commodore 64 is an 8-bit home computer introduced by Commodore International in January 1982.Volume production started in the spring of 1982, with machines being released on to the market in August at a price of US$595...
home computer), Bruce Crockett, and Al Charpentier. Their first product was a software
drum machineA drum machine is an electronic musical instrument designed to imitate the sound of drums or other percussion instruments. They are used in a variety of musical genres, not just purely electronic music...
that ran on a
home computerHome computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977, and becoming increasingly common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single nontechnical user...
.
In January 1998, ENSONIQ Corp. was acquired by
Creative Technology Ltd.Creative Technology Ltd. is a Singapore-based global company headquartered in Jurong East, Singapore. The principal activities of the company and its subsidiaries consist of the design, manufacture and distribution of digitized sound and video boards, computers and related multimedia, and personal...
for $77 million, and merged with
E-mu SystemsE-mu Systems, Inc. is a synthesizer maker and pioneer in samplers and low-cost digital sampling music workstations.-History:Founded in 1971 by Scott Wedge and Dave Rossum, E-mu began making modular synthesizers...
to form the E-Mu/Ensoniq division. The fusion with E-mu sealed Ensoniq's fate: after releasing an entry-level E-mu MK6/PK6 and Ensoniq Halo keyboards - essentially keyboard versions of the Proteus 2500 module - in 2002, the E-Mu/Ensoniq division was dissolved and support for legacy products was discontinued soon afterward.
Musical instruments and digital systems
Ensoniq entered the instrument market with the
MirageThe Ensoniq Corporation's Mirage was an 8-bit sampler introduced in 1984. Priced below $2000 with features previously only found on more expensive samplers like the Fairlight CMI, it became a best seller....
sampling keyboard in 1985. At the price of
USD$The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
1500 it cost significantly less than previous
samplerA sampler is an electronic musical instrument similar in some respects to a synthesizer but, instead of generating sounds, it uses recordings of sounds that are loaded or recorded into it by the user and then played back by means of a keyboard, sequencer or other triggering device to perform or...
s such as the
Fairlight CMIThe Fairlight CMI is a digital sampling synthesizer. It was designed in 1979 by the founders of Fairlight, Peter Vogel and Kim Ryrie, and based on a dual-6800 microprocessor computer designed by Tony Furse in Sydney, Australia...
and the
E-MU EmulatorThe Emulator is the name given to a series of disk-based digital sampling keyboards manufactured by E-mu Systems from 1982 until 1990. Though not the first commercial sampler, the Emulator was among the first to find wide use among ordinary musicians, due to its relatively low price and its size,...
. Starting with the
ESQ-1Ensoniq ESQ-1 is a hybrid digital-analog synthesizer released by Ensoniq in 1986. The ESQ-1 featured 8 voices with 3 digital oscillators per voice. Each oscillator could be set to one of 32 different waveforms. Some of these were standard simple waveforms such as sawtooth and pulse, while others...
, they began producing
wave tableWavetable synthesis is used in certain digital music synthesizers to implement a restricted form of real-time additive synthesis. The technique was first developed by Wolfgang Palm of PPG in the late 1970s and published in 1979, and has since been used as the primary synthesis method in...
based synthesizers. Following the success of these products, Ensoniq established a subsidiary in
JapanJapan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
in 1987.
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
samplersA sampler is an electronic musical instrument similar in some respects to a synthesizer but, instead of generating sounds, it uses recordings of sounds that are loaded or recorded into it by the user and then played back by means of a keyboard, sequencer or other triggering device to perform or...
) providing an "all-in-one" "digital studio" production concept instrument. These were often called "Music Workstations". High-quality effects units were included, along with disk drives or
RAM-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...
cards for storage. The manuals and tutorial documents were clearly written and highly musician-oriented, allowing the users to quickly get satisfactory results from their machines. In 1988, the company enlisted the
Dixie DregsThe Dixie Dregs are an American band formed in the 1970s. Their mostly instrumental music fuses jazz, southern rock, bluegrass and classical forms in an often unique style.-Formation and early years:...
in a limited edition promotional CD "
Off the Record"Off the record" is a term related to journalism sourcing; see Journalism sourcing#Using confidential information.Off the record may also refer to:- Music :* Off the Record , a 1977 album by Sweet...
" which featured the band using the EPS sampler and SQ-80
cross wave synthesizer.
The company had much success with the SQ product line starting in the late 1980s. This was a lower-cost line that included the SQ-1 (61 keys), SQ-2 (76 keys)and SQ-R (rack-mounted, with no keys or sequencer). Later versions were produced with 32 sound-generating voices.
The company's heyday was in the early 1990s 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
polyphonyPolyphony Instruments that are not capable of polyphony are monophonic.-Synthesizer:Most of early synthesizers were monophonic musical instruments which can play only one note at a time, and are often called monosynth as opposed to polysynth...
, effects engine, sample-loading capabilities and even better synth and acoustic sounds. The DP series of effects rack-mount units offered parallel processing and reverb presets on a par with Lexicon's offerings, but at affordable prices.
Despite these strengths, early (1980s) Ensoniq instruments suffered from reliability problems. Through the early and mid-1990s, much effort was focused on improving the reliability of the products. 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 to replace the aging SQ line. Excellent synthesizers like the VFX or TS models lacked cheaper rack-mount 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. During this time, much of the engineering effort and company resources were focused on computer sound cards, which offered more profit for the company.
Timeline of major products
- 1985 - Ensoniq Mirage
The Ensoniq Corporation's Mirage was an 8-bit sampler introduced in 1984. Priced below $2000 with features previously only found on more expensive samplers like the Fairlight CMI, it became a best seller....
- 1986 - Ensoniq ESQ-1
Ensoniq ESQ-1 is a hybrid digital-analog synthesizer released by Ensoniq in 1986. The ESQ-1 featured 8 voices with 3 digital oscillators per voice. Each oscillator could be set to one of 32 different waveforms. Some of these were standard simple waveforms such as sawtooth and pulse, while others...
- 1986 - Ensoniq SDP-1 Sampled Digital Piano
- 1988 - Ensoniq SQ-80
The Ensoniq SQ-80 is a synthesizer from Ensoniq. It was basically an update to the original Ensoniq ESQ-1.Compared to the ESQ1, the SQ80 includes 43 additional waveforms , an enhanced sequencer, and a floppy disk drive for storing patches and sequences...
- 1988 - Ensoniq EPS
The EPS was one of the first few affordable samplers on the market. It was manufactured from 1988 to 1991 by Ensoniq in Malvern, Pennsylvania, USA. The EPS was a 13 bit sampler....
- 1989- Ensoniq EPS-M
- 1989 - Ensoniq VFX
The Ensoniq VFX Synth was initially released as a performance type synthesizer in 1989. Shortly after, the VFX-SD followed and included some updated waveforms , a 24-track sequencer and a floppy drive. Both models were equipped with the Ensoniq Signal Processing chip for 24-bit effects...
- 1990 - Ensoniq SQ-1
- 1990 - Ensoniq SQ-2
- 1990 - Ensoniq SQ-R
- 1990 - Ensoniq EPS 16 Plus
- 1990 - Ensoniq SD-1
- 1992 - Ensoniq KS-32
- 1992 - Ensoniq ASR-10
The Ensoniq ASR-10 was a sampling keyboard produced by Ensoniq between 1992 and 1994. It is the keyboard model of the ASR-10R rackmount module. It was a follow up product to the very popular Ensoniq EPS and Ensoniq EPS-16+ performance samplers, and was also available with a piano style weighted...
- 1993 - Ensoniq TS 10
The Ensoniq TS-10 was a synthesizer / music workstation introduced by Ensoniq in 1993. It featured synthesis, user sample playback, sequencer, effects and performance facilities in a 61-key package...
- 1993 - Ensoniq DP/4
- 1995 - Ensoniq DP/2
- 1996 - Ensoniq MR61
The Ensoniq MR61 is a 61-key music workstation synthesizer that Ensoniq released in 1996. It features a 16-track sequencer, digital effects, and several hundred onboard sounds or patches....
- 1996 - Ensoniq KT-76
- 1997 - Ensoniq ASR X
- 1997 - Ensoniq E Prime
- 1998 - Ensoniq Fizmo
The Ensoniq Fizmo was Ensoniq's last attempt at creating the perfect synthesizer. Developed in 1998, the Fizmo uses a Digital Acoustic simulation Transwave with 4 MB of ROM, up to 4 voices per preset, each voice with 2 oscillators, independent lfos and FX: 48 voices maximum, with 3 separate fx...
- 1998 - Ensoniq ZR-76
- 1998 - Ensoniq ASR X Pro
- 1998 - Ensoniq PARIS Digital Audio Workstation
- 2002 - Ensoniq Halo (E-mu product using Ensoniq brand)
Sound cards and semiconductors
Ensoniq was known not only for their innovative musical instruments division, but also for their computer audio chips. In 1986, after making an agreement with
Apple ComputerApple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad...
, the same Ensoniq 5503 chip utilized in the Mirage and ESQ-1 keyboard was incorporated into the
Apple IIGSThe Apple , the fifth and most powerful model in the Apple II series of personal computers produced by Apple Computer. The "GS" in the name stands for Graphics and Sound, referring to its enhanced graphics and sound capabilities, both of which greatly surpassed previous models of the line...
personal computer. The Ensoniq ES5505 (OTIS or OTISR2),
ES5506 (OTTO)The Ensoniq ES-5506 "OTTO" was a 32 voice wavetable oscillator chip used in implementations of wavetable synthesizers. Musical instruments and PC sound cards were the most popular applications....
and ES5510 (ESPR6, ESP stands for Ensoniq Signal Processor) were used in various arcade games. They were all manufactured on the
CMOSComplementary metal–oxide–semiconductor is a technology for constructing integrated circuits. CMOS technology is used in microprocessors, microcontrollers, static RAM, and other digital logic circuits...
process. The OTTO was licensed to
Advanced GravisAdvanced Gravis Computer Technology, Ltd. was a manufacturer of computer peripherals and hardware. The company was founded in 1982 in British Columbia, Canada....
for use in the
Gravis UltrasoundGravis UltraSound or GUS is a sound card for the IBM PC compatible system platform, made by Canada-based Advanced Gravis Computer Technology Ltd...
card. In 1994 production began on
PCA personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
sound cards for home computers.
Ensoniq's sound cards became immensely popular, no doubt due to their many wins with the big
OEM system manufacturersAn original equipment manufacturer, or OEM, manufactures products or components that are purchased by a company and retailed under that purchasing company's brand name. OEM refers to the company that originally manufactured the product. When referring to automotive parts, OEM designates a...
. Towards the end of the
DOSDOS, short for "Disk Operating System", is an acronym for several closely related operating systems that dominated the IBM PC compatible market between 1981 and 1995, or until about 2000 if one includes the partially DOS-based Microsoft Windows versions 95, 98, and Millennium Edition.Related...
gaming era, every game supported the Ensoniq Soundscape. In fact Ensoniq was the first to come up with an
ISAIndustry Standard Architecture is a computer bus standard for IBM PC compatible computers introduced with the IBM Personal Computer to support its Intel 8088 microprocessor's 8-bit external data bus and extended to 16 bits for the IBM Personal Computer/AT's Intel 80286 processor...
software audio emulation solution for their new
PCIConventional PCI is a computer bus for attaching hardware devices in a computer...
sound cards that was compatible with most DOS games. 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. 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 E-MU's technologies, the buyout of Ensoniq became the best of both worlds.
Soundscape
- Ensoniq Soundscape S-2000
Soundscape S-2000 was Ensoniq's first direct foray into the PC sound card market. The card arrived on the market in 1994. It is a full-length ISA digital audio and wavetable synthesis device, equipped with a 2 MiB Ensoniq-built ROM-based patch set...
The original Soundscape was Ensoniq's first direct foray into the PC sound cardA sound card is an internal computer expansion card that facilitates the input and output of audio signals to and from a computer under control of computer programs. The term sound card is also applied to external audio interfaces that use software to generate sound, as opposed to using hardware...
market. It was a full-length ISAIndustry Standard Architecture is a computer bus standard for IBM PC compatible computers introduced with the IBM Personal Computer to support its Intel 8088 microprocessor's 8-bit external data bus and extended to 16 bits for the IBM Personal Computer/AT's Intel 80286 processor...
digital audio and wavetable synthesisWavetable synthesis is used in certain digital music synthesizers to implement a restricted form of real-time additive synthesis. The technique was first developed by Wolfgang Palm of PPG in the late 1970s and published in 1979, and has since been used as the primary synthesis method in...
audio card, equipped with a 2MB Ensoniq-built ROMRead-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
-based patch set.
- Ensoniq SoundscapeDB
The SoundscapeDB is an Ensoniq-designed and produced MIDI daughtercard designed to interface with the "Waveblaster" header available on many older sound cards. It was released in 1994....
The SSDB was a wavetable daughterboardA daughterboard, daughtercard or piggyback board is a circuit board meant to be an extension or "daughter" of a motherboard , or occasionally of another card...
upgrade for PCs with a sound card bearing a Waveblaster-compatible connector. It was based upon the S-2000 chipset but was without the digital sound effects section or any DACIn electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...
. The SSDB would use the host sound card for final output.
- Ensoniq Soundscape Elite
The Soundscape ELITE was Ensoniq's high-end ISA PC sound card offering. It offers the highest MIDI quality of any PC sound card Ensoniq produced. The board is an evolution of the company's previous Soundscape S-2000. The Soundscape ELITE was launched in March 1995....
The ELITE was Ensoniq's high-end ISAIndustry Standard Architecture is a computer bus standard for IBM PC compatible computers introduced with the IBM Personal Computer to support its Intel 8088 microprocessor's 8-bit external data bus and extended to 16 bits for the IBM Personal Computer/AT's Intel 80286 processor...
offering. It offered the highest MIDI quality of any PC sound card they ever made, including the newer AudioPCI. The Elite was based mostly around the S-2000, with some additional features that set it far apart from its progenitor.
- Ensoniq Soundscape OPUS
The Ensoniq Soundscape OPUS is a Gateway 2000 OEM sound card, and possibly was used by other OEMs, but was never sold to Ensoniq's customers directly. It was a Soundscape-like board, using the Ensoniq "OPUS" multimedia sound chip that only was used on these OEM boards...
This card was a Gateway 2000Gateway Computer Corporation, is a computer hardware company headquartered in Irvine, California, USA which develops, manufactures, supports, and markets a wide range of personal computers, computer monitors, servers, and computer accessories...
OEMAn original equipment manufacturer, or OEM, manufactures products or components that are purchased by a company and retailed under that purchasing company's brand name. OEM refers to the company that originally manufactured the product. When referring to automotive parts, OEM designates a...
, and possibly was used by other OEMs, but was never sold to Ensoniq's customers directly. It was a Soundscape-like board, using the Ensoniq "OPUS" multimedia sound chip, a chip that was only used on these OEM boards.
- Ensoniq Soundscape VIVO90 was Ensoniq's generational step forward from the Ensoniq Soundscape S-2000-based boards. It was first produced in 1996. VIVO90 had similar specifications to the older boards, but was built to cost less to manufacture.
AudioPCI
- Ensoniq AudioPCI
The Ensoniq AudioPCI is a PCI-based sound card released in 1997. It was Ensoniq's last sound card product before they were acquired by Creative Technology. The card represented a shift in Ensoniq's market positioning...
The AudioPCI was designed to be cheap first, functional second. However, it is very functional. When one compares the wide variety of chips and sheer size of the older Soundscape boards to the highly integrated 2-chip design of the AudioPCI, the cost-reduction is obvious. It consisted of little more than a small host CPU driven audio chip (one of the following: S5016, ES1370, ES 1371) and a companion DACIn electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...
. AudioPCI still offers nearly all of the audio capabilities of the Soundscape ELITE card.
Transoniq Hacker
The
Transoniq HackerThe Transoniq Hacker was a monthly newsletter for Ensoniq synthesizer enthusiasts. The magazine was originally subtitled The Independent Ensoniq Mirage User's Newsletter and was obviously intended as a means for exchanging information related to the Ensoniq Mirage within the Ensoniq user...
was an independent monthly newsletter that was published from July, 1985, through December, 1994. The newsletter was originally published as a means for owners of the Ensoniq Mirage to exchange ideas, but was eventually expanded to cover the to the entire line of Ensoniq synthesizers.
External links