Alesis Fusion 6HD

The latest version - It's pretty easy to get started - the keyboard has alot of hidden power to it -

The presets are very good - yes some sounds are just OK, but others are remarkibly clear and sound very real..

The Track HD recorder is good - it takes some time getting use to, but all in all pretty good - Edit patches takes some time - there are quik on the fly knobs and a few other effects that you can change right away -
I am not a big programmer and I only tweak the sounds as I need them - The Manual is OK haven't dived into it that much...

If you take the time to dive into this keyboard - You will be greatly rewarded!

The Poly is 128 plus - I mean its pretty amazing - even for complex sounds...

The effects are excellent and top notch - they didn't skimp here - very good effects processors - Midi is a bit quirky, but it works no problem -

It has USB - compact Flash Digital and Optical I/O and 80Gb Hard Drive - basically they threw in the Kitchen sink on this keyboard! -

This is a complete recording studio - I mean Totally complete - 8 Inputs for real time Hard Disk recording - The clarity is fantastic and could press a CD or MP3, or Itune with it ASAP - I have a 6HD with 80Gb Hard Disk - apparently they made them with 80Gb at the end of their production life...

Yes The sounds are good to excellent - Acoustic sounds are great - basically this keyboard is meant to produce movies, TV's shows and commercials on the fly -
The Piano sound is just OK at best - and the some of the synth sounds are common - Guitars are pretty good - horns and other stuff very good - Arp function is very cool - The keyboard sounds at times like a my Korg Triton LE - Honestly, the Triton is probably may sound a bit better on certain sounds, the the Fusion - sounds better with other sounds - so it's hard to say one over the other - but everything is processed very well..

Yes - the software seems a bit weird - I have not had any issues - just kinda of slow with my ROLAND A-90EX controller - Honestly, I have not really had any problems with mine at all - They are getting very hard to find so I would not - PERSONALLY I WOULD NOT GIG WITH THIS THING - I WOULD KEEP IT IN THE STUDIO - BECAUSE OF THE INTERNAL HARD DRIVE..

Company is OK dealt with them in the past - not too bad

Bummer they stopped making these things - The Fusion was really Remarkable for its price point and everything it could do - Some people bag on it because of its sounds, and some because of its software - Personally since I have alot of gear - I would buy another one, if given the chance - Pound for Pound the Phantom, Motiff and Triton Extreme or M3 will sound better, However, for quality of recordings and ease of use - along with pricing - You can beat it at all - It is a complete production studio with out any addons needed - That's what makes it so great!

I would buy another easy - but look for one in incredible condition -

been playing about 20 years or so- The Triton Extreme and LE, Motiff and Phantom - at $1000.00 less if you can find one - Got mine on Ebay - pretty much brand new - the Condition was excellent - I think the guy used it about 10 times total!

O.S. Is 1.22, second to last O.S. Revision. It is a little buggy, but nothing that has held me back or erased any or my work. Would upgrade to the newest version but don't want to risk losing all the new programs and songs I created. Like I said the bugs are nothing major so I probably won't ungrade. Rom presets are decent, VA presets are killer. Editing patches is eazy as hell compared to other boards I've owned like the prophecy, trinity and triton. The manual is a little basic. I think you can learn more just fooling around with the board for a couple of weekends. I think it's a easy to use board for people who have owned other romplers and va's but if it's your first board your pretty much screwed.

Polyphony is insane like 120. 4 freaking arps! what kind of electro head uses 4 arps at te same time on one track!? Thats way to cool.
Filters are pretty dam capable. You can load 40 gigs or sounds into it!
The Keyboard action is sweet but beware you don't want to play your drum parts on it. The keybed is not very resistant and you might end up with a broken key. I already hear a couple of keys coming lose but I'm taking it easy now. Effects are pretty cool, easy to use but you might want to have a extra efx box handy, not all the efx are high quality. Expansion blows everything out the water, the sounds you can create and load are almost endless. Midi control is sick but has a major flaw it dosen't count midi values from 1-127 it counts them 1-100 so the values on other gear will never match with the fusion's. Sequncer is good but I only use it for sketching. I usally import the sketch into my mpc and take it from there. Becuase of the midi, polyphony and expansion Is'm giving it a 9. If it had pattern based recording and better effect it would be a 10.

Instruments are well pretty dam good. There fat warm and gritty sounding. They sound alive with the right tweaking. There not pristine shimmering like a korg or roland. It's a whole nother direction, It does sound retro like but I like that, other people might not. It responses very good to my playing.

You probably can't depend on this board. But I'm crossing my fingers. Would recomend for live shows and studio playing but get yourself a padded case, becuase it was designed in the us but it was made in taiwan!!! I wish that it was made in germany or japan but you got to cut corners to compete.

CONSTANT UPGRADES, FREE SOUNDS BEING RELEASED ALL THE TIME. WHAT MORE DO YOU NEED?

Dam right I'm buying another one when this one is toast. I've been making music since 95 and this is probably the best sounding board I had but it's also the worst constructed. The pros out weight cons though.

Alesis listen up! The next workstation needs 1-2 gig's ram, better effects, pattern based recording and were gravy!

OS Version is 1.24

The original presets sounded fine. When adding the free sounds from Hollow Sun then overall, presets sound much better.
As for editing patches, I found it somewhat easy on the Fusion. I've owned numerous synths over the years (minimoog, ob8, yamaha fs1r, Kawai k5000s, korg trinity, triton extreme, the new korg m3..etc) and I was easily able to get into the Fusion and modify presets to the sounds I wanted. I still haven't got the knack of creating the FM sounds from scratch, but I haven't put alot of time into it either.

The polyphony varies per instrument style. Sample based, VA, FM, VM. with VM being the smallest..but thats ok, as the VM is the weakest section of the synth.
The effects are fine. The synth does take more memory, but that is misleading. All the sounds are stored on the 40 (or 80) GB HD and loaded as needed automatically.. No nead to go thru the load process each time for loading your own samples (this is a MAJOR plus for me)
The VA & FM synths are amazing, and the Sample based synth is what you make of it. If you don't like the sounds, you can buy some akai instrument CD's and load them..then tweak to preference :)

The on board sequence is ok. I don't use it, because I use PC based sequencers. The 8 track audio recording is nice. I've recorded live events on the 8 tracks and then did post mixing on it..very nice feature
I give this a 10 for what it does really well (sample synth, VA, FM, HD recording, auto loading of samples etc) ..and not what it might come up short with (sequencer and just ok VM)

I've used the Fusion HEAVILY for a soundtrack that ranged from 70's funk to orchestral to pads to hard music, an industrial metal cd, an acoustic rock cd, a couple of remixes and a new wave CD, and the Fusion did great on all projects.
My Korg Triton Extreme started collecting dust after I bought the Fusion. I think the synth sounds great!

My fusions (I ended up buying a 2nd Fusion 6HD since I liked it so much) have both worked very well. I've not had an issue with either. A friend of mine bought one and it had a lock up issue. There have been other issues reported ..but I don't really know that the fail rate of the fusion is any worse than any other synth.

I have used it on an important recording gig without a backup. And had it failed, it would have cost my client some $$. I used it without hesitation.

I've not had to deal with them.

Not only would I buy it again, if stolen...I bought it again without it being stolen. My current synth lineup is 2 Fusions & the new Korg M3.
I use the M3 and Fusion close to equal, but maybe the Fusion slightly more. I paid 2 1/2 times more for the M3 than I did my Fusion. If I had to choose to only keep one synth, I would still choose the Fusion..and thats over any synth I've owned over the years.
And at the price you can get this synth at, it's the best value on the market.

I am using v. 1.24. Pretty stable. The presets sound very good overall. Like most workstations, it has its strengths (synth, pads, leads, basses, analog strings, electronic drums, and even some of the guitar patches) and weaknesses (acoustic guitar, brass). Those that complain about the sounds of this keyboard obviously did not do their homework as they should have demoed it before they took it home. All workstations have a particular sound that does not cater to everyone. In this market, EVERYTHING IS SUBJECTIVE. If you are interested in this keyboard, you need to audition it for hours before you conclude if this is right for you.

I think there are some who purchased the Fusion based strictly on the feature set alone.

Nothing out there can match the features on the Fusion. If I had to gripe about one thing, it is that the memory for the sampler is not user expandable.

Polyphony is incredible. Effects are remarkably good.

Some people complain about the sequencer and although it does not have a real pattern sequencer, it is quite useable.

A lot of the sounds are textured and or evolves. In all, with the inclusion of Hollow Sun patches, this board could pretty much be used for a wide range of genres. The fact that a full featured sampler is included is also icing on the cake.

I haven't had it long enough.

Alesis has been very proactive and involved with addressing issues with its user base. While I feel this is starting to wane, it is still better than the other big 3.

I would definitely get one again if it were lost or stolen. It does not sound like the Motif, Triton, or Fantom, which is a good thing. It is not a ME TOO synth. When the Motif first came out, Roland and Korg tried hard to emulate that synth. Alesis did not choose to go that route.

IF you are looking for motif sounds, then you need to get the motif. If you want something totalty different, then the Alesis is the synth for you.

I'm using software version 1.24. Presets are excellent and very expressive. The additional samples from Hollow Sun are a wonderful sonic experience. Patches are easy to edit, and quickly stored in your "Favorite" banks for snappy access. The free "Fusion Converter" software converts various sample format libraries into Fusion format, including WAV, AIFF, Akai s1000/S3000/S5000, and soundfonts. The manual is very readable, and Alesis has been making supplements and tutorials available online for free download.

Polyphony is approximately 180 voices. The keyboard action is solid and excellent for a non-weighted device. The built in effects are easy to use and sparkling, but the leslie/rotary effect needs some tweaking. Expansion capabilities include the on-board 40 gig hard drive, a compact flash card slot, and optional install of additional RAM. The sequencer is fine for my use, but obviously won't meet everyones needs (that's what Cubase and Logic are for). The built in 8 track audio recorder is an unexpected gem.

This is one of the most expressive synths I've ever played, and velocity & aftertouch react to your playing and animate the sounds. With sample playback, user sampling, virtual analog, FM synthesis, and physical modeling, it's like having 5 synths in one keyboard. The instruments are very realistic - great pianos, horns, synth pads, choirs, and what not. And with the Fusion Converter, you can import the huge Akai library.

I use it for rock, jazz, blues, and standards. And it seems as though the more I play the Fusion, the more I find that my other keyboards are being stored in the shed. When I gig, I usually use only one other synth, my E-mu PK6. The Kurzweil, Korg, and Kawai stay home.

I've been using the Fusion for 10 months, hauling it to gigs, moving it in and out of my car trunk, and it has been totally reliable. The Alesis SR16 drum machine I purchased in 1991 has worked flawlessly for over 15 years. I owned an Alesis Quadrasynth for 12 years without any problems, as well as a QSR+ rackmount. Alesis makes reliable equipment and backs it up with upgrades and repairs if needed. I would use it at a gig without a backup, but prefer to use two keyboards, as I work a duo with my wife on guitar, play left hand bass, and like having one keyboard set up for lead sounds, and the other with bass/rhythm sounds.

I've had support dealings with Alesis since purchasing an original Quadrasynth in 1993, sent it in two or three times to upgrade the software, and once to have the power supply repaired. Alesis promptly did the work, and quickly shipped the unit back. The Fusion is a dream to upgrade. Alesis puts the software on their website, you download it to your computer, save it to a compact flash card, put the card in the Fusion, and upgrade the OS or load in new samples. Hollow Sun has been commissioned by Alesis to convert their huge library of vintage samples to the Fusion format, and you can download them for free. Two excellent user groups have formed that support Fusion players - Fusion Club http://fusioneer.proboards102.com/index.cgi and Fusion Zone www.promusicproducts.com/forum/phpBB2/index.php

If my Fusion 6hd was stolen, I would buy the 88 key 8hd, immediately, without hesitation. I purchased my first electronic instrument, a Wurlitzer 140 electric piano, in 1964. In the past 40 years I've owned over 50 keyboards, organs, synths, and samplers - The Fusion is the absolute best ever. It has a warm, moving, organic sound. It inspires me to play for hours.

In addition to the Fusion, my current instrument collection includes: 1861 Steinway Square Grand piano; Hammond M-3, X-66, & X-77 organs; Kurzweil K250 & K2000R; E-mu PK6 synth; Korg DSS1 sampler; Kawai PH50 synth; CDX Moog organ, Elka Unicord Panther organ, Alesis SR16 and Korg DDD5 drum machines; and Elka Wilgamat 3 auto-orchestra.

And the best thing about the Fusion is that my wife doesn't complain that it gets in the way of her vocals.

My current OS is 1.24 and on the whole I'm happy with the preset sounds. By the same token, the editing of sounds is logical and easily accomplished. Whilst the manual is useful, it is descriptive rather than instructional. That is to say, functions are described but with little or no implementation. Hence trying to use functions such as mix-song or the sequencer can be a nightmare

It has been stated that the Fusion 6/8HD is feature packed. This is an understatement, with Alesis cramming in just about everthing necessary for music production. (4 synthesis methods, sequencer, 8 channel audio recorder, effects and provision for up grading.) However, as has been stated, not knowing the way functions are implemented can make life difficult. In particular, the sequencer is a real pain to use and does not follow a logical sequence for its setting up, with the user having to backtrack through parameters that ought to have been set up upon initialisation. Hence the low rating.

Sonically, this machine is the dogs gonads. It works well with all styles of music and could easily replace anything from a DJ through to an orchestra. by the same token, the way in which this machine reacts to playing styles is a credit to Alesis.

Could I depend on this machine, I think not. Indeed, I shall be slaving it to my 18yr old ESQ80 which it was supposed to replace. My reasons are simple, the ESQ80 was developed by a small team. Hence, faults/bugs are small. Obviously, the Fusion was developed by a large team who lacked communication. would I gig it? No, not unless it was used as a tone module and nothing else.

I haven't used customer support as yet. However, the way in which this machine is behaving, I dare say it'll be soon. Especially as I'm having difficulty in deciding whether I have a hardware or software faulty machine. And that is said having used the onboard hardware diags (1+8 keys held down on boot up).

If it were lost or stolen then I could at least claim my money back on the insurance ( :-) ). Having played many pieces/types of equipment over 30+ years, this machine leaves me indifferent. That is to say, sonically beautiful but practically useless. Sofware based (like my Korg MS2000 and Alesis Micron)it is BUG RIDDEN! I have been in posession of this machine for over a week and have still not been able to turn out a piece of music. In stark contrast, my ESQ80 had me blairing out music in half an hour if that. DO NOT BUY. You will loose money or faith in the musical instrument manufacturer industry.

Using this keyboard is like going on a freaking treasure hunt. Yes, there are many great sounds. But they are hidden in endless menus and random places (i.e. a great synth lead in the ethnic bank). The software is glitchy and Alesis absolutely REFUSES to fix the problems. Editing patches is a puzzle, and the manual is terrible. The R&D team at Alesis should be shot. Seriously. How was someone with a college or masters degree even allowed to sign off on this?

Alesis has been terribly missleading about the Fusion. It's marketed as a keyboard where Alesis and users will continue to release new sounds and upgrades. Let me tell you: It will never happen. Alesis has essentially given up on this marketing flop.

Glitchy software and a total lack of focus have ruined this keyboard. Is is a pro-workstation, or a gimmicky techno toy for euro trash? Is it a classical piano, or a synth? Alesis can't deside. Have you heard of the expression: Jack of all trades, but master of none?

There is no real on-board sequencer for this supposed WORKSTATION. Yes, you can record your own sounds in real-time, but the sequencer is so terrible you'll want to buy a dedicated recorder. Yes, you can create your own sounds, but you'll need a PHD to do it.

As mentioned above, the sounds are decent, but a total treasure hunt to find.

Plastic. Made in China. Of course it's fragile and disposable. No surprise there. Alesis will make thousands of these and they will end up in landfills. That's the new American way. The last thing meant to last built in the U.S.A. was probably a car that used (God forbid) real steel in the 1970's.

You will call and get a company Yes Man. No one at Alesis really cares about the working musician. If they did, they would have sent the Fusion to a focus group to work out the bugs.

The Fusion is s decent value because it has a number of solid sounds and it's the only game in town offering true synth and organic sounds. However, it is a totally half-baked concept that never made it through true R&D. I'm furious with Alesis that they didn't give it there all. It should be called the Alesis Furious!

I just wanted to followup on my earlier review. A new OS was released yesterday that nails down the midi/audio sync issue. The two now work in perfect time with each other. In truth the onlt time I ever had a problem with it before was if I FFD or RWD while recording. I never used the audio recording much since I already had a nice HD 16 track. Now I'm thinking of live backing tracks....

I saw another review here to the effect that the user interface is not easy. I disagree with that. But everyone has their own comfort zone, right?

Using software V1.23.
After using this synth a couple of weeks I have to say the user interface is real easy to work with. Uploading akai samples is a peace of cake. Creating synth patches or complete mixes is dead easy. As with every synth or workstation, read the manual and get to know the machine.I do have to admit I don't use the sequencer since I'm using a pc for that but since most of the complaints you read about the fusion are because people didn't read the manual I suppose this as easy to operate as all other parts of the fusion.

Well compare the features of this synth to others and you know the deal.
Polyphony is much higher than any synth on the market (for all 4 synth engines). 4 sound synthesis types, sequencer, sample capabilities, alesis effects, usb, compact flash, hard drive.
Oh and the keyboard action is one of the best I've come accross in many many years.Finally a company that hasn't cut corners in the keybed department (compare the juno-g with the fusion and you know what I mean)

I read a lot of comments on the sounds in the fusion so I listened to every demo on the web and spent a couple of hours in the shop just listening to the presets and samples. The alesis sounds top notch! The VA synth and FM are very very good, the modeling is nice for special effects, maybe not for realistic reed sounds but it's excellent for expressive leads.The presets of my OS version are there with the best. Did you ever hear a convincing sax preseton a synth/workstation? Neither have I. Same goes for the fusion.Sound is very personal, but I like the piano sounds, the wurlitzer sounds from the hollow sun files can compeet with my clavia Nord electro2. The strings are marvellous.Acoustic drums could be better, but the electro ones are very good. Anyway I didn't bought this for the drums or guitars or reed instruments (I use a large sample library for these one's) or live players on stage.
As said, the keyboard is superb,it has aftertouch and the effects are great. I'm happy.

I haven't encoutered any problems yet.
It has a Hard drive and that is maybe a little bit dangerous.But I am pretty confident.
ALesis is doing a very good job in releasing updates with features and stbility updates.

I did not have to deal with them personally yet but when I see regular updates of the OS and also the amount of new free sound sets that has been relaesed by hollow sun and others. The sample converter they have licensed from the "chicken" guys.
I would say this is pretty good customer support. I haven't seen many competitors doing that.
Customer support is not only about dealing with repairs you know.
I have never seen Roland or E-mu releasing any OS updates for the synth I bought from them.

As you probably guessed it, I'm a happy Alesis user.Don't trust the negative feedback this machine is sometimes getting. There is also a lot of good feedback. Sound wise it's up there with the Yamaha's, Korgs or Rolands of this world. But it has more of everything (synth engines, sample cap., polyphony, audio inputs,...) and the price is unbeatable.

The Fusion is built pretty logically and has a big screen. However there are a few things that slow it down:
1.) The navigation is a bit cumbersome at times.
2.) The sequencer's interface is terrible - from adding new bars to looping to whatever else is often used. I just hate the sequencer.
3.) Loading times for instruments - inspiration killer.

Excellent features: the polyphony, the sequencer, the audio tracks are all fantastic on paper. The effects are also good, as is the variety of synth engines. Good keybed, by the way! But it sucks as a MIDI controller - limited # of knobs, no sliders, etc ...

The sounds are uninspiring.
The acoustic drums sound mighty thin, as do the bass instruments and the acoustic guitars. Distorted guitars are pretty good. Synth sounds are good as well. Strings are weak, brass is ok+. Organs are pretty good. EPs - some stinkers and some nice ones, nice overall. The grand piano is OK but has some "hollowness" in the mid-range and its velocity switching is way too obvious. Choirs - what choirs?
I found the sound set that ships with the Fusion to be a disappointment. The Hollow Sun additions sound good but focus on synth sounds mainly and take *time* to load. This loading time, which may seem trivial at first, quickly became a MAJOR inspiration killer for me.

I've owned the Fusion for 5 months now and have encountered 2 glitches. Both were fixed by powering the unit off and then on. My current OS is 1.21. In a software unit this would be expected. On a hardware unit - never, at least for me.

Haven't dealt with it.

For its current price, 999$, the Fusion 6HD is the best deal out there at the moment. However, that's not to say it's the best deal on an absolute scale.

In the end, the Fusion just doesn't "do it" for me. It's not good for acoustic type of music. It has great specs but that's not enough. I suggest you buy your next instrument based on whether it "does it" or not, not based on specs and low price. Music is an irrational field. Decisions based on rational parameters are bound to cause problems. Kind of like love. The most popular/richest/seemingly prettiest girl isn't always the one you fall for.

I have OS 1.22, but there is an new OS 1.23 just released today that says it will fix alot of MIDI related problems that I have yet to experience.

The S&S presets compare very well with the Yamaha Motif that my wife uses. The virtual analog are as good or better than everything that I have heard, except the Ion. The physical modeling is not up to spec for some, i find it wonderful for making unusual sounds. That is a great strength of this keyboard. It is easy to wander off into Synthworld.
There are a slew of sounds avaiable from Hollow Sun that are simply the best.
Editing programs is a breeze if you know about synthesis. Even the FM is much easier than on the DX-7 for example.

There has been alot of complaining about the manual. It could be better, I have seen worse. It is more of a push-this-button-when-you-want-to-do-this sort of manual. Not step by step. Alesis have put some tutorials up on their website and there is a users forum where most of the natives are friendly and helpful.
So factoring in the manual I am giving it an eight in this rating.

The polyphony is limited only by the complexity of the program. The effects are very usable and some are excellent, all are pretty easy to use.
It is capable of being expanded with software updates. No expensive little boards to buy extra. There is a sample converting program that will load WAV, Soundfonts and Akai format straight in. You may use the effects and synthesis engines to torture them further as you choose.

They keyboard is pretty good, my wife said it felt OK and she is an actual piano player. It is velocity sensitive and it has the bonus of aftertouch.

The sequencer is more of a linear affair and not a pattern based thing. This has caused some complaining in certain circles, but not from me. Top to bottom sequencing is fine, there really isn't a memory restriction with the hard drive, so I think it is easy to use.

I think that this instrument is good for anyone needing some great sounds right out of the box. Where it really kills is when you start making your own sounds. It is easy to get results that are great sounding and fun. There are so many options and you can go so deep. Expect a learning curve and dig in and explore.

I love the way this thing sounds. Some of the Hollow Sun sounds that are samples of analog machines just sound alive on the Fusion. There are tons of ways to make sounds react to your playing. Plus the sample and analog programs can have up to 8 LFO's per program. You really can't have too many LFO's.
You have modular synth connectivity. Almost anything can modulate something else. And you don't get bogged into alot of submenus.

You can program sounds that would work for any type of music.

I have had no problems with it in my studio. I would gig it without a backup. In fact I think my wife has her eyes on it

I have only had to contact Alesis about this board one time, the person who answered my question went out of his way to help me.

Thanks Jim Norman!

Right now the Fusion is an incredible value when you look at all of the options it puts at your finger tips. There is only one other product on the market right now that directly compares and it costs many thousands more than Fusion. If it were stolen I would go mad!

I chose this product because it has 4 sound generating engines and 8 tracks of hard disk recording built in. There is the ability to add new sysnthesis types, effects, and samples later.

It has helped me make music so far and I like the way the controls are laid out. It is all very logical to my way of thinking. Some may disagree, but I also think it is quite beautiful. Sleek and silver!

I wish it had wavetable synthesis or wave sequencing, but they can always add that later on.

I'm using the latest OS (1.22). It works as it should, but it's a lot of work to get used to it. It is very powerfull. I didn?t find any bugs, even when programing it extensively for hours and hours.
However, this is a sinth for those musicians( it's a professional instrument, not a toy) who like to get their hands dirty in the deeps of the machine. For those of you who just want to use nice factory presets, you might find something more suitable in the tradicional big three(or four) brands for this kind of products. But none can come close to the sonic power of fusion. I even dare comparing it, if not surpassing, the most powerfull dedicated samplers, virtual modeling sinths and even stand alone audio recorders out there. It?s that powerfull! For live use, however, you have to organize your banks first, because the amount of sounds it can hold in its 80 GB hard drive it's so huge! It's deep. It's powerfull. It shure isn't easy. Like my wife. And I love them both.

No match out there for polyphony, hardware or software. Outstanding built in efects : 2 bus plus four inserts per program at the same time, 8 inserts in mix mode.
Holds compactflash memory and can store up to 80 GB in it?s HD of what you want. Plenty enouph for me. Poly aftertouch (ouuch!)
Powerfull midi sequencer plus 8 tracks audio recorder.

The rom sounds are it's weekest point. As said before, if you want to take it out of the box, press a button or two to get the sound you want, look the other way. However, Hollow Sun is releasing special programs and samples via internet, for free, especially for the fusion and these are serious sounds, that excells any other hardware sounds outthere, so now the poor rom sounds doesn't bother me any more, I simply don't use them, except for the piano sound. Although not a gigasample, it is quite playable and expressive if you tweek it a litle. And the rom Electr?nica is also quite espectacular. I give it a ten not beacause of it's factory sounds, but for it's sonic power and its generaly high quality sound coming for it, now that I have my own selection of sounds in it, and for the Hollow Sun releases.

So far, no problems.
I'done a dozen gigs with it.

The best spent 1000? of my life. Half the price of its competitors with much more then double the power, and features, at all levels.

OS 1.22. Never used a previous OS. The presets are OK. The free sounds offered on the Alesis website is top notch programming by Hollow Sun.

As previously mentioned, I don't know what the polyphony is, Have not run out. I read that the sample memory can be quadupled.

The on board sequencer is pretty easy to use especially with the tutorial offered on the Alesis site.

Good for all kinds of music. With the 40 gig HD, it can accomodate any kind of music styles

Can't afford a backup.

The forum for the Fusion is one of the reasons I bought this keyboard. New dowloadable sounds almost monthly.

I would definately buy again. I've been sequencing since the Roland MC-500 days.
A sampler with a hard drive built in!! No one thought of that before? $899 for a fantastic sounding keyboard, sequencer and sampler!
With an OS update in the near future, I'm hoping Alesis will include step recording and a better pattern based sequencer.

I sold my Alesis QS8.1 and ?upgraded? to the Alesis Fusion 6HD. The Fusion is supposed to be a revolutionary keyboard offering unlimited potential for new sounds, and a built-in hard-disk recorder. There?s ?fusion? here alright: a lousy mix of bad software with a healthy dose of user un-friendly hardware.

The keyboard chassis itself actually feels sturdy and makes more use of metal that I expected. The real-time knobs are great, but the various buttons (and their locations) are a bit ridiculous. The keyboard has buttons for numbers 1-8 (but no 0 or 9) and only A-P. It apparently never occurred to Alesis to give users buttons for 0-9 and the full alphabet to type in things easier (programs, songs, banks, etc.).

The screen size is decent but navigating is a nightmare without a set of directional buttons. Alesis decided to give users a half-moon pattern of ?prev?, ?next?, ?inc? and ?dec? buttons around a jog wheel. This is about the stupidest thing I?ve ever seen on any human-machine interface. It?s totally counter-intuitive and difficult to use.

The Fusion takes a significant amount of time to load or ?boot up? when you first turn it on. You feel like you?re waiting for the thing to load Windows 98 on an old 486. After using the keyboard for the first time, it becomes quite obvious that the Fusion is more of a slow computer (with attached black and white keys) than an actual musical instrument. Sometimes you?ll select a sound and have to wait a few seconds for it to actually load off of the hard drive. While it?s loading, there are often loud and unexpected sounds (twitches, pops, and random noise). This isn?t a keyboard where you could subtly change programs in the middle of a live song.

Alesis continues to use an intensely retarded system of banks that don?t make any sense. What good is having 10,000 sounds on your keyboard when you have nearly no way to find them or organize them all!? I tried to create and organize a few new banks for about an hour and gave up in frustration.

When using headphones, the keyboard really never gets loud enough. I?m not deaf, and I?ve got some pro headphones, but the Fusion still doesn?t sound like it should with the volume maxed out.

The Fusion is insanely buggy/glitchy. I had to purchase a Compact Flash card immediately after receiving the keyboard in order to upgrade the firmware (another $30 purchase). There is no way to upgrade the firmware directly with a USB cable and a computer. The media that Alesis decided to use for backups/storage is also totally outdated and in three to five years will likely not be available. Even now CF cards are getting hard to find.

The manual is terrible. I know a lot of half-baked musicians always complain about manuals because they can?t read. But this one really is bad. The worst part is that the manual was printed before it was even complete. You need to go to the Alesis website to download about four or five supplements and print about 200 pages of new stuff. I have a three-ring binder (that?s twice as thick as the original manual) for ?supplements.?

See above.

See above.

Emailed Alesis. They tried to help, but this thing is such junk there's not much they can do.

Don?t buy this keyboard. Run the other direction. I will be returning mine. Alesis should really be ashamed of their lack of R&D. Who deigns and sells a car where you need to download wheels and parts to the engine? Or since when did you buy a microwave oven that needed four hours of programming before it could cook some nachos? I?m not being sarcastic. The Fusion really is that bad. As I write this, I?ve been waiting over three hours for the keyboard to finish loading sounds off a flash card. I feel like I bought more of a kit computer with downloadable software than a real complete instrument. Buy a Korg, Yahama, or even a Casio. Alesis needs to learn to put out a better product. This is totally unacceptable.

New OS 1.22 is much better and great tutorials are now posted on the alesis web site. Considering whats under the lid here (power!), easy to use.

Ease of use figure given based on how how easy it is to access this much power and flexability!

No fixed limited on poly
Great effects, sounds are updated for free frequently (to the hard drive via USB) and other sounds/samples can bve converted for free and played back via the sampler (AKAI, KONTACT, HALION, GIGA can all be played back on the Fusion!)
Midi, velocity, aftertouch.
Nice on board sequencer with 8 audio tracks, mix mode is like a groove box/pattern sequencer.
Synth, Sampler, Virtual Analogue (from the ION), FM (lots of FM power) and Physical Modeling! Only thing that comes closes is the Korg Oasis for 6 times as much money!

The new OS 1.22 has an amazing amount and quality of soiunds and new sounds are given away free and frequently (check the FUSION forum if you don't believe me, sometimes lately we have several banks a week of pro samples!!)

Very easy to use real time buttoms, arp and expression matrix + the cool blue mod wheels ;-)

Seems very solid. I have hgad no probles and moved it around in a car a couple of times.

Alesis are playing a blinder on this unit, frequent OS updates with new features, free tutorials and they have paid a sound designer to prodce free sound banks that are just 'given free' to fuson users!

The best synth I have owned, so good in fact that I sold my 6HD (that I planed to use along with my Virus, Micron, Korg Triton and 88 note master keyboard) and all my other keyboards and now only use a FUSION 8HD for everything.

Yes, it is that good, and amazingly it's getting better all the time.

See the fusion forum http://www.promusicproducts.com/forum/phpBB2/index.php
for real user experiances rather than reviews from people who just played a few presets in early OS versions!

I'm using OS 1.22 right now and everything is operating great. The presets sounds very nice, especially compared to my previous setup which was a Yamaha CS2x, QY70, DJX and DJX-II and a DD-55. All of this was being recorded on a Boss BR-532. Editing the patches is a breaze using the control knobs but I haven't tried to edit them in depth to come up with my own sounds just yet. Editing the samples is a little hard for me but I don't use my Fusion as often as I'd like so I just need a little more time to figure it out. I still have to learn how to do this but the tutorials on the website are great. The owners manual kind of bland. It explains what everything does but does not explain how to use it. It has no examples or TRY THIS sections.

Only God knows what the polyphony is on this workstation. I've tried running out of notes on this workstation but I CAN NOT DO IT. Keyboard action is great. It's very different than I older boards but I'm enjoying the feel of the keys very much. The only thing I'm a little iffy about is the noise from the keys. I'm not used to hearing the keys being played. But, again the Fusion keys are very nice to me. I like them better than the the BIG 3. This workstation has plenty of effects and they are all awesome and very easy to use. There are no expansion capabilities but there are free sounds you can download off the the internet from the Alesis website. I'm sure about about all of the MIDI capabilities. It does have an onboard sequencer which I'm enjoying very much so far but I wish that it had a pattern sequencer like my QY70. It is very easy to use and advanced but I just wish it had that one thing.

For the most part the instuments are very realistic and since they've hooked up with HOLLOW SUN, they have gotten even better. The only thing I don't like is I wish that there were more drum kits. But I think theyre very easy to use, but I don't know about extensive editing. I think the sounds work well for all types of music. The onboard effects are very good. Velocity and aftertouch is very nice and it reacts very well to my playing.

I can depend on this board but I would be nervous had traveling with it only because of the hard drive feature and because It's too darn heavy FOR ME to carry for long periods of time. It does have some bugs in it every once in a while. It will have trouble loading sounds or booting up but like I said, it is VERY RARE. It used to happen very often with the old OS from what I've heard. Now, like the manual says, if you use a lot of effects during recording on the hard drive, sometimes this will cause problems trying to locate what you've recorded later on. I used to have this problem quite frequently, but since I upgraded to the current OS, I have had no problems. And I stopped recording with the effects so heavy. You can flatten the tracks you've recorded on and this will help the sound quality. Time can only tell if I'd use this without a backup.

Customer support is great. I wouldn't try to email them with requests or questions. You'd be better off calling them during their office hours.

I'f it were lost or stolen I would be very upset, to put it kindly. I don't think I'd buy anything else, especially with the way Alesis is updating the sounds and OS. It keeps getting better and very frequently. I did consider the Roland Fantom X6 because I wanted an all in one machine. Synth, sampler, sequencer and recorder. The only workstations that have all of these features that I know of are the Fusion, Fantom X and the Oasys. The Oasys is way out of my budget right now but I think it's very interesting. I like the Fantom X too, but I didn't want to pay that much money, either. I'm very pleased with my choice. I was questioning my decision when I first bought this but not any more. I've been playing along side my dad since I was a child. I got my first keyboard when I was 9 years old. It was the Yamaha PS-2 which I still have. So it's about 22 years old now. I like having something different than everybody else. I don't want to be a ME TOO person. I know everyone thinks that this board is Casio like because of the way it looks and therefore it must sound cheap too. I'll let them keep thinking that and blow them away with the sounds of the workstation. When they get the drum sounds added or when I learn how to tweak them, I'll be overjoyed. I've already mentioned my other gear but I plan on keeping the BR-532 and the DJX or CS2x. I haven't made up my mind on which keyboard to keep. It does help me to make music but I wish it had the pattern sequencer like I mentioned earlier because right now I have to drag and paste my music to the way I want it. And like I said earlier, I wish it had tighter acoustic drum kits. I don't regret my purchase one bit. I'm glad that there's a user group for this workstation. You can go to the Alesis website to find it if you're interested. I hope this review helps somebody.

The Keyboard presets are pretty good and just like all alesis keyboards there are a lot of them. Editing is pretty simple, Patch editor???LOL alesis doesn't have one yet. The Manual for this keyboard is BAD!!!! I mean Really Bad, I thought rolands old stuff had bad manuals, but this is the worst. You have to learn the keyboard yourself for the most part. There has been a toon of updates since the manuel was writen anyhow.

This keyboard has the most features to offer excet for the Oaisys but it's about $4000 less, The only problem is alesis rushed to get this keyboard out,, and it's been out for a while now and they are just making some basic things work. The keyboard is ALMOST great. 32 track sequencer, 8 tracks for audio, usb updates for sound set, 40 GB hard drive,

This keyboard sounds good, The sound are pretty good, but for some reason they don't sound as good as my motif or my fantom as far as "real" sounds but for leads and synth basses I think it's great. There have been about 5 updates to the soundset since I've had my keyboard, about 2 months now, free of charge, so this is great.

The only problem I see is when I load a large ammount of samples into the keyboard they "get lost" on the hard drive and the keyboard is unable to load them

Prety good, called one day to get an answer, they answer my question in about 2 mins.

Worth the money, if they get the OS working as it should this would be a great, great keyboard,

Software Version 1.21

The newest OS fixes all the serious bugs and adds a new soundset which is certainly passable, at least on my monitor system - though nothing I would use un-tweaked (I find that true of ALL synths though). The newest OS also adds Loop-based recording.

Hollow Sun just released their third batch of extremely tasty samples/patches for the Fusion a few days ago - they are astounding...really nice PPG and electromechanical timbres with a few suprises...I'm really loving this board more and more as i play it.

The editing system is open-ended - if you want another envelope or LFO, just add one then attach it to a destination in the mod matrix. Really nice! The PM engine(s) is(are) much more capable than I had hoped and the FM engine's implementation is easier to program than I had hoped - back in the day I used to hate programming the DX synths. The featureset is pretty damn deep but the navigation and editing system is fairly intuitive and easy to get around on. One niggle - why aren't the assignable knobs implemented in a useful way for the edit pages? (ADSR on envelope pages for example)

The User manual is pretty dense but thank goodness for the "Quickstart" guide thats included. Once you dive in though, everything becomes clear fairly quickly...

I haven't hit the polyphony roof yet, even with very dense mixes! From what I can tell, polyphony is extremely high but is dependant on which synth engines are being used at once and how many instances of each...

I personally like the keyboard action though it may be light for some people...its not as spongy-light as a Korg Karma but its not as heavily weighted as a Kurzweil SP76. Velocity, release velocity and mono aftertouch are standard.

Expansion is easy...there's a huge hard drive in there - put what you want on it! I used the Fusion Converter program to dump a quarter gig of Akai-format Waldorf Wave samples into the Fusion last night. I just got through "fine tuning" them this afternoon...tweaking velocity settings and envelopes. Four banks of pure Wave! Sounds better than out of my S2000 and I can load all the programs at once instead of one at a time from a ultra-slow CD Rom drive. Unreal!!! O_O

I haven't touched the onboard hard disk recorder yet but it looks fairly capable - 8 tracks of simultaneous audio recording and room for lots of MIDI tracks. I'll probably use it as a "song scratchpad" when I don't feel like firing up my PT TDM rig.

Some observations about the Fusion's overall "sound" and the Piano in particular:

Some people have been asking how I like the Fusion's Piano and, more specifically, how it stacks up against the Korg and Yamaha offerings...

Well, It kind of depends on what you like personally.
Let me explain; the Piano on my Motif Rack was a brittle piece of crap to my ears. The piano on the Fusion is a lot more realistic. Personal taste varies on piano sounds quite a bit though - I've got an old Baldwin Acrosonic Spinet in the studio that I love!

I needed at least one "workstation" type rompler in my studio. I started with a Korg Karma but its sounds were overhyped plus it had the absolute worst keybed I have ever felt. Later I added a Motif rack to the setup - besides its too-bright sound it had awful MIDI timing slop...I sold it to help fund the Fusion.

Through my ADAMs, the Fusion has a nicely flat, unhyped sound. In my opinion, the Fusion's patches sit in a mix a little nicer than Korg and Yamaha - I had to compress and EQ them a bit to get them to "play nice".

I'm playing the Fusion along with a Serge Modular, Nord Modular, Yamaha VL-1, E-mu Planet Earth, Waldorf MicrowaveXT and a DSI Polyevolver Keyboard and I tell you, the Fusion can certainly hold its own, even with a disparate bunch of "weird guys". LOL! It really has a unique voice of its own thats different enough to be a very welcome addition :)

The unique sound engines in the Fusion are just a blast to program and I love their sound...thats where I think it really shines though Its obviously no slouch as a sampler either - now I can finally trash my old S2000.

If I want Piano, usually I'll just put a ribbon mic next to the Acrosonic but I can see myself actually using the Fusion's Piano once in a while.

If the Fusion's Piano sound is of paramount importance to you, by all means go listen to it but that's no reason to buy a synth...you can always load one more suited to your personal taste ;)

Seems fairly solid. I'm not planning on gigging with it - if I was, I would certainly buy a decent case, but I would do that for any synth I planned on transporting ;) I haven't had any lockups or software crashes yet...I've been digging pretty hard and deep into the beast since I got it and it seems very reliable so far. This is a much more mature OS version though...If you're looking into a Fusion, make sure the most recent OS is loaded - some of the earlier ones were rather buggy.

Rarely ever dealt with them. Had a flakey ION a while back and they fixed it up good as new for no charge at all. Warranty seems solid on the Fusion.

Some notes about programming the different sound engines:

I recently programmed a VA sound, a "reed" PM sound and a FM sound from scratch (not just tweaking existing sounds) and while the editing seemed a little fiddly at first, I soon fell into the Fusion editing paradigm - there are lots of nice shortcuts implemented to speed up things as well...individual mod pages have shortcuts to related sources and destinations.

The VA engine is very nice! The "RP" filter in particular is especially warm and squelchy. While my result wasn't quite as warm as some of the sounds I've heard from the Ion, it certainly is at least the equivalent of the Waldorf Q, if maybe a bit warmer. Certainly theres none of that brittle digital "fizz" I've noticed from my Nord gear, but its certainly not "dull" or "muted" sounding. All in all, I really like the VA engine.

The PM engine is bizarre! The trick here is to use the mod matrix extensively with multiple envelopes affecting things like "breath pressure" and "bore frequency", "reed threshold", ect... I was able to get a very dynamic Reedy Flute sound going in no time that I could actually "overblow" by using high key velocity. Nice stuff!

The FM engine is really powerfull in its being flexible without adding complexity! You can make up your routing scheme as you go, you're not locked into specific "algorhythms". I've managed to get a depth and subtlety of modulation I could never get from DX style FM. I created a patch that could easily be mistaken for a rather nice real analog string pad - and that was before even adding any filters! The FM engine can still do the "ringy" DX thing but can take it a bit farther. There's a FM preset called "Oxide" that I'm dieing to inspect - an ethereal scrapey bellish resonant thing that is astounding - it sounds like its rusting as you play it!

1.20 the update

For all the features it gives you it's a no brainer this is the new technology everything before this is old and obsolete.

Sounds? boy o boy does this thing blow away a triton, motif, and fantom x for sound possibilities that you never heard of! Some people may think the presets supposed to be the best ever created but forget that they may not, but the user must understand that this the best overall synth invention ever created and this will be around many decades after the current tired old synths sounds expire.

No problems yet.

never had to deal with it

Complete 10! Think of this as a one of a kind synth invention when this technology currently cost $8,000 in an Korg Oasys.

I didn't keep it long enough to check it out due to the issues I mention in the feature section.

My big complaint is that they advertised this as having semi-weighted keys and the keys are no different than my synth weighted Triton classic 61 key, or my Motif 6. This is the real reason I bought this, I could deal with a board that may not sound as good as my triton if it had semi-weighted keys. Big advertising error.

The analog sounds are better than the motif or Triton, everything else was not. Of course I had the early software version and I guess they fixed presets and problems.

I wouldn't buy, seemed cheap and plastic and too expensive for what you get.

1.0
The sound bank buttons, like piano, strings, etc make it easy to navigate.

The fact that Alesis will continue to upgrade software and sounds means that this keyboard has a great future. My big complaint is that this was advertised as semi-weighted and it is not, it is just like my Triton 61 note. The in

The Analog sounds are great. I geuss they have already come up with new sounds and a new piano, so its hard to say yet. Overall I would say it is better than my triton in synth sounds, but worse in some stock sounds, but I haven't upgraded new sounds yet.

I will post an update soon, I just wanted to give people a heads up about a few things.

Software Version 1.00 (Alesis released 1.01 to correct bugs) was the version I used. The presets were not earth shattering. The manual was well laid out. This keyboard really could have used a touch screen (but I guess lack of a screen is part ofwhat kept the price low). Navigating through sounds and banks was a little quirky.

Alesis says this is the polyphony: Dynamic processor allocation varies depending on the complexity of your program: Sample playback: 272 voices, FM: 240 voices,,Virtual Analog: 140 voices,Physical Model - Reed: 60 voices,Physical Model - Wind: 48 voices... I didn't keep it long enough to max out the polyphony.


The onboard sequencer (32 tracks) and 8 track audio recorder were big selling point, but i didn't keep it long enough to try these

The Holy Grail Piano was touted as being a big deal. It was one of the worst grand pianos I ever heard. There is a Holy Grail Jazz Piano patch that is a bit better. Piano/strings and piano/pad programs are horrible (though there is a MIX Symphonic Piano--or something like that which is a better combo of piano and strings). The Electric Pianos were decent. The FM pianos were nice, but didn't blow me away. The organs were a big disappointment. There were VERY few parameters to edit the leslie effect (ramp up/down speed was not there) and it just wasn't believeable. The organ sounds themselves weren't so bad, but lack of a good leslie was and is a big limitation. The physical modelling wasn't too spectacular either. The sampled wind and brass in the fusion are better than the modeled sounds. Strings were nice, but not as full as a MOTIF or Triton. Brass was nice, but still not as full. Leads (especially the analog ones) were very nice.

Compared to a Triton, the effects are very limited. Only 1 insert effect for Program. and in MIX mode, an insert effect could only used for 1 part. That was a big letdown for me. Plus there were not enough parameters for the effects.

Lots of bugs in the 1st version, not reliable enough to use live(sometimes it would play a different sound than what what displayed)--but i'm sure alesis will correct this in coming months.

I have a Motif 8 and a Triton Extreme 88, but i'm tired of carrying around these 60 pound beasts. So the fusion 6hd was going to be my alternative. But the presets didn't stack up. I decided that since i loved my Triton so much and i already had all the sounds/layers I needed in it, that i would return my fusion and get a triton 61 key.

I had planned on using the fusion to design my own sounds, but i really didn't see the potential once i started playing the fusion