Alesis Nanosynth

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Alesis Nanosynth

W × H × D (mm)	139 × 38 × 114
Rack units	1U, 1/3 width
Weight	0.56 kg
Manufacturer	Alesis
Release date	1997
Standards	General MIDI
Parts	16
Max polyphony	64
Normal presets	512 factory + 127 user
Effects	Variable, see Alesis Quadrasynth#Effects

The Alesis Nanosynth is a 16-part, 64-voice General MIDI synthesizer based on the same architecture as the Alesis QS6. There is no display for this unit, or any sort of buttons whatsoever, so any sort of front panel controls is done by turning the knobs to very specific directions.

There are four banks of 128 sounds each, plus one user bank which is loaded with GM-compatible sounds by default (with exception to the last program). All of the sounds in each bank are mapped to the General MIDI map, just with different variations on the instruments.

For more information, refer to the QS6 article.

Front panel controls

• Playing the demo song - Set the "channel", "category" and "program" knobs to the 12 o'clock position (straight up), then set the "effect" knob all the way to the left, and then quickly turn it all the way to the right.
• Stop playing the demo song - Quickly turn the "effect" knob all the way to the left, or power cycle the unit.
• Factory Reset - Set the "channel" and "effect" knobs all the way off, and set the "channel", "category" and "program" knobs to the 12 o'clock position. Then create a feedback loop with a MIDI cable from the device's MIDI IN to its own MIDI OUT/THRU. Power the device, and you should hear a loud beeping tone, indicating that the device has been reset. Turn the device off again and remove the MIDI cable and it will be reset to factory. Note that this does not reset the user bank to default.

Oddities

• User program 127, which is the last assignable user sound, cannot be modified and is intentionally left silent. This is a hack from the developers to disable a channel from being processed.
• From the front panel, only the primary General MIDI bank (Bank 0) and the user bank (Bank 1) can be accessed. Using the other banks requires using CC#0 to select the bank, and then using program change instructions from the sequencer to select the instrument.