Gameboy Color or DMG (Page 2 of 6)

Geez, people. Use whatever the fuck you've got, especially when you're just starting out.

As you develop a style and you really find out what kind of music you want to make, you can collect the right gear to do it with.

Or, maybe your style will develop around the gear you have. Either way, there's no right or wrong.

Ah, the yin and yang of the creative endeavor.

I'd agree here, but I think there are a lot of indirect and less tangible things that are learned from playing with new equipment, tools, or ideas; especially if music isn't all of what you do. Hackers, modders, and developers get a lot of out playing with new toys.

Last edited by Telerophon (Nov 1, 2012 6:48 am)

take it easy man hahhaha

The color is nice. CPU handles table spam much better, but unmodded it has a weird ringing sound for some reason and the wav channel is slightly less chunky.
The DMG is generally considered to have the nicer overall sound of the systems and the best WAV channel, it's somewhat easier to mod due to a less heavily populated board and having more room in the case. The prosound mod is really intended to help stop the sound degrading when it's being sent through massive tracks of cables at clubs and shit. Nice but not necessary for learning.

Pockets aren't used too often because the EMS carts eat batteries in them so fast it's stupid, and using them with a power adaptor adds 50/60hz hum like a bitch.

You could also argue that the main reason the DMG is favoured is essentially aesthetic, although the "GAMEBOYS ON EVERYTHING" craze seems to have died a death.

The DMG may have the best sound available, but when you ask too much (Heavy Tables processing), it will just crash (so will the pocket). The GBC as they say is quite a good way to learn, and if you pro-sound it, the sound will not be too much of an issue.

Or you can simply say "DMG is too mainstream" and buy a classic GBA, like I did. You get a near-DMG sound without crashes.
Then again, most people complain about the button layout, but it works for me.

That article was written YEARS ago, and is written using purely dry, direct examples of audio from various Game Boy systems. I even mention this comparison in the article I wrote on the subject. However, for one thing almost all artists who play live are going to use a mixer (as someone who didn't buy his own mixer for the first year of doing shows, lemme just say, buy a fucking mixer). Thus, the GBC having less bass or volume output really doesn't make a difference, just turn up the bass and the gain. There will still be the high pitched whine but I've ever had anyone say to me "Hey man, I really enjoyed your set but that background noise was really awful!". If anyone gives a fuck, they certainly never complain about it. And as I also linked to, for recording, there are methods of COMPLETELY removing the GBCs background noise, and I think even Arnie from Datathrash was going to start selling kits for boxes that did it automatically for live shows. This is not 2008 anymore. The "omg GBC has bad sound" issue is basically non existent if you're willing to put in some goddamn effort. However, there is absolutely no fix for being able to write songs using faster tempos, heavy table usage, and lots of kits (especially with effects or live manipulation of the kits) on a DMG, other than using a machine with a faster processor.

I get a little carried away, sorry. This topic is serious business for me.