using the Blofeld DAWlessly?

Why the heck did they do it that way? Would have cost pennies more to have make it powered.

Impossible and useless, as this would be against the USB standards. They would need another USB socket: Typ A. And it would need an extra small CPU to do the host thing. Or it would cost voices if the main CPU would take care of this too. And as the voice count is below 10 on certain type of oscillator usage (2 OSC set to samples) it would not be worth the efford. And you are the first asking for this feature. About 11 years ago when the Blofeld was original released, there was no demand for this.

ok.

But 11 years ago, USB adoption was not as universal as now.

I'll bet if Waldorf did a poll of potential Blofeld owners (not current owners), more than a tiny percent would say they would love to have USB support for small keyboards without DIN 5.

A lot, if not most, music made these days is made on small keyboards with mini keys. Because they're portable. And the Blofeld is one of the few really versatile synths that will fit in a backpack.

I'm not so sure... what if you've got more than one synth you want to control with your keyboard? You'd need some sort of router and USB wasn't really designed for this. There are devices from iconnectivity for example which do this sort of USB<->MIDI routing, but they're not exactly cheap.

But if Waldorf would change the hardware to get an additional USB host socket (of cause powered as all host sockets), this would create new R&D costs and they would change the way the Blofeld is build by a new housing and a slightly or not so slightly changed PCB. I wonder how many units the sell these days. And I wonder, if they would get paid their additional costs. The Blofeld is not the product of the year anymore. Its best days are gone by.

And if Waldorf see a commercial success from these changes, they would have done so by now, as they are in business long enough to know whats working or not.

BTW: the Moog One got a USB host connection available, but it will not work with most USB products at all.

Qwave,

Yeah, you're right.

And I have a keyboard that has a DIN output, and I just ordered a DIN cable, so I'm fine.

I'm just coming from years of VSTs, I actually thought DIN was obsolete. I guess it's alive and kickin'!

The electronics components store that rules the retail consumer realm here sell USB->12v/1amp adaptor for very cheap. I was thinking about getting one to power my Blofeld just the other day as nearly all the instruments I'm using currently run on USB or batteries and I can run them all off a nice and compact USB power hub quite nicely. It requires a minimum 2.1amps USB socket but the I bought a good little USB power hub from the same store some time ago at a good price.
Here are links to the two items:

Universal USB 12V Step-Up Power Cable
6 Way USB Powerboard

They also have a 9v/1amp USB step-up adaptor. For a small outlay you can tidy-up your lead at the same time as cutting-down the number of mains-power sockets you are using. I know not many here are from Australia, but I figure that if the items are available here, they must be available elsewhere (like that online megastore or that Internet auction site).
Oh yeah, I have to mention one of the most useful MIDI tools I have ever bought is a iConnectivity MIO4. Not only because it has the ability to run as an 8-port USB MIDI host, but also as a very flexible MIDI router. Only thing I could fault it on is it need a computer to program the routing, but I'm slowly getting used to everything these days requiring a computer (but it will be a cold day in hell when I use a DAW again )