Linn LinnDrum Midistudio (1985)
The LinnDrum Midistudio is what the name says: the original LinnDrum engine - that ubiquitous 1980s sample-playback drum machine heard on *Purple Rain*, *Thriller*, and *Rio* - grafted onto a serious MIDI sequencer. Linn Electronics released it in 1985 to fix the original LinnDrum's limitations. It added MIDI in/out/thru and a built-in 74,250-note sequencer that could sync via MIDI clock to other sequencers and drum machines. The pitch, decay, and mix of each sound could be adjusted and stored in non-volatile memory. A programmer could build modified kits and recall them later, which the fixed sounds of the earlier unit couldn't do.
The sound engine stayed true to the LinnDrum: 12-bit samples at a 28 kHz sample rate, 12 voices of polyphony, and 28 drum and cymbal sounds stored in ROM. The front panel used step switches for programming, and a cassette tape interface handled storage of patterns and kits. Output was flexible: six individual outs plus a stereo pair, with an analog mixer section for submixing. Eight polyphonic trigger inputs were also built in, so you could fire sounds from external pads or other gear.
Mix magazine (1986, p.29) also mentioned that fifty sounds and effects from Linn's disk library were included free — a nice bonus for a machine that already packed a 32-track sequencer into the same box. The pricing from that era is a little tangled: the LinnDrum alone was listed at $2,995, while the version with the 74,250-note MIDI sequencer ran $3,495. It's not entirely clear whether the Midistudio is that sequencer-equipped version or a separate configuration, but the numbers give a reasonable sense of where it sat.
Surviving documentation on the Midistudio is thinner than on the original LinnDrum. No dimensions, weight, or detailed service records have surfaced in the usual archives. Linn took a machine that had already defined the sound of mainstream pop and made it a far more capable centerpiece for MIDI-based studios. The LinnDrum's sounds were later reissued in 2007, and Roland offered a virtual recreation in their 2011 "Drum Collector."
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