Ahlborn-Galanti Parvus II

[cantornikolaos]

Does anyone know about the Parvus II keyboard? It is a keyboard with pipe organ stops and digital samples. I'd love to see and hear one. It too is pipe organ compatible with P.O.M.I. I could make a one-manual pipe organ with some flutes I have.

[arie v]

Nikolaos,

I wouldn't get too excited about the Parvus II. It is not of the same quality as the previous H6. It is a real budget job, with no voicing capabilities.

I am just going by what several dealers have told me who actually sold them. I'm not sure where you could go to hear/see one of these. Best to contact the US distributor.

Apparently, a new technology A-G keyboard is coming out in the new year sometime.

AV

[cantornikolaos]

Sweet! I'm looking forward to seeing or hearing it. I'd love to see one of AG's keyboards offered in console configuration. I think they did that before. Whatever happened to the H6?

Is AG going to replace Drake technology with something even more awesome soon?

[arie v]

Hi,

I believe the new products will still use the DRAKE chip, it may use an updated version of it. Apparently the present products do not use the full potential of the chip. It can support both sampling as well as physical modelling or a combination of the two.

The H6 and the console version the H5, have been discontinued since 2005. Older technology products, that didn't immediately get replaced.

The Parvus II, was not really the replacement for the H6.

AV

[cantornikolaos]

Thanks for the info. I am a huge fan of Ahlborn-Galanti and the more I learn, the more I like them. The drake chip sounds amazing with its modeling and sampling capabilities. I had read about that recently, but it didn't occur to me right away. I have heard some nice modeling, but I like sampling better. Either way, their pipe organ compatibility that even includes the Parvus keyboard is pretty awesome!

[Gemshoorn]

Apparently the present products do not use the full potential of the chip. It can support both sampling as well as physical modelling or a combination of the two.

Where this comes from?

Do you have inside information or is it public knowledge? Could you tell more about this?

[arie v]

Gemshoorn,

Well, you could say I have my sources. No real inside information disclosed here.

As to the DRAKE chip, it is important to remember that it is not a dedicated music chip as such. It is more of the CPU IC, in that it will do what you program it to do. It is used in A-G organs as a controller chip, dsp processor, tone generator chip. From what I understand, the chip can use much more memory. A number of sounds on the A-G organs were already generated by physical modeling.

AV

[Gemshoorn]

Gemshoorn,
As to the DRAKE chip, it is important to remember that it is not a dedicated music chip as such. It is more of the CPU IC, in that it will do what you program it to do. It is used in A-G organs as a controller chip, dsp processor, tone generator chip. From what I understand, the chip can use much more memory.

I find quite interesting what you say here. The DRAKE processor is a 32-bit one, like in the computers just a few years ago, but I did not know that it is more than a dedicated music chip. Do you have an idea how much memory is in use in an Ahlborn organ today? By this I mean the analog of the computer RAM, not the storage media. The DRAKE, being 32-bit, can address up to 2^32/2^30 GB = 4 GB of memory.

A number of sounds on the A-G organs were already generated by physical modeling.

What do you mean here? That some of the stops are not samples and are generated by modelling or that modelling is used to fill-in gaps when the samples are not complete?

[arie v]

I find quite interesting what you say here. The DRAKE processor is a 32-bit one, like in the computers just a few years ago, but I did not know that it is more than a dedicated music chip. Do you have an idea how much memory is in use in an Ahlborn organ today? By this I mean the analog of the computer RAM, not the storage media. The DRAKE, being 32-bit, can address up to 2^32/2^30 GB = 4 GB of memory.

According to the schematics each DRAKE chip used as a tone generator is connected to 512 Mbit RAM. I guess that means about 64 mbytes of RAM

What do you mean here? That some of the stops are not samples and are generated by modelling or that modelling is used to fill-in gaps when the samples are not complete?

To answer your question - several stop sounds were entirely put in these organs as physical modeling, not because they could get good samples.

From what I understand, the present organs were supposed to have been designed as physically modeled instruments. However, it took too long for them to get the technology going, so they fell back to sample playback. GeneralMusic, at that time the parent company of Ahlborn organs, designed the DRAKE chip, and already had implemented physical modeling in their pianos, keyboards, arrangers, back in the 90s. They were able with their resources to commit quite a bit of capital on research and development. Personally, with the advancement of processor power and cheap available memory, sampling technology is a better or should I say, more cost effective way to get good sound. Ten to 15 years ago, when synthesis chips were slow and primitive, and memory was very expensive per megabyte, physical modeling may have sounded like a very good idea.

AV

[Guest]

It's with all the advantages of a compact, portable, light and easy-to-play instrument, offers to the organist the best conditions for accompaniment of choir or soloist and for the performance of a vast and interesting musical repertoire, proudly placing itself

[Guest]

Just posted it on eBay today... a lightly used Ahlborn Galanti H6

Hi all...I just posted this on eBay today... I sure hope that a good musician would give this well cared for instrument a good home... thanks.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...STRK:MESELX:IT

[arie v]

Hi,

Approx. how old is this keyboard? If you don't know, if you post the serial number I could tell you.

Has the battery ever been replaced?

AV