Bob Moog himself said " those outside electronic music thought that synthesizers were made to immitate acoustic instruments , where as those who were inside electronic music knew they were made to make new sounds not available by acoustic means " . For the most part , a sample playback machine is just an overpriced organ , lacking in any real programmability . Things like the KORG Trinity , and Triton and the V.A.S.T. Kurzweil's ( variable architecture systhesis technology ) are more than just sample playback . But , most are just that , very boring , very bland , very limited . When synthesizers entered the voltage controlled era like with Moog , Buchla , Arp , and EMS and got more popular , some were at a lost for what all the controls were for . So preset machines started to come about , ARP PRO SOLOIST , MINITMOOG , ROLAND SH-1000 , SH-2000 , POLYMOOG ( which is not a real synthesizer at all ) and the string machines like ARP OMNI , MOOG OPUS 3 , ARP SOLINA 4 , ROLAND RS-505 , RS-202 , ARP QUARTET ( SIEL OR-400 ) , CRUMAR ORCHESTRATOR . These were made to provide familiar sounds and to be less intimidating . Then , with digital synthesis like the YAMAHA DX-7 even more realistic sounds were possible and programming was on the back burner . Then sample playback got cheap enough to produce instruments that played back real acoustic sounds and programming was really on the back burner . That's why the whole vintage synthesizer thing came about , people got tired of the sterile stagnant sounds of these machines and the absolutely poor user interface . Today with software synthesizers , you get alot of flexibility . Analog modeling gives you the best part of the analog world without the unreliability of the older machines . Also more control using Midi , which most analog synthesizers did not have . Analog synthesizers are still the most versatile tool in electronic music . They offer the best in control , flexibility , and sound . Electronic music is almost 130 years old , the first synthesizer was made in 1876 . It had 24 single tone sine wave oscillators ( one for each key in the 2 octave keyboard that it had ) . Since then electronic music has been an important part of modern music . A synthesizer is an instrument that gives the user control over the three aspects of sound - pitch , timbre , and loudness . That's a dictionary description of a synthesizer . It sounds like to me that you want to create you're own sounds , analog and analog modeling synthesizers are the best way to go for that . As well as some great software synthesizers like Reaktor , Vibra 9000 , Metasynth , Absynth , and Pulsar just to name a few .