akira^8GB wrote:Xuriik wrote:There was someone here on the forums with a broken one looking to get it fixed
That was Steve and yeah, he is looking to fix his.
Indeed it was...I've actually ended up ordering another one off Ebay which should be in the post.
I was incredibly lucky with my first one - I impulsively searched 'Philips PMC' and ended up getting one for £14 (p&p included) because the listing was for a 'rare Philips PMC composer', meaning anyone searching for 'PMC100' (its actual name) would have missed it. It was boxed and in mint condition, with the headphones and stickers and everything...then, after using it on some recordings with my band, stuck an adaptor at the wrong polarity through it, and my local repair shop charged me to tinker with it only to give me some vague 'there are too many broken components' excuse, which didn't make sense to me, but whatever.
The 100 sounds are pretty simplistic (though charming in the way that only budget 80s FM gear can be) and would be easily recreated with most basic FM gear from the period. Here's some info someone who claims to have worked for Philips posted on Music Thing:
Hi! My name is Bill Hewlett. Interesting to see that people still find my product interesting! I worked for Philips in the Netherlands for may years and I was responsible for this product concept, developing the business and marketing plans and obtaining funding from Philips for this project. It was based on a music cartridge application for MSX home computers (remember them?!) - I was confident that for the same price (99 pound retail) I could develop a complete music composer that would incorporate a cassette recorder for recording data and musical compositions. It was designed by Philips Industrical Design (thanks Gavin!), engineered by Richard Watts Associates (Lindsay was lead engineer) based on a Yamaha FM sound chip, and I had the unit manufactured independently in China. We sold around 50 thousand products worldwide (Spain was a big market) before Philips pulled the plug. Yamaha liked the idea so much they went on to produce a similar (cut-down) product.
I found programming it surprisingly intuitive but it's limited for composition since it's all accompaniment/lead/etc. I used it (and hope to use one again) to record single parts for a nice quick FM flavour. I haven't really explored the tape thing but that would be perfect for a lo-fi FM powered punk band or something.
