This thing is SO MUCH MORE than a smaller Stylophone - it's actually a totally different instrument! I was pleasantly surprised to discover that this is essentially a tiny drone machine, which I have desperately been wanting to play with. Plays well with my Stylophone - they sound great together when used separately, but I was experimenting and realized that you can chain them together and get some crazy effects. Tested out the expansion ports by having my friends hold leads to make a human keyboard. The friends' music-obsessed kiddo (my "nephew") just turned 3 and he was absolutely LOVED that everyone was now an instrument!
On top of the sheer versatility and pleasing (to me) sounds of this instrument, I adore the retro "cassette" aesthetics. It takes AAA batteries (included), with no power port, so I ordered some battery-usb adapters to be able to hook them up to a small power bank so that I don't have to keep buying/throwing away batteries (like all Stylophone instruments, rechargeable batteries are very much NOT recommended). I wish that Dubreq would realize that a lot of us don't like the battery waste, they do have a few instruments with built-in power ports, but I would like to see them in the other instruments as well, so we could have the option to plug in to save batteries and to also put in batteries when you really want to be cordless.
Stylophone Stylosette - Touch Keyboard x Cassette - The Mini Stylophone Keyboard | Synth Musical Instrument | Electronic Synt
3.8 | 10 ratings
Price: 49.95
Last update: 12-31-2024
About this item
THE MINI STYLOPHONE KEYBOARD - The Stylosette delivers the classic Stylophone sound and so much more, right at your fingertips. It's an excellent gift for both musicians and beginners alike!
EASY TO PLAY—This retro cassette-style synthesizer is played by sliding your finger along the touch-sensitive metal surface. Each segment on the surface plays a different note. Add vibrato and delay, and change octaves with ease.
CREATE AMAZING SOUNDS ANYWHERE - Experience our analog sound with our touch keyboard cassette. It features a built-in speaker, delay effects, vibrato, and a three octave range—all without the need for a stylus.
POCKET-SIZED & PORTABLE - At just over 10cm wide, the Stylosette is pocket-sized and portable. It runs on 2 x AAA batteries and features a built-in speaker and headphone jack – so you can play it everywhere you go. Batteries, cables and accessories are included.
STEM LEARNING - Use the expansion port and clips to trigger sounds using conductive objects such as fruits, vegetables or spoons! Change the speed, depth and delay with the screwdriver accessory to customise your sound. Even connect to another Stylosette.
EASY TO PLAY—This retro cassette-style synthesizer is played by sliding your finger along the touch-sensitive metal surface. Each segment on the surface plays a different note. Add vibrato and delay, and change octaves with ease.
CREATE AMAZING SOUNDS ANYWHERE - Experience our analog sound with our touch keyboard cassette. It features a built-in speaker, delay effects, vibrato, and a three octave range—all without the need for a stylus.
POCKET-SIZED & PORTABLE - At just over 10cm wide, the Stylosette is pocket-sized and portable. It runs on 2 x AAA batteries and features a built-in speaker and headphone jack – so you can play it everywhere you go. Batteries, cables and accessories are included.
STEM LEARNING - Use the expansion port and clips to trigger sounds using conductive objects such as fruits, vegetables or spoons! Change the speed, depth and delay with the screwdriver accessory to customise your sound. Even connect to another Stylosette.
Product information
Warranty & Support
Amazon.com Return Policy:Amazon.com Voluntary 30-Day Return Guarantee: You can return many items you have purchased within 30 days following delivery of the item to you. Our Voluntary 30-Day Return Guarantee does not affect your legal right of withdrawal in any way. You can find out more about the exceptions and conditions here.
Product Warranty: For warranty information about this product, please click here
Feedback
Would you like to
tell us about a lower price?
Stylophone Stylosette - Touch Keyboard x Cassette - The Mini Stylophone Keyboard | Synth Musical Instrument | Electronic Synthesizer Keyboard | Cassette Stylophone Instrument Synth
Share: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DP5KH5SQ
Found a lower price? Let us know. Although we can't match every price reported, we'll use your feedback to ensure that our prices remain competitive.
Where did you see a lower price?
Top reviews from the United States
ZeroAn AWESOME addition to my instrument collection!
BillyPretty cool
FONPerfect 1st Synthesizer for my Granddaughter
ShinyvilleWell, this is awkward.
Shinyville
Reviewed in the United States on December 23, 2024
This, though, has me very perplexed: a nearly identical product, the Synth-a-Sette by MicroKits, has been on the market for the last couple of years--note the incredible similarities in my photos. They're nearly the same size, have nearly identical packaging/presentation concepts, and are functionally quite similar, too, though I'll get into the differences below. Their product names are eerily, maybe deceptively, similar. Both are also being marketed for their potential use in STEM settings by using included alligator clip accessories, with which you can connect the little devices to basically anything that can conduct a signal, like fruits and vegetables, and make music by simply touching them. When one considers that MicroKits only has two products on the market, and that Stylophone has recently been showing how cool their original designs can be, I think it's kind of a bummer that this product is such a copy of the livelihood of another small business. You can get the Synth-a-Sette on Amazon as well, by the way, when it comes to this particular product, I'd have to recommend that one over the Stylosette, because this all feels ethically kind of gross, to be honest.
Functionally, the Stylosette works basically fine, but isn't quite as finessed as the Synth-a-Sette. The immediate thing I noticed when turning it on is that its touchpad isn't very sensitive--I practically have to lay my fingers down flat to make it work. There's no clear way to adjust that, either, which is ironic, as the original Synth-a-Sette's touchpad is very sensitive out of the box, and also offers a way to adjust the sensitivity directly on its circuit board. Since that's the main interface for the gadget, that's a big minus for the Stylosette out of the gate.
Both devices run on 2 AAA batteries, which are included, but the original can also be powered with a USB-C cable when needed. No such luck with the Stylosette, which isn't a huge surprise, as the whole Stylophone line is battery-only. This can be a little frustrating if you're trying to use these as "real" instruments, though.
Both have the same limited 1-octave keypad range, along with a pad for bumping everything up an octave. Both also have a way to add vibrato--on the original Synth-a-Sette, this is actuated with a switch, while it's done with another pad on the Stylosette. You can make adjustments to the depth and speed of the vibrato on the Stylosette, which can be useful at times, but I noticed that it never sounds quite as "smooth" as the vibrato on the Synth-a-Sette, which is more musical to me.
Their fundamental sounds are slightly different, too. The original Synth-a-Sette sounds a little more "pure" to my ears, for whatever that's worth, more like a classic vintage synth sound perfectly filtered to be both nostalgic and musical. The Stylosette is a bit harsher, more sawtooth wave-y, which can be nice in its way, too.
As mentioned earlier, both devices come with alligator clips as accessories, so that you can connect to whatever conductive objects you'd like. On the Synth-a-Sette, you clip these just in front of the touchpad; on the Stylosette, one end of the clips has been stripped to bare cable to be inserted in a pin pad on the circuit side of the device. This pin pad offers some other interesting ins and outs for CV control between devices, but given their limited range and battery power, I don't see much practical application for those more modular-friendly ins and outs, unfortunately. Kind of interesting that they're available, though.
The one place where the Stylosette has a clear advantage is its inclusion of a little delay circuit. It's a low-fi sounding thing, but it behaves like an old-school analog bucket brigade delay. This means that the delay times overall are relatively short, and that when you max out the repeats, it can self-oscillate, which is kind of fun. Presumably it’s the same circuit found on the new Stylophone Theremin, and I think it’s especially useful on that instrument, as the inherent glissando of a theremin gets a lot more body with a bit of delay behind it. While it’s cool having delay onboard this tiny gadget, I think most folks who would avail themselves of the potential of running something like this through delays probably already have tons of delay pedals or plugins at their disposal, too.
That delay circuit is why I'm giving this two stars instead of one, though. It's really the only innovative thing here. On the whole, I still feel sad and disappointed in how derivative the Stylosette is. The Synth-a-Sette feels like a clever, fun little product that fills a niche that was previously unaddressed in the microsynth world. The Stylosette feels like it's trying to stomp directly on the Synth-a-Sette, and in the small world of synths, this just doesn't feel like a goodwill move. I'm still loving the Stylophone Beat, the incredibly well-conceived Stylophone Theremin, and I'm looking forward to the Stylophone drone synth expected sometime in 2025, but I'm not feeling good about the Stylosette.
Images in this review
Eric H.A blatant copy of a product created by a smaller company
Eric H.
Reviewed in the United States on December 18, 2024
The Synth-a-Sette has been available since 2023. Compare that with this "new" product from Dubreq and it's clear they saw the Synth-a-Sette, decided to slap together a quick imitation, and use their already established name to sell it. Everything from the name, the design, the need for no stylus, the plastic cassette carrying case, and the clip attachments that allow you to connect conductive objects (spoons, fruit, etc.) are the exact same as the Synth-a-Sette.
As of writing this, the Stylosette is currently not available on Dubreq's official website. This Amazon page is most likely a way for them to get a bit of data before officially launching their unoriginal product in the coming months.
It's such a shame that Dubreq decided to rip off a product from a much smaller company. Please do not buy this and support a small business instead.
Images in this review
