Moog 1982 Product Catalog

Moog 1982 Product Catalog featuring the Memorymoog, DSC, The Source, Taurus II, Liberation, Opus 3, The Rogue, and the System 15 and 55 modular systems.

I thought I would try something a little different today and post a scan of a product catalog that I haven't seen around online too much - hopefully you will find it as enjoyable as I find Moog's 2009 catalog.

As always, you can click on the images above to view each page. I've also tried something else a bit different - I've put all the pages into a PDF for those that want to download and view all the pages in one document. Let me know if you have a preference.

This four-page catalog is great - it contains photos and some good descriptive text for each instrument. But what I find most interesting are the list prices. This helps me really understand how good we have it today. For example, the Memorymoog listed for $4,195 in 1982. That's around $7,800.00 in today's dollars.

Here's the others in today's dollars:

• DSC $1700
• The Source $2600.00
• Liberation $2700
• Opus 3 $2400
• The Rogue $900

The best example is the Taurus II. In 1982 it listed for $895 - the equivalent of around $1700 today. Moog recently announced a limited run of 1000 Taurus III's that will be faithful to the Taurus I sound, and also includes MIDI and CV, 48 programmable presents, and an arpeggiator for only $1,995. Seriously great stuff.

For the record, Moog isn't paying me for any of this... I doubt they even know this blog exists :o)

I also have an emotional attachment to this particular piece because it was one of the first Moog catalogs that I ever held in my hands.

I distinctly recall being in a friend's basement years ago where he was showing off his ever-expanding home-built modular. While noodling around with the machine I mentioned that I had recently bought a Pro-1 and, due to his generous nature, he immediately turned his attention to a nearby box to find a copy of a manual.

As he dug deeper and deeper into this container of wonders, more and more synthesizer manuals, catalogs, and magazines started appearing like rabbits out of a hat. The amount of synthesizer history that came out of that box was almost comical, and a copy of this catalog was among the treasure. If my memory is not mistaken, he mentioned that he received the catalog along with some other manuals during a gear trade with another member of the Analogue Heaven email list.

I remember spending hours in that basement reading material out of that box. Then, years later, a copy of the catalog fell into my lap. And I obsessed over it - all over again.

End note: This same friend retrofitted the Pro-1 I mention above with a blue LED while it was at his house for a good cleaning and check-up. Blue LEDs were very rare in synthesizers at the time, I think due to their cost, and his thinking was that if it was ever stolen and used on stage, I would be able to easily identify it as mine. A sincerely generous and thoughtful dude.