Alesis NanoSynth

The manual says very little, but its definately usable. From the front panel you can get a good deal of sounds, but the unit really shines when you access the midi only sounds. Hell of a lot of patches. It took me a little time to get the midi communication alright, I actually had to reset the module.

64 voice poly. Each patch has an effect on it. No expansion, Midi in/out. Its about as simple as it gets. Something like 640 voices or something. Powerful little guy for the money, even tho there are very few features.

Many many sounds. Some are great, some are good, some arent too hot. Some very good patches. For the money, again, its crazy value. Im in it for the pads and string mostly, and its pretty good. Its not the best, but its definately usable.

Its simple, i doubt it would crash.

Dunno.

This is very damn good. If you have a crappy Casio or Yamaha PSR and want something better for not so much money, get this. For the price you cant beat it. A nice controller and this little box would make a nice board.

If you are semi proficient with MIDI and your computer then this is an excellent value synth for live or home studio use

This is the same synth engine as the QS6 keyboard in a small module. The 126 of the 600+ sounds are extensively editable. You can pick all the best QS6 sounds from the alesis website and upload them to the nano in your userbank. It handles monophonic patches and has a flexible FX implementation. Shame about the lack of a resonant filter. Bonus: stereo input.

Plunder the QS6 library and you have a huge selection of quality sounds. The nano doesn't sound 'analogue' but it's strengths lie in the way the sounds fit together. The entire collection of patches work well together. Great strings, techno basses, weird bleeps and sweeps. This box is very usable and easy to compose with.

My used unit was bought with a broken MIDI activity LED. Works perfectly in every other respect.

Alesis are American. I believe SoundTechnology handle things in the UK. I've ordered a PC serial cable from them and enquired about repairs / servicing. They seem very professional and organised. Nanosynths are still repairable in the UK.

Pick one up as cheaply as I did and you'll be laughing.

If you just want to plug and play, its very simple - only ins and outs.
However, if you want to get anything really useful out of this unit
you need to use it in conjunction with a PC. You can only get to most
of the programs and features that way, and the preset programs are not
that great - you need to load some good QS6 programs in using Unisyn
to get the best sounds.

Nice features for a small, cheap unit. As mentioned above, though, you
need to be fairly proficient with computer editing to really get at
them. If you are familiar with the QS6, the NanoSynth is basically
the same. No expandable, but that's not really what this was designed
for. In short, it has tremendous features for the price.

I love my old QS6 and purchased two NanoSynths to use to play sequences
live, so that I don't have to take my keyboard. The Nano has the same
sound set. Be aware though, that the preset programs on the Nano are not
the same as those on the QS6, even the ones with the same name. I didn't
think they were as good, however, so I simply used Unisyn to load my favorite
QS6 programs into the user bank of the Nano and got the equivalent programs
to what I use on my QS6. So, to get the best sounds I think you have
to do some reprogramming. The sounds are not exactly the same in
audio quality as the QS6 though, as the Nano seems to not have the same
level of fidelity - the drums being the worst. But then it probably
doesn't have as good an amplifier as the QS6 in such a small box.
For me, I don't think I'd use the Nanos for recording for this reason,
except to isolate a particular instrument, but for playing live I'm
thinking that a little less fidelity is not such a big deal.

Overall, it has the standard hodge-podge of sounds and they are pretty
good, but again, I think you can get better by loading some QS6 programs
into it. In this price range, I've tried both the Alesis QSR and the Roland
JV-1010, and I actually prefer the Nanos. The sounds on the QSR are bad,
and the sofware in the unit is crap (i.e. it just doesn't work very well).
The Roland has nice features and tons of sounds, but the audio quality is
very bad - it doesn't sound professional at all. So, in spite of the fact
that the Nano is a low-end unit, I find the Nano closer to the sound
and quality of my higher level equipment than either of these units.

I've never had problems with any Alesis unit. The Nano seems just as
sturdy.

In the past, e-mail used to always get a response in a day or two.
In the past year, though, I have sent several e-mails to support and
they have never been answered. You can call them, and if you don't
mind being on hold for a while you can get a tech, and they are generally
very helpful when you get them on the phone.

For $150, you can't beat it. Even with its problems I think is sounds
better than the JV-1010, and works pretty well with decent sounds, unlike the Alesis
QSR which has crappy samples and tends to detune itself and change your
settings for no reason (they should call it the HAL-QSR). The audio
quality is close, but not quite up to, the level of its parent unit
the QS6. But, for live performance the difference is probably negligible.
I bought two at this price and I'm not as scared to take these to a
gig as I am my more expensive modules I use for recording.

You really must use this unit in conjunction with a computer to get
to all the sounds, and to get some better programs in there. I suggest
getting the Unisyn files for the QS6 and load some of them into the
Nano - they are much better in my opinion.

So, if your application is appropriate for a low end unit like this,
I think it is preferable to the other units you can get for under
$700. The sounds can be good, but the audio quality will not measure
up to more professional units. However, it sounds better than most of the
the other low end units I've tried, and certainly great for the price.

Simple to use, basically plug and play. GM makes things fairly easy if you're using this module to replace a sound card. However, the ease of use out-of-the-box is countered by a nasty effort to tweak the presets. The manual is typical alesis: usable, but hopefully you won't have to call customer suport.

For the sounds, I can't see why everyone gushes over the percussion sounds. The non-drumset percussion sounds are good, except for the tympani, but the drumset sounds are weak. Apparently, the only drums these guys ever heard belonged to Phil Collins, not Peter Erskine. The cymbals are weak, and the cymbal samples far too short.

The piano sounds that everyone rags are not the best. However, for some unknown reason, if you use a patch librarian or send bank changes to the unit, you can get some halfway decent piano sounds. Why they didn't put the best piano sounds on the GM set I'll never know.

Strings are surprisingly good, and brass is average (although the muted horns are pretty good). Nice harp, OK clav, mediocre synths, good guitars, astoundingly authentic accordian, especially if you use a volume pedal with it. I can use a volume pedal with my Peavey PC1600x to control volume on this sucker, and I'm set for cajun gigs.

The on-board reverb can occasionally get heavy-handed, and it isn't there with every patch. I would love to have dry drums, and then be able to dial in some gated reverb with the effect knob.

As far as the rest, it's fairly plug and play, and not many bells and whistles. But then, if you're looking for expandability, this would not be what you'd buy.

This would not be good for jazz or country, it seems to be more squarely aimed at rock and rap types. If they want to make it more of a Classical box, they need to include more symphonic percussion, and perhaps some multi-sampled tympani.

I'd never use anything at a gig without a backup, but yes, I'd clal it reliable.

Twice I called Alesis about my HR-16; the first time, the guy didn't speak any known language...maybe what they spoke on "the gods must be crazy". The second time I spoke to somebody that told me exactly how to fix my problem. So I guess, with persistence, the customer support is good.

If it were stolen, I'd probably replace it, especially at $149. It hasn't changed the way I make music, say the way my Kurzweil or Octapad have, but it is a nice little unit...especially for the price.

Midi in and Midi out. What could be simpler? But don't buy this if you?re into tweaking patches. Despite the inclusion of the editing software think of this as a "Play Only" unit.

64 voices. Decent effects. But not great. Not expandable. But I wouldn't expect that feature for this price. Responses well to incoming midi signals. Supports SysEx. No Sequencer.

Lets see... The good the bad and the ugly. Terrible Piano sounds. It?s got Fantastic Synth and Percussion sounds. It has one or two good organ. If you have a computer you'll love it. If you don't you you'll find yourself writing negative reviews on web sites. The best patches can only be accessed with patch change commands from a computer. We're using it with Cakewalk configured with the appropriate instrument definition. This allows us to quickly search the entire instrument for the best patches.

Had it two years. It has to be reset sometimes with the procedure mentioned in the previous post. But we've never had to have it serviced. Overall I've seen much worst.

A bit sporadic. I've had emails returned in a day and I've received no responses at all to my emails at times. Go figure....

If stolen I'd replace it. This is a great box in the right situation. But do not rely on it as your meat and potatoes synth. Its great unit for taking some the polyphony load off of your other synths. (Drums, lead lines etc....) It's not the main course, but it great seasoning.

The Manual sucks, but it is very easy to use this little box

For the price, the fetures are great

Some sounds are very nice, especially organs and a few
nylon guitar patches. Strings stink, but they do on most synths.
Some decent drum patches.

I dont gig live, works great in my studio

Called them, was on hold for twenty minutes, got a human being.
Not Mr. Congeniality, but I did get a human.

For $179, are you kidding? It sounds good, takes no space, has
64 note polyphony, no-brainer to use. Its not a Kurzweill, but
for $179, it cant possibly be a bad choice

The key to this little fellow is getting into the banks you can't access from the front panel... so it can be pretty easy to pass judgement unless you send bank changes from your controller.

The manual is consise, but aside from the above consideration, this sucker is pretty much plug and play. No Rocket Science!

I bought this primarily to provide some cheap polyphony in my sequencing rig... I wasn't expecting pro level anything... It is a nice, inexpensive workhorse that does what its told without much hassle.

The GM stuff is thin... but that's pretty much status quo... Underneath that there are some nice guitar patches, e-pianos, and organs.... along with a large supply of mediocre to above average sounds in other categories. Don't buy this as your only source for an acoustic piano... Otherwise, for the price it carries the load reasonably well.

My only problem is the little host-midi switch broke off... but if its anything like my nano piano, I could throw it of a cliff and it would still work

I probably wouldn't replace it... I just switched to a yamaha S-80 as the cornerstone of my rig so I'd probably just pick up the XG card for that if I needed a good shot of polyphony... The half rack roland, and korg (JV 1010,and N5R(?)) are superior instruments, but a bit pricier. I'd recommend it for a computer sequencing beginner or maybe as a backup tool for a gigging keyboardist.

The presets sound okay. The piano settings are pretty dumb until you get to the second half of the dial. Also, a lot of the sounds don't react much to my dampen pedal (this is including the piano). The drums are great. The cymbals don't sound at all real, though. Everything else sound terrific!
This thing is very easy to use, though I haven't tried much aside from plugging it in to my keyboard and playing it that way.

I have to give it a one on features. The thing came with a foot long port cable that had no chance at all to reach my computer tower. So I can't use the midi on it.

As I said before, a lot of the sounds on it are great. If they aren't "great" they're horrible. The sound is very clear.

The nobs fall off! Of course, you can easily put them back on. I've never tried gigging with it, but I would probably perform well with it.

Never tried.

If it was stolen I'd buy a new one. I'd, most likely, buy the PianoSynth instead. I've never recorded any songs with it, but it doesn't 'get in the way.' If anything, I'd recommend this product as a sound bank for a limited keyboard, but not as a synth.

If you just want to use the presets, it's very easy to use. Just twirl the knobs on the front. If you want to edit patches, you have to use the packaged Unisyn software and that's a royal pain.

It's fairly limited as a synth, but feature packed for it's price. It's got four efx busses; it responds to some controller signals (but not any, which is disappointing); it has a fairly flat sounding and somewhat useful lowpass filter available for each sample. Don't expect any resonant techno filter here.

It's fairly flat sounding. It's not an awful unit. It got me started and now I've moved on to bigger, more expensive synths. I never really use it anymore, but when it was my only real synth, the sounds were passable. The filters aren't biting enough for techno, but it's not realistic enough for straight-up pop. It's a great beginner synth, though.

Those little knobs fall off so easily! But functionally, I've never had a problem with it. It's not exactly something that I would use for gigging, though. It needs a computer to be very useful.

Never dealt with Alesis

Good beginner synth, if you want to get started sequencing music, but don't want to shell out the big bucks for a real synth.
Wouldn't buy it again, but that's because I've moved on.

I use magix music studio and had no setup problems. unisyn gave me a couple problems, but I think they were due to my soundcard.

Good drum sounds, applicable to most types of music, cymbals a bit weak on some sets.

I've had to reset mine once or twice by hooking a midi cable to the in and out and setting to knobs to a certain position. Found this method on a web page at synthzone.com

These things are going for $200 dollars at grandmas.com, pretty good deal! makes a good beginning synth in my beginners opinion. Anyone have a synthmodule to recommend in the $400-$600 range? Also if anyone knows how much better the jv-1010 sounds than the nano please let me know.-sam

The Nanosynth is a 1/2 space rack mountable unit that has one of the lowest prices around. This unit's sounds reflect its price. The synth's basic operation is very easy. Just dial up the patch you are looking for. The sounds are often harsh, and thin. I also own a Nanocompressor, and a Nanoverb. Running the dry signal thru external effects seems to make the synth sound better. Buyers of this synth should have a computer to use with it because over half of the features of the synth are only accessable via computer. The manual describes the synth, but does not go into details, and does not cover computer applications.

There is 64 voice polyphony. Each patch has a built in effect. There is a dial on the face of the unit for setting the level of effect. There are no hardware expansion capabilities, but you can edit user patches via computer. The unit has full midi capabilities but I noticed significant differences between the Nanosynth and a QS6. For example, the modulation effect is different on the same patch of the Nanosynth/QS6.

The sounds are average in realism, and will work well for pop music. I didn't like the onboard effects on some patches (Piano). They sounded too wet with too much reverb, and chorusing. Had no problems with midi implementation

This unit is very small, and makes a great backup of other equipment.
No problems with it to date.

Average Support.

I now own a Nanosynth, a Korg N1R, and a Roland JV-1010. I control these modules with a Fatar SL-880.
Rankings:
Ease of Use: Sounds: Features Prices Paid (new)
1. Nanosynth (NS) 1. JV 1. N1R 1. NS $249.00
2. JV-1010 (JV) 2. NS 2. JV 2. N1r $399.00
3. N1R 3. N1R 3. NS 3. JV $419.00
I bought this unit as a backup to my other equipment and actually will use some patches from it over ones from my other equipment.
I would probably buy this again because it costs so little and is so little.

Incredibly easy to use, rather self-explanitory.

200+patches if controlling manually. if controlling digitally from another unit (keyboard, puter) has 500+ patches. flexibility is limited only by the controlling unit.

guitars sound great, keyboard sounds are relatively good, bowed strings and brass sound decent in ensemble patches but crummy alone.

I LOVE THIS THING!!!!!!

The Nanosynth manual has a few tantalizing tidbits of useful information, but could be much more complete. The Unisyn manual is only on the CD, so you have to print yourself a copy (250 pages) if you really need to use it.
I can't get a handle on using Unisyn with the Nanosynth. (That's the patch librarian/editor software the unit ships with.) I'm not asking for much; I just want to be able to get the damn reverb under control because the defaults are way way too wet on the drums. Some might say it takes a PhD to figure this out; well I have one and I can't. And the synth seems to have a mind of its own sometimes. I get the 'dryer' sounds I want and then poof! they're gone again. How the "drum mode" works under Unisyn is anything but clear. How much of the GM bank is 'hard wired' and how much (i.e. the effects) can be edited? etc. Maybe if I could take two weeks off and just spend them reading the manual? I'm fairly patient and I've found this to be Byzantine.

The effects knob controls only one effects program at a time. I'm not too sure what that means. It does not tame the reverb-heavy default snare sounds in the GM bank; I gather this is because the reverb is part of the sample?
The direct-from-serial jack is a great feature, allowing you to bypass your MIDI interface. However, I have found that this is limited to playback and recording --it does not work for patch editing using Unisyn(c).
Its tiny size is one of the very nicest things about the Nanosynth. That's a big big plus for me.

I got it primarily for the drum sounds, and they're okay but you could probably do better. Some of the cymbals sound better on my pre-Columbian Yamaha RX7 box. The Latin percussions all have too much reverb. Yeah, I know: that's user-programmable. Well, it depends on the user I guess.
Pianos sound pretty good to me, ditto organs. The Farfisa patch sounds terrific (once I finally located it) and there's a dynamite harpsichord in one of the banks, much richer than the GM one. I rarely use anything but the basic drums, bass, pianos, and organs for my music. And for recording, I'll play a real bass.

Well as I said, my Nanosynth can be very quirky. I usually don't understand why a file I've played many times before comes out different one day, why I have to re-set the program numbers for instance, or why that huge 80's-style reverbed snare is back once again, after I'd thought I'd killed it for good.

I got a very short answer to my question "In order to use drum sets other than the GM one, do I need to feed my drums to a track other than ten?". The answer was, basically, "yes".
The first one I got had a non-functioning serial jack. They replaced it no problem.

I'm a guitar player/songwriter who'd rather have a band, but this'll have to do for now. After buying the Nanosynth, I got a no-frills Fatar controller ($130) so that I could write midi files. It works fine. My sequencing software (Mac) is MasterTracks Pro and I'm very satisfied with it.
I really wish they'd made the pre-programmed stuff, drums especially, DRY and let the user add reverb or other effects, instead of programming the reverb in and leaving us, manual in hand, trying to figure out how to sqelch it. I have at least a dozen questions I'd like to ask the experts, but I'm not even sure whether some of them are basically Nanosynth questions or Unisyn questions.

This is an addendum to my previous rave review, the key thing here is price performance ratio, yes there are plenty of modules that can steam roll it into its grave.....but nothing and I mean nothing in this price rang can touch it is a great product for the price!

yes i would buy it again and again and again( hey they are just to cheap to pass up, I have paid more just for a CD rom for my EMU sampler) If you have a soundcard studio and what great sound but want to keep it simple..NANOSYNTH!

Fairly easy to use right out of the box, if you want to access the other sounds than you need acomputer, so far it has been relatively simple and depending on your computer sequencer and your ability it is very simple and very cool, waayyy better than stumbling through 32,000 sub menus, owners manuel is great. Short and sweet. I could see some one new to computer sequencing struggling a bit at first, but overall its pretty user friendly. The best prod. for me is one that I dno't need to read the owners manual tomake music, Alesis has done this over and over again..I appreaciate that.

Polyphony is 64 voice on single programs, but more intense programs can us 2,3,4 voices at a time.Built in effects are excellent, and although its not expandable it can down load other patch banks, it has stereo inputs and outs!! on rca plugs which is ok because it goes into a stereo mini on my card as it was really designed to do, so the rca's are a welcome rather than 1/4 plugs, and the stereo inputs, well lets just say i love it when prod come with stereo inputs, saves me bucks on a mixer.

The sounds are fantastic, especially for a module in this price range, the guy who wrote the ssoo flat scenario before this review needs new speakers or something, mine sounds great, and I also have e top of the line EMU sampler and CD roms to compare it to. I love this little guy, it almost fits in my pocket to boot.

Never had a dud from alesis yet sssoooo

Pathetic...good luck getting to actually talk to somone there, but, the products are so easy to use you really won't need support unless something breaks, and out of five Alesis prod. I have owned, none have ever needed repair.

Presets are sooo flat! My goodness, the sounds had no presence, I felt like Alesis had sampled a cheap wavetable soundcard! The piano was the first preset and once I heard how it sounded I knew it was all downhill from there. My Yamaha PSR-85 can kick the NanoSynth's butt! How dissapointing!

64 note polyphony, which I guess is good, but what's the point if the sounds aren't lush? It seems that Alesis has failed to tell everybody (including their web page designer) about the inputs & outputs. Everywhere I read it says that there are only two 1/4" L/R stereo jacks. But when I got it, it had RCA in's and out's.

Like I said before, don't expect too much. Problem was I read all the hyped reviews without actually taking it for a test drive first. Adding EQ won't help any, just makes it kind of muddy. Sounds are very weak and should be scrapped.

N/A

Only talked with them once on the phone, couldn't reach them again.

Really dissapointing since I highly regard Alesis and fail to see why they would put out such a weak product.

8 (with a Mac or PC) The main panel interface is straightforward but lacking of important features. The manual is cool, however the don't provide tutorial of the synth engine. (hint: download QS-6 manual at the Alesis WWW site. Editing is well handled by the included Unisyn software.

Very versatile! The module come with a Cd-ROM (PC & Mac) with Cubasis, Unisyn and also 3 extra bank of 128 patches. The module look like a cheap GM board but beware! It has a very interresting modulation grid. Portamento, monophonic mode, velocity are very well implemented. A very capable synth for that price!

pianos are good. Hammonds are killer due to the nice Leslie effect. All synths are convincing; the waveforms are truly above average. It's a great synth for modern music (read techno-pop, trip-hop, hardcore,... ) but would please also prog-rocker. Drums set are great. Overall I think the patches are a little better than those on the QS-6 (more useful loops, less overprocessed sound).

Seem to be fine. It's so small!

E-mail to Alesis were promply responded.

So little $$$ for such value! Altough it does not have an arpegiator and a resonant filter, it's a good buy if you need realistic keys sounds but doesn't to spend too much for a XP-50 (for exemple). The overall feel of the Alesis synth is less "middle of the road" than those from Korg or Roland, more modern... With the money saved I will buy a AN1x or CS1x... For that price, and with all the software included, what can you say?