The Chinese manufacturer Donner is probably hardly known to anyone in this country, but it already has an extensive portfolio of musical instruments ranging from guitars and drums to digital pianos. Many of them are inspired by the products of other manufacturers and thus bring back memories of another company that produces cheaply and en masse in China. It is quite possible that products from other companies producing in China are simply rebranded here, i.e. simply marked with the Donner brand. Similar to Behringer, Donner has now also expanded its range to include analog synthesizers, starting with the B1, which is heavily advertised online.
TB-303 in modern design
Somewhat surprisingly for the Donner company, which has hitherto been more mainstream-oriented, B1 does not come up with a wide-ranging digital sound generator for the classic keyboard player, but with a special analogue sound generator at a low price of less than 200 €. A closer look at this shows that the B1undoubtedly influenced by the legendary Roland TB-303, although the original‘s sequencer, which took some getting used to, has been replaced by a more intuitive model and the design also looks more upto-date. We took a closer look and listened to the modernized 303 clone.
