Gear Music tech Stories Tech
Elektron is halting sharing of mods and hacks on its forums; official comments
Music gearmaker Elektron last week announced it would not allow sharing hacks and modifications for its devices on its official Elektronauts forum or social media channels. In a statement, the company says a sudden surge in firmware hacking, apparently driven at least in part by AI, helped motivate the decision. Here are the details.
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x0xb0x, the synth that launched an open-source hardware boom, is reborn
Based on the legendary TB-303, the x0xb0x was an underground legend all its own, one that helped popularize the open-source hardware movement. And now it’s back, in a digital emulation of the original hardware, from x0xb0x’s original creator.
Peter Kirn - September 17, 2026
DIY + Unusual Gear Music tech Tech
Scales among updates to the free Ardour DAW — with tuning on the way
Ardour 9.8 continues the rapid, detailed development of this free and open-source DAW, with improved session recovery and clip recording, expanded support for controllers and hardware, and an arpeggiator MIDI tool. The 9.8 update also adds scales and keys, but with a twist: unlike competing software, scales/modes will soon be tuning-aware.
Peter Kirn - September 7, 2026
Music tech Software Tech
Free: 4ms VCV Rack ROMplers put gobs of drums under voltage control
Peter Kirn - May 19, 2026
Gear Modular-Analog Music tech Software Tech
New free VCV Rack modules: chaotic oscillators, HP word generator, drums
Peter Kirn - July 21, 2025
Music tech Software Stories Tech
Live coders from all over the world are playing music and visuals live online, right now
Peter Kirn - March 19, 2020
DIY + Unusual Motion Music Music tech Software Stories Tech Web
