Poly Synths...suggestions?

Yo boys,

The Volca keys poly-synth nature has wet my mouth beyond wipe'ability.

Looking to possibly upgrade to a more tweekable, reliable and easily control'able model (the knobs are just too small for accurate playing)

Not looking for a polymoog or anything crazy expensive, preferably on the cheaper side, and would like to keep my set-up analog if possible, but open to digital suggestions (I have great fun with my X-station)

suggest away!
cheeeeers

Korg Poly800

Roland Alpha Juno 2

Akai AX73

Siel DK80

Crumar Bit99

I have an akai ax60

it's very bossy, especially in "unison" mode, easily a dark electro warmachine

not too tweakable though with touchy/unresponsive sliders..

it's very cold and emotive, great bass that will easily go more Terminator than what I'm into

I'd like to find something warmer and rubbery

"preferably on the cheaper side, and would like to keep my set-up analog"

Pick one.

the synths I posted are both cheap and analogue (DCOs). although I guess cheap is a relative term, but you shouldn't have to spend more than £350 for any of the ones I posted (and that would be on the expensive side for most of those synths).

  On 3/12/2014 at 10:08 PM, bossman said:

I have an akai ax60

 

it's very bossy, especially in "unison" mode, easily a dark electro warmachine

not too tweakable though with touchy/unresponsive sliders..

 

it's very cold and emotive, great bass that will easily go more Terminator than what I'm into

 

I'd like to find something warmer and rubbery

sounds like my kinda synth!

do you need a polysynth with knobs and a keyboard? I think in terms of cheaper-end 4 voice or 8 voice analog synth, you'd be looking at around $500-800.

you can get a Poly800 with Moog Slayer mod (i.e. knobs) for around £300 usually, just seen one on US eBay for $395 Buy It Now... OP is in Ireland though so I guess UK pricing more appropriate.

xpander is the daddy imo

Nice one, boys - appreciate the suggestions. Keep em' coming

  On 3/12/2014 at 11:02 PM, John Ehrlichman said:

do you need a polysynth with knobs and a keyboard? I think in terms of cheaper-end 4 voice or 8 voice analog synth, you'd be looking at around $500-800.

No real need for the keyboard, but i'd definitely like to have some knobs to twiddle with - having fun with my Dark Time as of late, so happy to use that to sequence and then just tweek away

what about price range? Have you looked into the blofeld? not analog but plenty of voices and extremely versatile

  On 3/12/2014 at 11:26 PM, kxta said:

xpander is the daddy imo

agreed, have you used it's later cousin the Marion - msr2? It's designed by tom oberheim, and it's a just slightly less powerful xpander in one tiny rack size (8 voices out of the box, expanded to 16 with an extra module inside)

i just got a tetra a few weeks ago, and like it more than i thought i would, i mean the sound of it anyway. lots of people seem unhappy about the options for controlling it via vst. the 'official' vst controller i guess is buggy for lots of people. i haven't tried it yet.

anyway it might not be the 'fattest' analog around but its great for layering and you can get a big sound out of it if you put in the effort. got mine for around 500$

4 voices, 2 DCOs and a subosc each. saw, triangle, tri+saw, pulse with various width settings (50 giving you a square wave), lots of mod sources, maybe not quite as many mod destinations as i'd like (i'd like to modulate stuff like attack/releases etc, but i can do that by midi cc if i really want). the feedback parameters can really beef it up too

  On 3/12/2014 at 11:32 PM, John Ehrlichman said:

what about price range? Have you looked into the blofeld? not analog but plenty of voices and extremely versatile

 

 

  On 3/12/2014 at 11:26 PM, kxta said:

xpander is the daddy imo

agreed, have you used it's later cousin the Marion - msr2? It's designed by tom oberheim, and it's a just slightly less powerful xpander in one tiny rack size (8 voices out of the box, expanded to 16 with an extra module inside)

 

Looks similar to the Cheetah MS6, which is another fine, cheap-ish analogue polysynth

The Xpander/Matrix 12 is def a nice synth, but not worth the price these days imo. Loads of different modulation options yes, but you are limited to how many instances of modulation you can have going on at once. I'm not sure about the Xpander, but on the Matrix 12 it's 20, which add up surprisingly fast especially when making performance style patches where you have parameters linked to velocity or aftertouch. It is awesome that you can have say one lfo modulating the speed of another lfo etc. but the instance limitation really puts a ceiling on how much you do. I'd be more enamoured if the sound was a bit ballsier and flexible, but in my experience it really only shines on brass/pads/strings/fx stuff. FWP I know.

The Rhodes Chroma is set up in a similar modular fashion, although with slightly more limited routing options and sounds waaaay nicer to my ears. You can make some really killer leads and basses with the thing. The price point is fluctuates a fair bit, but is comparable and sometimes they can be found for much cheaper than an Xpander.

neways, /end non applicable rant.

  On 3/12/2014 at 11:32 PM, John Ehrlichman said:

 

  On 3/12/2014 at 11:26 PM, kxta said:

xpander is the daddy imo

agreed, have you used it's later cousin the Marion - msr2? It's designed by tom oberheim, and it's a just slightly less powerful xpander in one tiny rack size (8 voices out of the box, expanded to 16 with an extra module inside)

 

no but i was just gonna look for something rack mountable - things like mks80 too expensive for just twiddling - this might be a wise step, TRiP

oh lordie...so many choices

to be honest i'm almost sold on the Poly800 after watching this video:

http://youtu.be/OaWxDDpViZg?t=4m32s

Having said that in an ideal world I would love to have more control over the sound in terms of attack, decay, release etc. but perhaps that's something more in the digital synth world?

I am happy messing with my X-station, but I wouldn't mind finding something similar...but better! an upgrade if you will

Any digital synths anyone might recommend along those lines?

Not digital other than the DCOs and delay, but the Korg DW 8000 (or the ex 8000 rack module) is a cheapish analog and a very underrated synth, worth a look. It's definitely similar to the poly800, but a much better synth.

I recommend a poly where you can play more than one note at a time. =)

  On 3/13/2014 at 9:56 PM, Gocab said:

Korg DW 8000

yeah excellent synthesizer. dunno if it's necessarily "better" than the Poly800, not strictly analogue - is a hybrid and uses sampled waveforms but run through analogue filters (not that this matters, it sounds lovely). overall probably more flexible than the Poly800 I guess..

  On 3/13/2014 at 9:18 PM, TRiP said:

oh lordie...so many choices

 

to be honest i'm almost sold on the Poly800 after watching this video:

 

 

Having said that in an ideal world I would love to have more control over the sound in terms of attack, decay, release etc.

you can control all of that easily on a Poly800, it's just not as hands on as traditional analogue synths - ie no dedicated knob for each parameter. also, there's probably control software available, plus various hardware mods.

Watch out though, the poly800 isn't really "polyphonic", it only has a single vcf and vca, just like volca keys.

MKS-50 can be had for next to nothing.

Good call!

get a roland jx3p. poly800 is good but jx3p is better. no velocity

Try holding Preset 7 during power up. You can play it with velocity now with an external keyboard/DAW ect

Make your own u fukn pussies