iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 4h

There are very few technological advancements in the last few years that i've enjoyed more than hobbyists and small electronics makers taking the nightmare black art that is SCSI, and turning it into an easy plug in SD card and USB storage thing, just because they could. My 90s samplers thank you!😉

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 29/09/2026

Might start doing very slightly different design and component choices in things so that in 20 years time if something has inexplicably become popular, everyone can have fun arguing about whether you want the rounded script font version, or the toggle switch version, or the black screw version... 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 28/09/2026

Due to inescapable mission creep, once again a simple task such as getting a cheap AES/EBU to SPDIF box has ballooned into hours of research on format converters and the purchase of a obsolete firewire MOTU interface to act as a standalone convert anything to anything else box. It was inevitable. 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 27/09/2026

Never quite been able to work out why every single week we get 4 or 5 emails from people saying "i was just looking at these mods on your site, they look great, can you tell me how much they cost?" You were just looking at the page with the prices clearly shown! Where else are they going to be? 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 26/09/2026

This is a drawing of my friends sadly deceased cat Colin watching an episode of Midsomer Murders, expertly executed on Microsoft Paint. We liked it so much we had 1000 stickers made, which seemed like a great idea at the time... 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 25/09/2026

Jünger Audio b42 digital dynamics processor. £30 because it wasn't starting up and the screen was black, but there were a few LEDs on and the relays responded to button presses. Turned out it's a really early OLED screen that dies quickly. Dropped in a new OLED we happened to have and it works fine!

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 25/09/2026

Glow in the dark HATE ECHO and another orange sand textured one available on etsy. circuitbenders.etsy.com/listing/1173... Buy it, don't buy it... its all the same to us. We're too busy achieving synergy on the information superhighway... or something along those lines anyway.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 25/09/2026

The ultimate frustration of knowing that the thing you want is on AliExpress, or eBay or even feckin' Amazon somewhere, but their maliciously obstructive search engines make it impossible to find it. It's so close you can taste it, but remains tantalisingly out of reach

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 24/09/2026

Just renewing the domain circuitbehringers.co.uk for another year with no other justification than a real dedication to absolute stupidity. Why not buy a tshirt for similar reasons... circuitbenders.teemill.com/product/circ...

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 23/09/2026

There's so much stuff that we really can't bring ourselves to make more stuff because there's too much stuff already! Maybe a TB303 clone would help... The world definitely needs another one of those... or a vintage fuzz pedal of some sort. Nobody has made a new one of those for at least 24 hours 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 23/09/2026

MAM really did use the cheapest components is was possible to buy in the 90s. Which explains how the MB33 and Freebass racks sold for £99 in 1996. I think they call this contact oxidisation... erm... I'm not sure what metal that supposedly is, but I don't think I've ever seen it that bad before! 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 23/09/2026

I get that Pioneer (i refuse to call them AlphaTheta) CDJ's take a lot of punishment, but i've never known any piece of kit to have SO MANY faults where you fix one thing and something else fucks up. You press the 'loop exit' button and it ejects the CD. How is that ever a possible failure mode?

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 22/09/2026

This raises some excellent points. Just admitting you like spending stupid money on some often very cool stuff surely doesn't carry as much shame as the entire world thinking you were taken in by some very obvious bullshit and then had to double down on it because you'd signed up to the cult.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 22/09/2026

Hey Bluesky! Whats the latest news in "person in authority on my side/the left of the political divide didn't do exactly what i wanted them to do in a certain situation because of laws that would make doing that thing both an illegal and an authoritarian overreach, so that means they're now a nazi"?

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 21/09/2026

Dull component knowledge post #119: The Roland 7X7 power socket has a 1.8mm pin and also oxidises wildly, which means that a normal modern 2.1mm PSU plug often doesn't work properly and an original 707 PSU won't work in anything else. See the next post for exciting details of how to make some cash!

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 20/09/2026

Just looking for a set of replacement hot cue buttons for a Pioneer CDJ2000. They cost around £20 with postage from pretty much everywhere. That is apart from the actual official Pioneer spares site where every order has a £10 'handling fee' and £8 shipping regardless of size, so they cost over £35!

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 20/09/2026

Theres something rather pleasing about getting orders from Japan and the address is often something like "906 Maison Supreme" or "169 Quality Mansions".

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 19/09/2026

Needed 2 of a certain obsolete part. 60p each on many sites, but extra for shipping. £3 each with free shipping on eBay, but what's this, 50 for £10 and free shipping you say...? So yeah, now we have 48 spares we'll probably never use... but at least it feels like we got a bargain, somehow. 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 19/09/2026

A new Raspberry Pi 5 with 16GB RAM costs more than twice as much I just paid for a mint condition second hand Google Pixel 8 phone... Something not quite right there. Although what is anyone doing on a raspberry pi that needs 16GB RAM? Kind of defeats the point of what it is doesn't it?

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 18/09/2026

Back in the 00's if you shipped to Russia then literally everything would be stolen by Russian Customs no matter what it was. If you sent something tracked then it would arrive, but the package would contain something else like a paperback or whatever other junk they had lying around.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 18/09/2026

Relentlessly buying ESP12 module boards from AliExpress, like there are genuinely things I own that would actually benefit from being controlled by WiFi, as opposed to just using a physical switch like some kind of primitive animal.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 16/09/2026

You know when someone comments "this wins the internet" and you want to punch them for not just taking a moment to do a bit better... well, i'm afraid that in the wake of this pair of posts from @strategictaper.bsky.social all other social media is now redundant. Mankind has peaked.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 15/09/2026

Slightly interesting facts #738: 19 years ago in 2007 just after Future Music published an article mentioning the Highly Liquid MIDIspeak, a decent condition Speak & Spell machine suddenly cost twice as much as an Akai S3000XL. Funny old world...

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 14/09/2026

Apparently our absurdly specific one hour delivery time slot between 11:31 and 12:31 "cannot be changed..." No, not by us it can't, but DHL don't seem to have such limitations and have heroically missed their own apparently imaginary schedule for the third day running. Impressive stuff!

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 13/09/2026

I'm constantly shown adverts for guitar tech 'innovation' and I genuinely don't know why 90% of it exists. "Heres another expensive solution to a problem nobody has, that only serves to overcomplicate something that was perfectly simple", but like audiophiles they seem to love spending money on it.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 13/09/2026

I like the way that Behringer Mu-Tron phaser rip off always has to make a huge point of it having "12 opto-couplers". It's pure Spinal Tap. Nobody knows what it means or why that's a good thing, but there's 12 of them! Imagine only having 8 opto-couplers in your phaser. Some kind of amateur are you?

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 11/09/2026

Signed up to the newsletter from the FSB (Federation Of Small Businesses) in the hope of keeping up to date on any changes to EU shipping and packaging rules. Whats in the first newsletter we recieve? "FSB champions small firms at Reform Party Conference!". I mean... just fuck off. UNSUBSCRIBE.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 11/09/2026

Really need to buy a new solder fume extractor, but i'm paralyzed by choice and the impossibility of working out which ones are shit. They're all variations of exactly the same very basic thing. A box, a fan, a filter and a funnel. Thats it. Prices go from £50 to well over £1000, for some reason.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 11/09/2026

AI tells us that "this one thing can take your sound to the next level". Given the fact that apparently theres a very real chance that AI will end humanity, do you want to argue with our machine overlords? No, i thought not...

circuitbenders.etsy.com

DEMON SEED - Frequency Shifting FUZZ Noise Pedal With 'robot' Effect - Uses HT8950 Megaphone Voice Changer Chip - Etsy

This Pedals item by circuitbenders has 651 favorites from Etsy shoppers. Ships from United Kingdom. Listed on Sep 5, 2026

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 10/09/2026

Eastern Bloc drum machine knobs. Goes up to 12, but clearly won't have any of that decadent western 'using even numbers' business. Also appears to be designed upside down and back to front, unless the soviet authorities issued them with knobs that only pointed one way and they had to bodge them in

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 09/09/2026

Imagine having the sheer audacity to besmirch another mans knob choices. The insolent gall of it! My good Sir, there are some things that one simply does not question! If you don't like them then change them on your own time.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 07/09/2026

This is what they call 5 star customer service...

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 07/09/2026

Alesis Microverb 1 on the right and a slightly cannibalised Microverb 2 on the left. They're absolutely identical, apart from the OS eprom and the MV1 having what are on paper slightly better opamps. The internet is full of people saying the MV2 has wider bandwidth and sounds much better... 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 06/09/2026

Sunday night and I thought I'd test an Alesis Microverb1 we just got in. Thinking that the board looks identical to the Microverb2 I thought I'd try swapping operating systems, which worked perfectly. Half an hour later we have a Microverb with a prototype ROM switcher so it can be a v1 or a V2.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 06/09/2026

PCB for a possibly abandoned EMS VCS3 Ring Modulator project from a couple of years back. It was suggested that the text might be a little 'tasteless', but we prefer to look at it as the basis for a character in an exciting new series of books for children......

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 06/09/2026

Really wishing someone would hurry up and buy something on ebay so i don't have to buy it...

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 05/09/2026

We absolutely appreciate that many people have no basic understanding of how electronics works, but no, we can't take the filter section from a broken, but still very digital Korg MS2000 and stick it in a Casio SK1. You can't just cut off a 100% software based digital filter and transplant it!

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 04/09/2026

YES! Its bandcamp Friday and theres a new Spectre album. Its pretty much exactly the same as 10 other Spectre albums i own, but they're all great so its all win!

therealspectre.bandcamp.com

BLAZAR, by Spectre

15 track album

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 04/09/2026

Now taking bets on when the ebay search we have set up to email us every time someone lists an Alesis Quadraverb is actually going to hit the £300 mark, and we can officially declare the vintage music kit world as having completely lost its mind. One at £286 today!

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 04/09/2026

Weird thing with people who use AI to write their emails is that they genuinely expect you to put in the time to answer, despite the fact they simply couldn't be bothered to write the thing in the first place. Send us an obvious AI email and we'll send one back... Literally nothing will be achieved.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 03/09/2026

Gratuitous reclocking knob on a Boss SP303 photo #001.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 03/09/2026

BEHOLD, the Holy Grail! The electro kit expansion cartridge for the mighty Cheetah MD16. For decades we have heard whispered tales of its existence, but never thought we would actually see one. Given its rarity, we might look at cloning it for the lucicrously small demographic that might want one.

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 03/09/2026

Assistant #1 kindly volunteered to help with packaging an Akai S2000, but seems to find the whole affair far too hilarious to actually get anything done. 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 02/09/2026

Take one step outside your normal feed and like all social media this site appears to mainly consist of people being self righteous and angry at everything, especially bluesky itself, all of the time. Did we learn nothing from Twitter? Wasn't the point of Bluesky that it didn't have to be this way?

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 02/09/2026

If you're in the EU then you can't actually buy one of these from us at the moment due to the insane new EU packaging recycling rules, so if you have an overwhelming desire to own a Roland R8 with one of our plug in patch boxes... www.marktplaats.nl/v/muziek-en-...

marktplaats.nl

Roland R8 + Circuitbenders percussion grinding patch box (m2427386575) — Drumcomputers — Marktplaats

Roland R8 + Circuitbenders percussion grinding patch boxThe Circuitbenders Roland R8/R8M percussion grinding patch box is an external patchbay case

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 01/09/2026

Some more Boss SP303 reclocking with better quality audio than the previous video. Apparently theres no way to change the speed or pitch of samples on a standard SP303, which seems something of an oversight... Why are they so expensive? 🤔

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circuitbenders.co.uk @circuitbenders.co.uk · 01/09/2026

You want lofi? We've got lofi... Reclocking on a Boss SP303 Dr Sample. On paper the LTC1799 clock chip can't go fast enough to even reach the SP303's standard 33.8mhz clock speed, but it turns out you can overclock the new clock used to reclock the Boss clock... despite what the datasheet says. 🤔

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