During the weekend I took a trip to a music shop and ended up spending about 20 minutes playing with a Roland RS-9.

I have to tell you... I was TOTALLY blown away. This is without doubt the best synth I've ever tried.

I thought it really kicked arse. It had 88 semi weighted keys and with a few tweaks of the knobs I could get some very cool sounds. PLUS- dig this- it's got 512 factory preset sounds with 127 empty user banks for you to store your own sounds. As well as all that it was pretty cheap (£600- which is cheap for a synth these days).

I'm not in the business of advertising for anyone, (infact, while we're on the subject I think Roland gear is generally overpriced and I've yet to hear a decent sound from a groove box!) but you've GOT to check it out the RS-9.

By the way, the demo's at the Roland website do it no justice at all.


Once again, I'm sorry if I sound like some sort of phoney advertiser, but I can't understand why it's been so poorly advertised. Maybe it's got something to do with the fact that it's only about one third the cost of a Phantom or an XV88 (by the way, Phatom's only have 76 keys!).

I'm waiting for someone to tell me what's wrong with it the RS-9. If anyone else has tried it then I'd be interested to hear your criticisms.

The only criticisms I could think of is that it doesn't have your standard two wheels (pitch bend & modulation)- instead it just had this slightly limp wristed little joystick thing.

The other criticism that I have is that apparently it doesn't have aftertouch. BUT, I must admit, I never noticed any great absence of aftertouch when I was playing it in the shop.

Is having no aftertouch a big drawback? Will it affect piano settings?


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OK, I better end this post cos it's going on for ages. Stay cool.

I'm sure it has aftertouch through midi

-tek

That's true - it responds to aftertouch, but does not transmit it. That keyboard is a kind of melting pot of the JV1010, and the A37 controller. It has more keys and more sounds, but the basics have been around in other disguises of Roland gear. The sounds are pretty good, and the real time knobs are nice, but like a lot of newer gear ... the keys are getting lighter and lighter. This worries me for longevity.
As a lightweight, cheap, 88 note piano .... it's a steal.