ARTURIA – ARP 2600 V – USER MANUAL
7
The great rival of ARP was the Bob Moog’s company. The competition between
the two manufacturers can easily be seen when we observe the machines: The
ARP, for example, has linear potentiometers, while its competitor has rotating pitch
bend and modulation wheels.
A well-known episode of this competition was the 24 dB/octave filter, the 4012,
used by the ARP. This was a replica of the famous filter made by its competitor. In
1973, this one threatened ARP with legal action and the firm decided to change
the circuits on its filter. The 4072 was born and took the place of the 4012. This
possessed a calibration error in the high frequencies – the maximum cut-off
frequency was less than 11 kHz instead of the 16 kHz promised in the press. Luckily
the repair for users was fast and not much of a burden. On the first ARP 2600’s, the
4012 filter was still used (this was the case for the “Blue meanie” and on the first
examples of the “grey and white”) while the models that followed offered the 4072.
The ARP synthesizers possess very stable oscillators, more reliable than the ones
equipping Bob Moog's synthesizers, what he admitted himself. On the other hand,
ARP for a long time dipped the electronic circuits for filtering in resin to avoid
industrial piracy... this made for major problems when trying to perform a repair.
In 1972, ARP launched the Odyssey, which would be in direct competition with the
Bob Moog’s monosynth released one year earlier. The same year, the Pro-Soloist, a
preset instrument, was also unveiled.
In 1976, ARP released a small 16 step sequencer in the form of 2 independent 8 step
sequences. This became famous and is still very sought after (it is emulated in the
ARP2600 V.) The same year they presented the Omni, which would become one
of ARPs biggest successes. The instrument allowed the combination of two
polyphonic violin sounds – a great innovation for the company – and 2
monophonic bass sounds.
In 1976, ARP released a small 16-step sequencer in the form of two independent 8-
step sequences. This became famous and is still very sought after (it is emulated in
the ARP2600 V.) The same year they presented the Omni, which would become
one of ARPs biggest successes. The instrument allowed the combination of two
polyphonic violin sounds – a great innovation for the company – and two
monophonic bass sounds.
But in 1981, ARP was finally bought out by CBS. The following year, CBS with part of
the ARP development team would produce the Chroma, a programmable
polyphonic synthesizer, and in 1984 the Chroma Polaris, a simplified and MIDI-
capable version of the Chroma.
