Fairlight products have been at the cutting edge of digital audio technology for more than 30 years.
Since then the company has released a stream of innovative products, and built a loyal customer base who are still our strongest advocates, and our most valuable intellectual resource.
See a few historical points below.
Fairlight’s track record at the cutting-edge of digital audio shows that the company knows how to build, market and support innovation.
Its concentration on the audio post market has built a strong knowledge base within the company, supported by strong customer relationships.
How have we maintained such strong relationships with customers?
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Joe Pascarell enjoying his FAME console (thanks Joe)
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- By making our hardware systems upgradeable over long periods.
- By ensuring that all audio and mixing data recorded on Fairlight systems is forward compatible.
- By ensuring that all audio data is backwards compatible over three generations of the system.
- By maintaining consistent editing techniques over generations of the system.
Fairlight is the only company that has consistently offered tactile control of nearly all functions in its systems. Most people who have experienced the tactile way of working prefer to stay with it.
They are very tough and reliable. People used to joke that you could pull out the plug and they would still carry on recording!”
Matthias Fischenich, Sound Technician, WDR Germany
Innovation Milestones
1979: Invented Computer Musical Instrument, first digital audio sampler
1982: Invented screen-based music sequencing via Page R
1983: Timecode-based sequencer
1985: CMI Series III, world’s first 16-bit sampler
1985: Invented Voice-Tracker, first pitch-to-MIDI device
1990: MFX controller series: button-based post production controller
1991: Hard disk recorder with scrolling waveforms, real-time crossfades and clip EQ
1994: 24 tracks of uncompressed 48 kHz playback from a single hard disk
1996: MFX3 – killer dialog editor and ADR platform
1996: FAME (with English company AMEK) – integrated mixer, recorder and editor
2000: MFX3.48 – 48 channels in and out with floating point processing and mixing
2001: Dream Console series – motorised knobs, individual silicon keymat switches, Binnacle editing
2005: Crystal Core – world’s first FPGA-based workstation. Single chip replaces 64 SHARC DSPs
2007: Xynergi – revolutionary user interface device using self-labelling keys
2010: EVO consoles bring large format mixing into mid-range price