Vintage Synth Explorer — Synth Specs Scraper

Scrapes the complete synth and drum-machine specification catalog from Vintage Synth Explorer (vintagesynth.com) — the definitive reference encyclopedia for vintage synthesizers, drum machines, and electronic instruments.

What it does

Discovers all instrument pages from the Vintage Synth Explorer sitemap (~900 URLs) and extracts structured specification data for each model, including:

• Model name and brand
• Synth type (e.g. analog, FM, wavetable, sampler, drum machine)
• Year released
• Polyphony (voice count, mono/poly configuration)
• Oscillators (type, count, synthesis method)
• Filter (filter type and characteristics)
• LFO (modulation capabilities)
• Effects (onboard effects)
• Keyboard (key count, velocity, aftertouch)
• Memory / patches (patch storage)
• MIDI / control (connectivity)
• Notable users (famous artists and recordings associated with the instrument)
• Description (editorial overview)
• Image URL and page URL
• Scraped timestamp

Why use this

Vintage Synth Explorer is the canonical reference for gear-specification data — no comparable structured dataset exists publicly. This actor is the only automated way to extract the full catalog in machine-readable form.

Use cases:

• Synth retailer and marketplace product enrichment
• Plugin and preset maker research (authentic parameter ranges)
• Music-tech media and editorial
• ML training data for gear recommendation and identification
• Academic research on electronic instrument history

Output example

{
  "model_name": "Roland D-50",
  "brand": "Roland",
  "synth_type": "Digital LAS",
  "year_released": "1987-89",
  "polyphony": "16 voices (32 partials with 2 per voice)",
  "oscillators": "Digital LAS (Linear Arithmetic Synthesis) & PCM, 32 osc.",
  "filter": "low-pass-resonant",
  "lfo": "YES (3 x 2tones = 6 LFOs)",
  "effects": "YES",
  "keyboard": "61 note keyboard with velocity and aftertouch",
  "memory_patches": "64 patches",
  "control_midi": "MIDI",
  "notable_users": "Eric Clapton, Enya, 808 State, Jean Michel Jarre, Vince Clarke",
  "rating": null,
  "description": "The D-50 is an all-time favorite digital synth...",
  "image_url": "https://www.vintagesynth.com/sites/default/files/2017-05/roland_d50.jpg",
  "vintagesynth_url": "https://www.vintagesynth.com/roland/d-50",
  "scraped_at": "2026-05-21T05:00:00.000Z"
}

Input

Notes

• Rating field: The community star rating is rendered client-side via JavaScript and is not available in static HTML. The rating field is always null.
• Coverage: The Vintage Synth Explorer sitemap contains ~900 instrument pages. A full run takes approximately 3–5 minutes.
• Notable users: Extracted from bold text in the editorial description. Not all instruments have documented notable users.