Hexfix93 (Velvet Acid Christ) has been doing some tests, trying to figure out which computer/sequencer combination is the tightest for doing electronic music.

He tested sequencers by sequencing a series of 16th notes, recording the output, viewing it in an audio editor and checking how much the 16th notes deviated from where they should be. .

He found three computer/sequencer combinations that he thinks are tighter than anything produced today – and they’re all ancient.

The winner?

The Atari STe:

The Atari STe is monochrome in 640×480 max res, 8mhz, yes, 8mhz motorola 68000 processor, with 720k floppy drive and no hard drive, external mouse and monitor, a space hog. Doesn’t make noise though.

The timing is super tight with drums, if you put the drums on midi channel 1 and bass on midi 2, and put the hardware for the drums and bass 1 and 2 on the midi out chain, the drums and bass will be super tight. You can throw 170 bpm 32nd and 64th notes at it and doesn’t choke. It’s amazing.

If you are doing aggressive electronic, high temp, or glitchy stuff with hardware, these are the best sequencers. No PC or modern MAC can match it.

How tight is the Atari STe?

Tight to 1ms.

Anyone else try tests like this?

It seems a bit pathetic that the tightest computer for sequencing would be 20 years old.