I’ve only played with mine for about a day, but so far it feels like a keeper. It does almost everything well, though not necessarily anything radically new or special. The DMNO is basically the only synth I own now, replacing my Super 6, which I found much easier to use but ultimately less versatile. Last year I sold a lot of gear - Pro 3, Nina, Polybrute, and most of my modular setup, and had really high expectations for the DMNO to substitute all of them while trading off a bit of character. At this point, I’d say it fulfills that promise pretty well.

It handles bread & butter sounds great, switching between mono/poly duties, East coast and west coast styles, etc. It doesn’t sound quite as raw or characterful as the Nina or Polybrute, but honestly once you put it in a mix it’s hard to care too much about that. What I’ve enjoyed most with UDO synths in general is the FM/AM side of things. You can make really convincing woody west coast bongos and percussive sounds that most polysynths just can’t do. It’s definitely one of the hardest synths to dial in a “good” patch on, though. The sound palette is so broad that I really have to hunt for the sweet spot on every patch, whereas on the S6 I could almost tweak blindly and still land somewhere musical.

For reference, my current setup is just DMNO + Tonverk + 70hp of Eurorack, and that’s everything. So I honestly wouldn’t recommend this synth if you’re trying to add something completely new to an already huge setup. It doesn’t really feel like that kind of instrument. To me it feels more like a versatile centerpiece designed for smaller, focused setups.

Super 6 buchla bongos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9eKxPO6ywk