Joi Ito brought a neat toy to FOO Camp this year — a Tenori-On. The Tenori-On is this very interactive, beautiful piece of hardware created by Toshio Iwai that, to paraphrase his words, creates a “visible music” interface with a shape and sound that fits the player organically, a sort of re-invention of the violin for the digital age. Here’s a neat YouTube demo of the Tenori-On. I had seen this instrument for the first time in a fabulous live performance by Cornelius in Tokyo, and had since lusted for it.
Joi was an amazingly good sport, and let me do what I instinctively want to do when I see a piece of sexy hardware like this — undress it! Thankfully, I always travel with screwdrivers and a camera to capture rare opportunities like this, so I was able to capitalize on the moment. I did get it apart (and put back together again!!), and here are some photos of the innards to share with you. I’ll eventually throw these photos up on ifixit, it’s a better site for sharing teardowns.
(Most images click to reveal a larger version)
Such a pretty face.
Backside view, showing the array of 256 decorative LEDs on the backside. The button sheets are, in this case, dummies used to diffuse the LED light evenly.
The brains of the Tenori-On. Nice piece of work, well laid out (very nice symmetry around all the parts, good isolation of analog and digital), some premium component choices.
Backside of the 256-switch + LED array. There’s a diode at each intersection of the keyboard scan array.
Front side of the 256-switch + LED array that’s behind the active button panel.
The backside of the front bezel, showing the array of buttons. The case is made out of cast Aluminum, which is a pretty expensive technology for a relatively low-run product. Each button is carefully designed to allow for a uniform spreading of the LED light while also allowing for easy pressing of the offset switch.
Thanks again to Joi for letting me open up this baby!
I played with these at Mutek last year; fun toy! Pity they’re so expensive… I’d consider one, but a a software version is just as good for me.
[…] Bunnie writes- Joi Ito brought a neat toy to FOO Camp this year — a Tenori-On. The Tenori-On is this very interactive, beautiful piece of hardware created by Toshio Iwai that, to paraphrase his words, creates a “visible music” interface with a shape and sound that fits the player organically, a sort of re-invention of the violin for the digital age. Here’s a neat YouTube demo of the Tenori-On. I had seen this instrument for the first time in a fabulous live performance by Cornelius in Tokyo, and had since lusted for it. […]
This is excellent. thanks for the guts. I looked at a friends a year ago and wanted to do the same. This device would benefit from homebrew in a few ways. It was a long time ago but I remember that instinctively wanted the ability to tie frames together. Each frame is 16 bars and it would be nice to sacrifice one of the layers to be used as a frame instead. Oh well, too many projects. How about turing one into to a visual tool for a logic analyzer?? I have a http://monome.org 128 sitting here that I would like a day or two free to do exactly that.
Lovley to see the inside of the tenori-on. I have a confession. All my other hardware except from tenori-on i have opened just to see whats inside. Been looking at the circuits for a short while, TMP92CA25FG is the processor. But how about IC305 and IC307 not in place? And still, I don’t really know if tenori-on is a rompler or if (my actuall guess) it is using soundchips from Yamha keyboards.
By the way. Tenori-on spits out midi with a voltage of 3.2 volts, not so good for some equipment. I actually have a list of things I really would like to have fixed, but I really enjoy playing it.
[…] Tenori-On Teardown […]
Here is another good example of the tenori-on in use. This is Little Boots, UK artisit doing a cover: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6tLRCDqJ2c
Great, Thanks for information
That is one sexy looking board. Thanks for the peek inside.
Thank you for posting these pictures!
One very minor correction, the case is made of magnesium.
Ah ha! Thank you for doing this, I couldn’t bring myself to tear it apart.
Thanks so much. I’m planning to open mine to fix the on/off switch that snaped and seeing your pictures it makes me a lot less nervous seeing that its easy to open. So once again, thanks :) .