All the music gear to buy instead of Teenage Engineering’s $2,300 OP-XYIt’s sleek, it’s smart, and it’s sophisticated. But it’s $2,300. Can Teenage Engineering’s OP-XY really be worth the eye-popping price tag? We’re reviewing the new synth, sampler and sequencer later this month to find out but, in the meantime, we’ve been looking at what else producers can get for the cash, instead of feeding their GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome). Spoiler: it’s a lot.
READ MORE: “We dare say it’s probably the most complete, portable sequencer ever built”: Teenage Engineering introduces the OP-XY
An entire bedroom studio setup
Please, for the love of god, do not buy the OP-XY as your first piece of music gear. I don’t care if you’re a rich and overzealous newbie — just don’t do it. Find a space in your house, whether it’s an office space or just a section of your bedroom, and set up a desk (this $95 Amazon desk will do) and cram it with gear. Even if you don’t have a laptop or computer yet, a $2,300 budget will get you everything you need from a mouse to a vast plugin bundle.
Here’s everything you might need to start making music, coming in at $2,272. There’s no skimping here either — you can get alternatives to the below for a much lower price, but these selections are for maxing out the budget.

Apple M4 Mac Mini: $574
Samsung 27 Inch Curved Computer Monitor: $130
Logitech wireless mouse & keyboard: $20
Desk $95
Apple Logic Pro: $200
Arturia KeyLab Essential 61 (software bundle included): $270
IK Multimedia T-Racks 6 Pro software bundle: $202
IK Multimedia iLoud MTM monitor speakers: $250
Focusrite Scarlett 4i4: $280
Rode NT1 Microphone: $250

Image: IK Multimedia
All of Teenage Engineering’s Pocket Operators, an OP-1, an OP-Z, and an EP-133 K.O II.
Yep. This comes in at around $2,230. You could buy all nine of Teenage Engineering’s Pocket Operators and its EP-133 K.O II sampler direct from the Swedish brand and pick up a second-hand OP-1 and OP-Z for that price. And there’s some serious power in that bundle. Check it out:

Teenage Engineering EP-133 K.O.II: ~ $299
Teenage Engineering OP-Z: ~$400
Teenage Engineering OP-1: ~$700
All 9 Pocket Operators: $79 to $99 each

Teenage Engineering EP-133 K.O.II. Image: Simon Vinall for MusicTech
An amazing synth, a powerful sampler, and an intuitive sampler…plus some plugins
Ok, let’s say you have a studio setup but you’re desperate for what the OP-XY can offer: deep synthesis, easy sampling, and effective sequencing. At $2,300, you can get this in droves.
Recommending ASM’s Hydrasynth is practically a meme to many synth nerds at this point, but it really is a powerhouse. For $800, you can get the desktop version, which you can play with a MIDI keyboard or using a sequencer, such as the Akai MPC Key 31. That’ll set you back $900, which leaves us $600 in the budget for a powerful sampler. Easy — you can get a second-hand Elektron Digitakt for that. If you prefer more old-school workflows, go for a Roland SP-404 MKII

AKAI MPC Key 37: $900
ASM Hydrasynth Desktop version: $800
Eletrkon Digitakt: ~$600
Roland SP-404 MKII: ~$500

Image: Akai Professional
Studio time at a gear-packed space with a producer
Maybe you don’t want to buy new gear but you want a place that inspires you and lets your creativity flourish. For $2,300, you can spend some quality time in a studio space near you, which will likely be packed with gear and could even have an engineer or producer as part of the hire.
As an example, a look at The Room Melrose in Los Angeles is currently $300 per 12 hours. For a more casual solution, Pirate Studios has locations in London, New York, Houston, Chicago, Berlin, Dublin and more — you’re looking at around $25 per hour in one of its studio spaces.
Years of musical instrument and music production lessons
Knowledge is power, right? Why spend all that money on gear that you don’t really need when you can learn how to play an instrument and make your music sound impeccable?
Picture this: Over the next three and a half years, you spend a few hours a week learning how to play keyboard and guitar, and watch and learn from some of the best products in the world, all online. How good would your music sound if you committed to that?

Melodics annual subscription: $135
Fender Play annual subscription: $150
Mix With The Masters annual subscription: $319

Six years of Suno Premier
Maybe you don’t care about making music at all and you just want an AI to do it for you. Suno Premier is $30 a month, so $2,300 will get you a solid 76 months of not making your own music.
Save it
Or don’t buy anything and save it, invest it, give it away — whatever. It’s $2,300. You could hire a professional accountant for an hour, who will probably tell you to save the remaining $2,200 you have after the session.
Just buy it
If you’ve scrolled all the way here and you’re still not convinced that you shouldn’t buy the OP-XY, then just buy it. I clearly can’t convince you and you must need it for something right? So buy it and, please, send me the tracks you end up making with it. I should probably see what I’m missing out on.

Go on, then…Head to Teenage Engineering to learn more about the OP-XY. 
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