This is without doubt the most creative, fun and flexible instrument I've ever owned and an absolute delight to explore and play. It is so robust but portable, so effortless to explore and so, so wonderfully simple to generate interesting sounds, melodies and songs with. My biggest problem is not having enough time to just sit down and enjoy it regularly! The capabilities of this machine (particularly relative to its size) are pretty mind blowing and make it worth the money. Nothing is as portable and comprehensively featured as this. Although it has limitations, they can be used to focus your efforts on particular areas and really hone your craft, forcing you to work in particular fashion but developing ideas effortlessly and rapidly - something many DAWs lack. If you have done your research and think an OP1 might be of interest to you I would very strongly recommend saving up or taking the hit and plopping down the cash. It is a seriously fantastic bit of kit, enhanced by the recent (Nov 2016) update that adds a new synth, arpeggiator, presets and bug fixes. It may be several years old but it remains unique, powerful and highly sought-after. The OP1 will always hold a special place in my heart and my collection of instruments and gadgets. It is utterly unique but highly practical and useable. It is expensive but it is very powerful and hugely entertaining. For reference I also own a Novation Circuit, Volca Kick, Keystep, Korg Monotron Delay and plan on getting a Waldorf Blofeld and Elektron Octatrack very soon. I kept a very close eye on the Amazon price and bought it when it dropped pretty low. I would strongly recommend only buying from Amazon or proven reputable 3rd parties as I've heard of people being burned by dodgy sellers - likely scammers. Read more

Over time composing, arranging and producing using a DAW has become something of a chore. The OP1 has breathed new life into my songwriting process. It costs nearly $1,000 because it is worth nearly $1,000. Is there ever price limit on creativity? Here are my favorite things about it: - Full end to end music production. Is it a synth, a step-sequencer, a 4-track or a production workstation? It's all of the above! There's very little competition in terms of anything else so complete yet portable at the same time (except for possibly an iPad). - Portability. I can compose and arrange from just about anywhere. So far: on the bus, on the subway, on a plane, in a doctor's waiting room and in a train station concourse. - The synth engines. They produce a great "low-fi" sound, if that is an aesthetic that you like. - Sampling / Line-In capabilities. If the synth engines aren't what you are looking for, you can sample or record from the line-in (or the onboard microphone, but I recommend the line-in option) - Versatility with external hardware/instruments. You can place the OP-1 just about anywhere in the music production cycle depending on your work flow. You can use this as a midi controller, or you can use it for its synth engines sent as an audio signal to an external DAW, or you can use it as your main work station, with external instruments recorded to the 4-track as line-ins for mixdown and mastering on the OP1. - The cow... Many reviews of the OP1 break its features down into individual "modules", and then compare those modules to other products. For example, its synth engines aren't on the level of other good soft synths on the market, its mixing capabilities aren't as good as a full DAW, etc. However, each of these criticisms misses the point of the OP1. It is deliberately designed to have relatively few bells and whistles to get your creative juices flowing and make music, all while being able to fit in your pants pocket! I'm barely scratching the surface of what the OP1 is capable of, and I could go on for several more paragraphs, but I'll end by saying that I have never purchased an instrument that has brought quite as much joy as this one. **** EDIT (September 2018) 6 months after writing this review, I am still having so much fun with my OP1, and its capabilities continue to amaze me. Here are some "hidden" features that allow you to keep as much production / mixing on the OP1 as possible without "giving up" and finishing the tracks on a DAW: - You can use the built-in gyroscope to "wobble" the pitch of the note (similar to a Roli seaboard)- because "wobbling" the note causes the whole OP1 unit to physically move! - You can achieve sidechain compression using an external drum beat as the sidechain signal through the line input - If you pan one tape track all the way L, and another tape track all the way R, by recording identical parts into each and altering the relative volumes between L and R, you can place an instrument anywhere you like within the stereo field. I'm pretty sure i'll discover even more "hidden" features as i continue to use my OP1. *** EDIT (November 2018) I can see a lot of price gouging on Amazon. DO NOT BUY THIS UNIT FOR MORE THAN 900 BUCKS. Wait and they'll come back in stock. P.s. I'm still having **so** much fun with the OP-1. As I write this, the OP-Z has been released, and many people on social media are (1) complaining about the OP-Z's battery life (3 hrs max at the moment) and (2) regretting not buying an OP-1 instead. *** EDIT (December 2018) I take back the disparaging things i said about the OP-Z. I own one now, and it's a joy to play. If anyone is considering the OP-Z instead of the OP-1, i now have the knowledge to distinguish them here (in case you are interested): - The OP-Z is a sequencer, not a 4-track tape recorder. It has fewer synth engines and tweakable synth parameters than the OP-1. - The OP-Z does contain 8 tracks, and many people think this is "better" than the OP-1. However, the truth is that 4 of those tracks are separate percussive elements (kick, snare, cymbal and sfx), 1 of those tracks is a monophonic bass, 1 is a chord track with 4-note polyphony per step, 1 is a lead track with 3-note polyphony per step, and the last one is an "arpeggiator" track, which is highly annoying and a bit useless. With the OP-1, you can layer an infinite amount of polyphony onto any track you desire, the OP-Z is definitely much more limited in what you can do (even though it has more "tracks" on the surface) - The OP-Z is definitely a lot more portable than the OP-1. Don't get me wrong-- the OP-1 is highly portable, but the OP-Z just blows it out of the water with how tiny it is - The OP-Z does not contain a sampler, or a line-in, limiting its role as a "full production work station". - The OP-Z does not allow you to export the finished songs as a .wav file. In conclusion -- if you're looking for an all-in-one portable workstation, the OP-1 is your best bet. Furthermore, I believe that the OP-1 will hold up far better over time as a unique instrument. The OP-Z is great, but it's a portable groove box that you're unlikely to actually finish a track on. *** EDIT (September 2019) The OP-Z now has line-in and microphone sampling capabilities in the latest firmware. *** EDIT (February 2020) Teenage Engineering appears to be committed to updating the firmware for the OP-1, which is great for a decade-old product. The latest firmware allows the user to further slice up the tape track into half-measures, quarter-measures and even finer slices, making it easier to execute the sequencer in smaller increments to keep your tracks tight. In addition, in an earlier post i advised potential buyers not to spend more than $900 on an OP-1. However, this is now outdated advice, as the price of new first-hand OP-1 units has increased to $1,300 (presumably due to production costs going up as a result of now-obsolete parts being replaced.) So, would I have spent $1,300 dollars 2 years ago for an OP-1, without the knowledge and experience of the unit that I now have? Perhaps not. But with the benefit of hindsight, I would spend another $1,300 on an OP-1 in a heartbeat if for any reason my unit breaks. With that in mind, please please protect your OP-1 if you have one already. I'd get a decksaver and an official OP-1 case, and use both at all times when not using the unit. In addition, if you are comfortable with electronics, buy replacement parts on iFixit- you never know when you might need them! Read more

La station nomade ultime! La prise en main de la "tape" enregistrement en live sur plusieurs piste (4) sans quantification n'est clairement pas pour tous... personnellement je l'utilise en complément avec mon iPad, j'utilise les possibilités de modification du son de l'op-1 et monte les pistes en entrée audio avec un irig pro pour palier à la limitation des pistes. L'appareil se suffit à lui même mais la combinaison avec l'iPad (garage bande) c'est enoorme !!! Mes compos sont dispo sur SoundCloud rechercher Mzik Read more

El aparato esta Increíble, creatividad ilimitada y miles de sonidos y posibilidades para crear lo que se te ocurra. Super. Read more

An amazing portable synth, drum machine, production tool. The OP-1 can be one thing or many things depending on how you use it. To me it's an instrument unto itself. There's a lot of features and it takes some time to learn to use it effectively for recording or live performance but it's definitely worth the effort. As a synth it's great. A great variety of synth engines that are very customizable. You can sample your own sounds to create your own unique patches or use the stock engines to create new sounds. The drum machine is as nice as the synth. You get a lot of nice stock patches that can be customized and it's very easy to sample sounds to create your own drum patches. I personally love taking spoken word stuff and chopping it up using the drum sampler. Recording is intuitive and easy. The hardest part is playing in time. It's just a very unique machine. I've used it as a complete recording tool to record entire songs and as an external instrument. You can also use it as a MIDI controller if you like. This thing doesn't try to sound analog. It sounds the way it sounds and it's not trying to be something it isn't. It has its own unique sound that is going to be recognizable if you just use the stock patches but it's so easy to customize the sounds that you can fit it into just about any genre of sound and it would be hard for someone to say "oh yeah, that's an OP-1". I write and record mostly guitar driven music but have been incorporating the OP-1 into my songs lately. It's really given things a different feel and texture. It's expensive and when I bought it I immediately thought about returning it the next day because of the price tag but once I started playing with it I fell in love. It's a very inspiring tool. I had written a new song within an hour of playing it for the first time. To me the sampling feature is the most addictive. I also love the different sequencers for both drums and synth. If you have the means this is a full DAW, MIDI controller, synth, and drum machine that is incredibly portable. It's actually quite a bit heavier than it looks and feels very solid and well made. The keys took me a bit to get used to. It feels weird to play keys on what are essentially Mac style computer keyboard keys with a scissor mechanism but now I really like it. The keyboard itself if kind of small but it makes it easier to play some things and doesn't really make things difficult. You could send MIDI over USB to the unit if you want to use an external keyboard but that's not really common and I personally wouldn't bother. Anyway, there's so much to say about this thing but the bottom line is that I love this thing. Read more

Lo que más me ha gustado es que tiene muchas funciones en poco tamaño.Es muy compacto y tiene un chasis metálico muy robusto.Lo que menos es que es un poco caro. Read more

Famoso per essere un ottimo strumento…confermo ora che l’ho provato! Read more