D-50: Still limited by today?

[rockfan]

OHMYGODyouguysareliketotallycrazy:freak:

No kidding.

All this is getting us nowhere.
We're just
Poor "electrik force" is traumatized by now.

Hey, Electrik, both synths are good, regardless of what us hemorrhoids have to say.

[electrik force]

No kidding. All this is getting us nowhere. We're just Poor "electrik force" is traumatized by now. Hey, Electrik, both synths are good, regardless of what us hemorrhoids have to say.

Oh, I don't think I'm traumatized. Its just a thought I have to say. I know both the M1 and D-50 are good.

[packrat]

Here we go again. OK, here are my sources: Wiki: The Korg M1 was the world's first widely-known music workstation. Its onboard MIDI sequencer and palette of sounds allowed musicians to produce complete professional arrangements. Outselling the Yamaha DX7 and Roland D-50, the M1 became the best-selling digital keyboard of all time, which it remains today. Click here to read more about it: M1 Also watched the vid on SonicState.com re: the top 20 synths of all time. M1 came in at number 5; D50 was 6th: Finally, my statement is based on facts, not personal opinions.

 

 

Not 'facts' in any sense, just someone else's personal opinion you scraped off a website. Let's not consider the lack of internal self consistency when you quote sales figures, because despite being outside, the DX7 came in higher in this arbitrary rating list.

 

The rompler issue has been done to death. The M1 certainly changed the synth landscape, and it certainly sold a lot of units to... people of dubious talent or application. Much as most modern romplers do today. This is well accepted but doesn't say any more about how 'good' a rompler is than McDonalds sales figures represent a substitute for a food review.

 

The D50 is a genuinely interesting synth which is fun to hack around with and explore, whereas the M1 is very much dated and superceded by all those more modern romplers it had so much effect on.

 

Which is better? Well, today probably a D50.

 

B>

[Paolo Di Nicolantonio]

Here we go again. OK, here are my sources: Wiki: The Korg M1 was the world's first widely-known music workstation. Its onboard MIDI sequencer and palette of sounds allowed musicians to produce complete professional arrangements. Outselling the Yamaha DX7 and Roland D-50, the M1 became the best-selling digital keyboard of all time, which it remains today. Click here to read more about it: M1 Also watched the vid on SonicState.com re: the top 20 synths of all time. M1 came in at number 5; D50 was 6th: M1, one step higher than D50. Click here to view all vids: http://www.sonicstate.com/top20/ Finally, my statement is based on facts, not personal opinions.

LOL! You must be joking, right? Now everything is clear - you have never owned a D-50 or M1, you're just repeating things you read on the Internet and acting like you know what you're talking about Why don't you try to learn something from this experience, and come back with useful comments when you have some real-life experience with those two machines?

[rockfan]

LOL! You must be joking, right? Now everything is clear - you have never owned a D-50 or M1, you're just repeating things you read on the Internet and acting like you know what you're talking about Why don't you try to learn something from this experience, and come back with useful comments when you have some real-life experience with those two machines?

Still at it?
Hey, at least I read. You should try it sometime instead of sitting on that chair getting hemorrhoids. And, I never said I owned either one. Who here does?

[packrat]

Still at it? Hey, at least I read. You should try it sometime instead of sitting on that chair getting hemorrhoids. And, I never said I owned either one. Who here does?

 

 

Well, I've got a D550 and PG-1000. I've fiddled with an M1 but didn't see anything interesting about it.

 

B>

[cosmic.synth]

Rule No1: Always thank Preset Kings for trashing good products and therefore keeping their prices low. Roland company already had resonant filter before Kawai K4. They made one in S-550 in 1987. As well as Yamaha (with their TX16W) in 1987. Kawai came in 1989. Here is another D-50 thread with some infos: http://acapella.harmony-central.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1392256&page=2

Dude, I am not disputing that fact. I am just correcting what you had said in your previous post that no other synth had a resonant filter until 10 years after the D-50. Untrue. The Kawai K4, as you have already attested to, had a resonant filter in 1989, only 3 years after the D-50.

[kpatz]

I used to own an O1/W (M1 successor) and a D-50. Although I liked both synths back then, I would get another D-50 before I'd get another M1 or O1/W.

 

The presets, along with the built-in sequencer is what sold the M1. The D-50 sold on presets, and programmability, and above all, the SOUND.

[Paolo Di Nicolantonio]

Still at it? Hey, at least I read. You should try it sometime instead of sitting on that chair getting hemorrhoids. And, I never said I owned either one. Who here does?

 

 

Well, if you come out with a comment like

 

"D-50 is a classic digital synth.

And, yes, it is limited.

The Korg M1 made it obsolete two years after the "D" came out."

 

that surely sounds like you have owned the synths at some point in your life -

You sound like you need to adjust your attitude, but perhaps you're a teen-ager, aren't you?

 

Several people here own a D-50 and an M1, including me. They are - together with the DX7, and since you like quotes, here you can quote me because I've said this for a long time - the three digital synths of the '80s. I wrote it in my website for all three synths M1 D-50. In fact, until not many years ago, a typical studio/live setup for a keyboard player consisted of FM synthesis, LA synthesis, and AI synthesis (and a hardware sampler). These three types of synthesis complemented each other and made sounds that the other couldn't make. Do you see where I'm coming from?

 

Again, I suggest that before you come to a forum and herald yourself like the ultimate authority on something you have never tried in person but only read about on the Internet, you buy the two machines and judge for yourself if the M1 made the D-50 obsolete, or if rather they complement each other, like I suggested.

[mate_stubb]

 

Still at it? And, I never said I owned either one. Who here does?

 

 

As I explained earlier, I owned them both.

[Don Solaris]

They are - together with the DX7 ...... the three digital synths of the '80s.

Three amigos. Three synths that shaped the "sound" of countless 80's and 90's hits.

[Don Solaris]

 

Dude, I am not disputing that fact. I am just correcting what you had said in your previous post that no other synth had a resonant filter until 10 years after the D-50. Untrue.

 

I'm sorry but this is just ridiculous and has no logic at all.

 

Where did i said that no other synth had a resonant filter until 10 years after the D-50 ?

 

Can you please provide a quote where i say: "No other synth had a resonant filter until 10 years after the D-50" ?

[Khazul]

And, I never said I owned either one. Who here does?

 

 

Had a D5 back in its day with regular access to a friends D50, DX7 and M1.

 

The D50 was allway my prefered synth of the 3 with the exception of couple of piano and organ presets for the M1 (Though preferred a preset on the U20 for the kind of piano sounds I used).

 

These days - v-synth with a VC1 (D50) card in it which is still a D50 but with a much easier to use UI for progrmming it. My Motif ES has the DX7 mk2 card in it - just used for presets as its a real pain to program - even worse than the original.

 

As for the M1 - if one came up *very* cheap, I probably couldnt be arsed with it now - its was special in its day as a first, but basically had no lasting value for me once superceded by others who did it better. Could be tempted by a very cheap M3R just for about 3 classic presets from it, but I dont really think its worth the rack space, whereas a D550 would be well worth the space.

[kpatz]

Vintage romplers don't tend to stand the test of time as much as true vintage synths. One reason is that new romplers are always coming out that can still sound like the old ones. Snag just about any rompler from the early 90s on and it can sound like an M1. But nothing can do what a D-50 does, except a D-50/550 or V-Synth w/VC-1.

 

Same for FM... sure every rompler ever made has DX samples in it, but they can't do what a real FM synth can.

 

The setup I would like to have is one rompler, one analog/VA, one FM and a D-50. That would pretty much cover all the bases. I've owned all of the above, just not all at once. I would love to add a D-550 to my current setup. It would look good alongside my TX802.

[soundwave106]

Again, I suggest that before you come to a forum and herald yourself like the ultimate authority on something you have never tried in person but only read about on the Internet, you buy the two machines and judge for yourself if the M1 made the D-50 obsolete, or if rather they complement each other, like I suggested.

It is true that the Korg M1 made the Roland D-50 obsolete, *if* you were looking for realistic sampled sounds. The Korg M1 eventually outsold the D-50, so that probably was the viewpoint of many keyboardists of the time.

If you are looking for "analog emulations" too, the D-50's wave section is not exactly good. It doesn't sound that analog. But it does still sound interesting to me. Plus, the D-50 is very programmable. Yes, there is a certain base "D-50 sound" that is breathy and glassy etc. But that sound is interesting to me... and I can't think of a lot that emulates that tonal quality. (Most of what I can think is other early Roland ROMplers like the JD-800/JD-990.)

The Korg M1, on the other hand, has been surpassed by every workstation that came after it. Used Korg Trinity keyboards for instance are cheap these days for instance. I see no reason to get an M1 over a Korg Trinity. The M1 does have some signature sounds (that piano etc.) but is more limited as far as *constructing* sounds goes. These days, I can understand jonesing over a D-50 far more than jonesing over an M1.

[kpatz]

It takes some programming creativity, but the D-50 can sound quite analog. Downright warm in fact. More so than any rompler. It's one of the reasons it was my favorite synth when I had one. It just had a certain quality to it that made it unique. Maybe it was the pseudo-sawtooth. Maybe it was the unique way they implemented the filter. Maybe it was the DAC. Maybe it was the chorus effects. Maybe it was the fact that each partial had its own filter and amplitude EGs. Whatever it was, I loved the analogish sounds I could coax out of it.

 

Granted, a modern VA or true analog would clean the D-50's clock with its analog sound. But it certainly is the most "analog" of any digital synth from that era, or anything for the next 5-10 years or so.

[Don Solaris]

Some points about D-50 to keep in mind

 

 

It can sound FAT. Not warm as it is digital, but FAT. Really fat. It is because you have 4 oscillators per patch. Each can be detuned. Each can have its own Pulse Width Modulation!! Yes. And what's even better, each PWM is modulated by its own independent LFO!!! Can "your state of the art" VA do this? Don't think so. Want even more fatness? Use the other two available LFO's to apply subtle pitch drift over two oscillators for that

[cosmic.synth]

D-50 does not have a true filter. Just an emulation of one. If D-50 would have the filter, you would be able to filter PCM waveforms too - but you can't. Second thing, in the year of 1986 no synth company in the world could produce you a digital resonant filter. It would be a science fiction. Such chip requires a lot of DSP power, that simply didn't exist at that time. To give you an idea of what exactly i talk about: it will take 10 years (since D-50' release) for Korg to finally manufacture a synth that has a digital resonant filter! (in Trinity). And it took 4 years for Roland (after the D-50) to finally release a synth with digital resonant filter. It was the U-50. Later renamed to D-70 Super LA Synthesizer. Below is an image that explains how D-50 emulates a "filter":

 

[kpatz]

And, AFAIK, the D-50 was the *only* digital synth that could do real PWM, until virtual analogs started to appear years later. The DX7 couldn't. The M1 couldn't. It was the first digital that had a resonant filter, even if it was a limited implementation. The DX7 had no filters at all. The M1 had a non-resonant filter. The D-50 could do ring modulation of each pair of partials. Try to do that on an M1. Heck, the M1 didn't even have portamento. The D-50 does.

 

The amount of sounds that could be created with *just* the synth engine on the D-50 could keep a programmer busy for a lifetime, and then you have the PCM waveforms on top of that.

 

I better stop posting to this thread or else I'm going to want a D-50 again. I already do.

[Don Solaris]

Here is your original quote. Not a big deal. No need to get snippy about it.

Not snippy at all. I thought maybe you were in a hurry and didn't read carefully.

 

[ElectricPuppy]

I'm guilty of misunderstanding your original quote too, Don. I, too, thought you were asserting that NO one had developed a synth with a resonant digital filter for another 10 years after the D-50.

 

[Don Solaris]

yeah... sure.

 

 

 

"it will take 10 years (since D-50' release) for Korg to finally manufacture a synth that has a digital resonant filter! (in Trinity)."

[ElectricPuppy]

See, what I saw was:

 

"it will take 10 years (since D-50' release) for to finally manufacture a synth blah blah blah..."

[Don Solaris]

and i turned my head to right and saw this:

 

 

 

 

 

"get D-550 while they are cheap!!!"

[ElectricPuppy]

 

Envy!