Hardware synths - what to go for.

[xgsjx]

The Roland Juno X popped up in my YouTube feed, so me & the Mrs watched a vid. We then watched about 6 more Juno X vids & the Mrs was impressed & said “if you want one, get one”.

I joined a 4 piece band recently, me on bass/synth (that being a laptop & Roli Rise), drummer (has acoustic & e kit), guitarist & a keys/clarinet player.

Soundwise, we’re a kind of ambient funk jazz lofi chillout sound (think Zero7, Khruangbin, R+R=Now, etc). So a hardware synth would be ideal. I’d also be using it for producing music at home as well as just playing it at home for fun. 

After watching a few more vids, I stumbled upon the Jupiter X & was blown away.  Basically the Juno X’s big brother. 
But then I’ve saw the Arturia Polybrute, which is analogue & is rather impressive too. 

So now I’m stuck. I like that the Roland synths have scenes & can layer 5 parts (1 of which can be a drum track) & you can add various Roland synth models, but I also like the hands on approach to the Polybrute, with it’s Morphee pad & ribbon controller (I’m also a sucker for that wood).  I haven’t really looked at any other synths around the £2k mark, but these 3 all get great reviews. 
 

So, any players out there got any advice or Pros/Cons on these synths?

[Skinnyman]

Roland menus are often painful.
 

Others to consider are the ASM Hydrasynth, Novation Summit and the Sequential Rev2.

 

I just went through a similar exercise and ended up with a sequential Take 5.

 

 

[soldersqueeze]

I keep seeing used Summits hovering around the £1100 mark which just seems hugely tempting. I love my Bass Station II and it's left me something of a Novation fanboy.

 

I had a Hydrasynth desktop which was fun for two weeks and then the screen died, so it went back for a refund. I've seen so much anecdotal evidence of crappy QC I've stayed away from them since. I think it's a great synth for sonic exploration but if you want to be able to just pull up recognisable sounds quickly you'd have to be very skilled at wavetable synthesis. I'd really struggle to recommend it as a main instrument for a musician in a band.

 

I want to recommend a polybrute because I really want one, but I haven't actually used one so my opinion on that means precisely zero!

[Woodinblack]

I find rolands are very easy to set up for live performances, although sound wise everything is going to sound good at that level. If it was just for home I would stick with the Roli and Equator 2.

[Skinnyman]

4 hours ago, soldersqueeze said:

I keep seeing used Summits hovering around the £1100 mark which just seems hugely tempting. I love my Bass Station II and it's left me something of a Novation fanboy.

I spent an hour or so playing with a Summit at Gear4music and really wanted to love it but, somehow, it just didn’t ‘click’ with me. It’s a great synth, beautifully made and I really like the user interface - but I just couldn’t get excited about it.
 

I had a quick noodle with the Polybrute while I was at G4M and it makes a great sound. It was a useful exercise because, playing with it, I realised that it’s got way more potential than I need and I didn’t really gel with the workflow. I much preferred the Summit.

 

I’m loving the Take 5 but I suspect that I’ll be adding a Peak to it at some point….

If I was going Roland, I think I’d go with the System 8 as that gives you an awful lot of flexibility. 

 

 

[xgsjx]

3 hours ago, Woodinblack said:

I find rolands are very easy to set up for live performances, although sound wise everything is going to sound good at that level. If it was just for home I would stick with the Roli and Equator 2.

Whatever I get is going to be for live & home. 
I love the Roli & will probably regret selling it, but last time I took it, my 7 year old MacBook decided to play up (a known issue with Montary). I had considered getting a Modal Cobalt8 & using the Roli with that (Modal synths are MPE), but then the Juno X popped up & I’ve decided to flog the Roli & my NI S61 mk2 to help fund a new synth. 

[xgsjx]

1 hour ago, Skinnyman said:

I spent an hour or so playing with a Summit at Gear4music and really wanted to love it but, somehow, it just didn’t ‘click’ with me. It’s a great synth, beautifully made and I really like the user interface - but I just couldn’t get excited about it.
 

I had a quick noodle with the Polybrute while I was at G4M and it makes a great sound. It was a useful exercise because, playing with it, I realised that it’s got way more potential than I need and I didn’t really gel with the workflow. I much preferred the Summit.

 

I’m loving the Take 5 but I suspect that I’ll be adding a Peak to it at some point….

If I was going Roland, I think I’d go with the System 8 as that gives you an awful lot of flexibility. 

 

 

I think this is what I need to do. Get my butt through to GG in Glasgow & have a play with a few. 
 

I’ve looked at the System 8, but it’s basically the predecessor to the Juno X & Jupiter X. 
The Jupiter X has 6 synth models in it (Jupiter X, Jupiter 8, Juno 106, JX8P, SH101, RD piano) as well as a vocoder & a bunch of classic drum machines. You can add more from Roland Cloud. 
The Roland synths I’m looking at are not analogue, but from listening to demos on YouTube, they do a very convincing job. 

[Woodinblack]

2 hours ago, xgsjx said:

Whatever I get is going to be for live & home. 
I love the Roli & will probably regret selling it, but last time I took it, my 7 year old MacBook decided to play up (a known issue with Montary).

 

Not sure what that was - I had a 10 year old macbook that I used to use, but now I have a new one. I would probably still take the old one out if I was going to gig it at a pub.

 

2 hours ago, xgsjx said:

I had considered getting a Modal Cobalt8 & using the Roli with that (Modal synths are MPE), but then the Juno X popped up & I’ve decided to flog the Roli & my NI S61 mk2 to help fund a new synth. 

 

I have a modal Argon 8, which is pretty good although not very accessible for live. 

[xgsjx]

10 hours ago, Woodinblack said:

 

Not sure what that was - I had a 10 year old macbook that I used to use, but now I have a new one. I would probably still take the old one out if I was going to gig it at a pub.

 

 

I have a modal Argon 8, which is pretty good although not very accessible for live. 

It uses up all the free memory for “system processes”. I had 350gb free & it used the lot, so when I tried to do anything, it flagged up “out of memory” messages. I believe the issue’s since been resolved. 
 

when I was a teen, I was heavily into synths & always wanted my own Juno 106. I should have bought one when the could be picked up for £300. I’d still like one, but the Juno/Jupiter X would fill that gap. 
 

I nearly bought a Juno 60 back in 1989 for £250, but I was £50 short. 

[Woodinblack]

1 hour ago, xgsjx said:

when I was a teen, I was heavily into synths & always wanted my own Juno 106. I should have bought one when the could be picked up for £300. I’d still like one, but the Juno/Jupiter X would fill that gap. 

 

Same here, except it was the Juno 6 at the time, but I didn't quite have enough

[BassTractor]

Can't advise on these, but just want to say that if the PolyBrute has important parts of the MatrixBrute DNA, it probably is a beast and worthy of a good loooooong try-out. I'm particularly thinking of the quality of the oscillators/filters and their sound shaping from soft to harsh to super fat Moog-like to bell-like.

Of course it's simpler than the MatrixBrute, but that probably is a good thing.
Not saying the MatrixBrute is too complex, but that that complexity to me seems less well-fitting in a poly.

BTW, and seemingly-but-not-really off-topic, I had the Odyssey both as mono* and as iPad poly. The latter, to me, was a revelation. I'd thought the typical Odyssey sound was not good for polyphonic material. I was wrong.
(That or I was right originally and am wrong now. 😀 )

Anyway, get your hands on a PolyBrute and at least give it a chance.
 

 

*) paraphonic, but I still call it a mono compared to real poly.

 

Edited August 23, 2022 by BassTractor

[BigRedX]

What sorts of sounds are you after and are you going to want to program your own or be happy with tweaking what is already there?

 

For me, in hardware synthesiser the following are most important:

 

1. As many actual controls as possible, and the less I have to delve into hidden menus the better. Don't be fooled though, simply by the number of controls on display. I used to own a Waldorf Microwave XT which has a massive number of knobs and switches on the front panel. However all the modulation routings and additional envelopes and LFOs were hidden away in the menus which made all the interesting options much harder to use than the layout of the synth initially suggested.

 

2. At least two oscillators and two envelope generators per voice, oscillator sync and a ability to modulate each oscillator separately. I'm not that bothered about loads of different filter types. One good low pass filter that is capable of going into self oscillation will be fine.

 

3. Modulation routings should be easy to see, either with dedicated front panel switches or a display that shows all the routings on a single screen.

 

4. User program memories and the ability to name them. Most synths have them , but a few are still going for that "old school" vibe by having numbers only.

 

5. Polyphony. This will depend a lot on what sorts of sounds you want and what sort of a keyboard player you are. I'd be happy with 8 voices, but if you are a "proper" piano player you might want more so that sounds with long release times sound more authentic. However, the ability to limit the number of voices assigned to a patch is useful as is both monophonic and unison modes (and ideally the ability to set the number of voices used in unison). Split and layer modes will depend on how you intend to use the keyboard live as will the number of keys.

 

If you like the Roland sound, my choice would be the System 8 hardware version.

 

[xgsjx]

Cheers @BigRedX

That’s some great points you’ve given. 
 

I like creating sounds, but also happy tweaking a patch that’s close to the sound I want. 
Im not a pianist, but I’d like a decent polyphony & 61 keys is my preference.

I looked at the System 8, but being plastic & 49 keys is not selling points to me. Though I agree, it’s a very capable synth. 

The Roland X synths attract me as they tick a lot of boxes for me, but I want to weigh up all the options & get other’s opinions on what’s available. 

[tauzero]

How about a hardware software synth? https://zynthian.org/

[xgsjx]

That’s a good idea, but not what I’m looking for just now. 

[Woodinblack]

Also I would say that what you want from a live synth (quick access to patches and sections you want to change) and the flexability you would need in a studio / home.

[xgsjx]

The Roland X synths seem to be ticking all the boxes so far. They have the easy access to patches, layering & splitting, lots of tweakability on the front panel & can be integrated into my daw for studio use. 
But I’m still gonna try a few out & open to looking at other ideas. 
One think I’d like to do with whatever I get is play bass & keys/pad/arp on it. 

[Earbrass]

If I was in your position I would also want to check out the Nord Wave 2. Not played one myself, but the ability to combine 4 separate synth engines, as splits or layers, which can include sounds from the Nord Sample library as well as the ability to create your own sampled instruments, in addition to the VA/FM/Wavetable capabilities would make it an interesting proposition to me. I think Nord are better at UI and focus more on the player experience than Roland do. Just my 2p. Have fun watching all the youtube vids and going out to try synths!

[BigRedX]

2 hours ago, Earbrass said:

If I was in your position I would also want to check out the Nord Wave 2. Not played one myself, but the ability to combine 4 separate synth engines, as splits or layers, which can include sounds from the Nord Sample library as well as the ability to create your own sampled instruments, in addition to the VA/FM/Wavetable capabilities would make it an interesting proposition to me. I think Nord are better at UI and focus more on the player experience than Roland do. Just my 2p. Have fun watching all the youtube vids and going out to try synths!

 

The synth player in Hurtsfall uses one. Very nice and appears to be a Nord Lead with the ability to use samples (and user created samples) as oscillator waveforms. 

 

The Nord Lead is probably my all-time favourite synth and I even preferred it to the Jupiter 6 I used to own.

 

If you have decent keyboard technique you should also look at the various Hydrasynth options. At least one of them has polyphonic aftertouch which is the "holy grail" of proper keyboard players' performance requirements.

[Earbrass]

Another thing that might be important to you if you're going to be gigging with it is size and weight: for example, the Jupiter X is around 37lbs, and the Polybrute is 44lbs, which in turn means a more substantial and heavier stand. The Summit and Juno X are more reasonable, at around 25lbs, with the Nord Wave 2 a little less at just under 20lbs.

[xgsjx]

Thanks.  I watched J3PO on the Wave 2 last night. It sounds great too, so added to the list to try. 

I plan on getting the Roland KS10Z stand, it’s a heavy duty fold up Z stand. 

[Quatschmacher]

Have you thought about a Prophet 6 or OB6 desktop paired with a controller keyboard of your desired length?

 

Summit is lovely, though the factory presets aren’t to my taste. The digital oscillators are very tight so if you want some analogue “sloppiness”, a judicious use of the oscillator and filter Diverge parameter adds some nice movement.

I recommend checking out Matt Johnson, Creative Spiral, GEOSynths, J3PO and Luke Neptune to get a taste of what various synths can do in the right hands as they are all talented programmers.

 

The Take 5 is very playable, despite its short keyboard due to the ingenious Low Split feature. They should add that to all their synths. I was surprised - I don’t like using boards with fewer than 61 keys but this one worked well, even more than a 49-key model. 

[Quatschmacher]

If you can get your hands on a Korg Prologue 16, that’s worth a shot too. No aftertouch but ticks a lot of other boxes and quite reasonably priced for what it does. 

[xgsjx]

I looked at the Prologue, but they’re no longer in production. 
Don’t really want to go down the rack/desktop synth & controller route & the P6 /OB6 have the same issue as the Polybrute, limited polyphony. Though I have been noseying the Rev2. 

[Quatschmacher]

On 01/09/2022 at 15:21, xgsjx said:

I looked at the Prologue, but they’re no longer in production. 
Don’t really want to go down the rack/desktop synth & controller route & the P6 /OB6 have the same issue as the Polybrute, limited polyphony. Though I have been noseying the Rev2. 

Six voices isn’t terrible. Most of the chordal stuff I do is 5-6 notes at a time though sometimes I stray higher. If you intend to use long release times and want the overlap when switching to a new chord then a higher voice count is needed (though often this can sound messy).

 

There are still a few B-stock prologues around in some stores from time to time.

 

How important is the keybed feel to you? Personally the Polybrute one is disappointing, especially as in their Keylab MKII they use a decent Fatar one. Sequential’s current offerings all use nice Fatar ones.

 

The Rev 2 is a very capable synth, though has DCOs so you’ll need to dial in some looseness. Creative Spiral has done some amazing work in using the gated sequencer to create parameter offsets which replicate vintage voice variance behaviour and really brings the synth to like. A couple of things to note, the Rev 2 filter isn’t as nice as their other synths and the knobs suffer the problems as on P6 and OB6 in that they often become wobbly due to their not being mounted to the chassis.

 

I totally get not wanting a separate module and am that way inclined too, though the P6 module is actually more logically laid out than its keyboard counterpart; the opposite is true of the OB6.

 

Don’t discount stuff like the VA Studiologic Sledge. 

Edited September 3, 2022 by Quatschmacher