Alesis QSR

Soft. Vers. 1.02
I have the Vintage Keyboards and Sanctuary cards; therefore organs, ep, choirs, and synth sounds are great.
Editing is like a labyrinth without an editor (Soundtower's is very cheap), but if you have got one, your life will become wonderful.
The manual is clear and clever

Use it always in the "mix" mode , and you will find a big friend for your music out.
The effects are good, and the four separate ouputs are convenient.
The cards which I own are really great.
Midi implementation is complete (I use Sonar 6.2)

From my point of view ih has four higlights: basses, organs, eps, synth, strings and drums are good, I don't like its piano, but in general it is sufficient.
You can play rock and pop, and jazz too, without problems.
I play it with a masterkeyboard (Oberheim MC 2000) and i find it very reactive.

The external power unit is a bad thing for gigging, I have another one.

There are many user's websites with a lot of advices, sounds etc.

If it were lost or stolen I will search another one, I love it.

super easy to play preset tones, but not to program your own sounds
the manual is very straight forward, but doesnt offer any indepth walk throughs.

64 note polyphony. the effects are pretty lush, but not all of the patches have the same midi paramater controller assaignment (like 93 for reverb ect)
there is a performance mode, in which the sounds are more full, and can have multiple effects assigned to only one patch. in multi mode, you can use 16 patches but the effects can only be assigned to one channel, but will effect all channels.

pianos were excellent. but then one day i starded getting distortion in them. all of them and only on piano sounds. this is the reason im taking time to write this review. i later met a guy who had a qsr and all of his patches were playing back fuzzy distortion. so i guess its a bug, and alesis doesnt work on these anymore, at least thats what they told me a year ago. but i did get 4 solid years out of it. they were good years.

not very dependable over time
still gig with it, but no piano sounds.

no good, not anymore

buyers beware of people selling these because there sounds pooped out, and alesis no longer will service

I wrote a review of the QS8 which I just sold 4 days ago - You may want to read it. I purchased this unit to replace it.

LCD seems a lot bigger then the QS8 but not necessarily as bright.
Data wheel is the pitts...almost frustrating. The Lexicon PCM500's had this same problem - and they sent out a chip to fix it.

See the other reviews.

In my QS8 review I wrote that it has a few Marque sounds, acoustic sounds are thin/weak, organs and synth sounds are good. I still believe that to be true. I had a lot of emails from people about my review - most agreed, so why did I get the QSR. Well, it layers well with acoustic sounds from my XV-88, and I truly love a handful of sounds.

This unit came with two Q-cards. Eurodance and hiphop and there were another handful of sounds I really liked. Some of the grooves were very nice...definitely invoked a vibe of the genre.

A friend has had one for years, so I figure mine will last too.

Called them once about some ADAT's and they were knowledgeable and responsive.

I'd replace it if lost or stolen. I believe it was worth what I paid for it. Wish the Alpha Dial worked consistently. For a couple of bills you get 64 voice polyphony, a decent user interface, digital outs, two card slots (mine are filled as described above), a good variety of sounds, all in a single rack space. I guess a JV1080 would be the competition - since I already have an XV-88 I didn't look at the 1080.

BOTTOM LINE: Good bang for your buck.

decent presets, I'm a little surprised that their presets sound so much like the GM presets. Good piano though in my opionion. I did A/B comparison to the Roland competition and liked it better.

64 note polyphony. built in effects, two bays for PCMCIA cards. pretty feature packed

works well playing sequences from cakewalk which is about all I use it for.

I'm no midi guru by any stretch but use it with a midi drum mod, midi guitar preamp, and midi vocal harmonizer, all with a lap top using cakewalk and a couple of guitars. The trouble with midi is, if you live by the computer, you die by the computer.

good web page.

overall, I'm very pleased

It's a 1U module after all so you can't expect that much. Thus said though they done a reasonable job, putting a decent easy to read bright screen and a good if not all that accurate jog wheel to move about. I don't like the way it works as a 16 channel synth though. In the multichannel modes you are seriously limited by the effects and editing capabilities you have. Tried once to hook it to my PC but without much luck. The software is OLD and midi is SLOW! Also I have a ram card for it but never managed to put and sounds on it at all.

The effects once you manage to sort out their seemingly illogical behaviour are actually quite good. Def more of a multi-purpose synth rather than spectacular in any one area. Some nice Mix settings but mostly too bizarre/cheesy to use. The editing of sounds isn't that straight forward either with huge menu's to get through. About 5 different Envelopes... all overly complicated if you ask me!

Genrally great. The Piano's SUCK! Nothing compared with the latest Yamaha/Roland offerings. Very thin but then that's a lot down to the limited on board memory. If, like me your serious about a decent piano sound don't buy without a decent Kurzweil or whatever module to. The organs to are pretty poor, not in tone but in playability. Everything else is pretty sweet. The Pads and Drums deserve special mention! Genrally pretty sweet on the whole. That said though it's still a mid 90s GM sound module so what you get out is pretty out of date but for the bread and butter sounds! WICKED!

I gig regularly with it and very soon became burdened by trying to transport it on it's own. Ended up buying a 2U flight bad which is ok but heavy. It's taken a good beating still!
Been using mine for 4 years without any hassle until last week when it started playing up. The backlight stays on but otherwise the module is dead. Then suddenly it will start working fine again for a while and then go. Shame because its been brilliant for so long!

Emailed Alesis straight away and no response at all. I'm dreading the repair bill!

Overall a very honest no frills, hardworking module. A great starting point to build from. Does the bread and butter pretty well and would work very well if put alonside something more specialised like a Proteus etc.

Lots of people write reviews out here (and that's great) but one must read through the attitudes and assess the experience of the writer when weighing their opinions.

I'm a 15-yr old-style synth guy. Cut my teeth on MIDI when it was first implemented and still use controller boards (Oberheim MC-3000 & Roland A-70) and a rack of modules for my sounds.

I've been a daily user of two QSRs for over one year now. Each QSR has a QCard (Vintage Synths & Sanctuary) and a RAM card for holding the extra factory banks and extra user presets.

The QSR's interface is relatively intuitive in its physical operation, although as with all 1-space modules, there's so little real estate that you need good, strong deltoids to do lots of pushing and dialing to get where you want to go. The dial wheel tends to be imprecise but isn't a show-stopper. (The production process isn't rigid, I got both QSRs at the same time and their controls felt slightly different out of the box compared to each other.)

The MIX edit pages are concise and intelligently laid out. The ability to be very specific with what's being played on what MIDI channel, grouping multiple channels to respond to a single channel, and the ability to edit programs from within the MIX environment is very nice. The individual PROGRAM environment is weird - especially editing. Some of the settings aren't organized well, and a few, especially envelope "depth" settings vs. envelope "level" settings are redundant and act on each other. In other words, you can get the same envelope by reversing each of those two settings, but maximizing both of them creates no greater effect than maximizing one. Effects editing is powerful, but the visual real estate makes keeping the manual open necessary - very cryptic lettering on the display. Alesis is one of few who put manuals online in .pdf format - this is nice. The manual really isn't bad, but leaves out some very important things to a MIDI programmer - like what's the SYSEX string to switch to Program mode from Mix mode, or how to you call programs in a different bank in either mode.

The PC-based patch editor that comes-with is junk. Then again, most PC-based generic editors have programming errors and you're playing with your life if you let them talk to your box - you're likely to wipe out patches or cause internal errors in the QSR's software. The QSR accepts out-of-range parameters sometimes and displays them, but at least it doesn't choke or freeze when it does -- it just ignores them.

In summary - for a $500 street-value box I have been able to learn how to get around with the QSR and deal with its quirks.

64 note polyphony, 16-part multi-timbral. Good effects, but you are limited to five "configurations" or combinations of effects -- you can't customize how you drop in and combine effects outside of these 5 basic structures.

OK, here's where my major beefs come in: The cycle-time it takes to change sounds is quick enough in a live situation, but if you send a patch change simultaneously with other MIDI controller info like 10 (Pan) or 7 (Volume) the QSR doesn't buffer and then process that information - it just drops it. This requires you to get creative with your controlling devices and tie up presets (you only get 128 if you don't have a RAM card) on the QSR. I hate wasting a preset on a stock sound I like well enough just because I want it panned or leveled a little different from the factory setting.

Alesis is aware of the above problem, and also knows they have a problem with saving settings to RAM cards. If you save a Mix you're working on to a RAM card, and one or more of the programs in the mix is coming from a QCard or RAM card, it incorrectly stores the those programs one bank off. This means you must "fool" it by storing your programs, assigning them to your mix one bank off in the other direction, and then save - did you understand that? Yeah - very goofy. If you are using waveforms from QCards in a custom patch WATCH OUT when you're saving this stuff on RAM cards, it gets real squirrely. I've called Alesis Tech Support three separate times with problems related to cards, and each time a different guy said "We don't get many people doing what you are trying to do." As if to say, if you're a power user, well, we really just designed it to make sure a simple user had no problem. In my mind, if you advertise a capability and that's what the customer is paying for, it ought to work.

Now, to rebutt myself, for $500 you get a ton of sounds. As a straight-up module with thousands of sounds (when you add cards), this box is still a great value.

Alesis says the planned "life" of the QS series in the market is still another 1 1/2 years. I've asked them to consider a software release to fix the aforementioned bugs. They haven't ruled it out now that they got a buyer (the owner of Numark but its NOT Numark itself) to pick them up off of the floor, but I'm not counting on it.

I love reading the debate out here on quality of sounds between all of the major brands. One guy can sing praises while another curses a company to hell for the same sounds. The QSR produces very rich, very usable sounds. It struggles with the complex instrument types that the sound industry has always struggled with (horns, human voices, etc.) while making some valiant efforts, and excels at all the classic stuff like organs, synths, etc. The editing features are powerful enough for you to tweak all day on one voice and wonder when the sun went down - so you can get pretty close to whatever you're trying to achieve.

Be careful on the QCards. The Piano based QCards don't make a difference enough for the money. I found the Classical Qcard, while offering extra choices, didn't blow me away. Vintage Synths and Sanctuary offer enough new, unique waveforms to justify them (which is why I kept those). I'm not into dance and trance music, so I generally avoid those, but I understand the Qcards based on that style to be good enough if you're into that.

One year of hard, portable use and these QSRs have been very reliable. Once in a great while you get a stuck note or MIDI glitch - par for the course. Turn it off and back on - you're healthy again.

Alesis's website is pretty good for basic information. I usually don't wait long for a live person. They're office staff was gutted when it looked like they were going under and they had to let go of their sound designers and developers -- now they're trying to get them back. I know this because rather than lying or stonewalling, TS personnel has been willing to confess why they can't make you happy. (Alesis: if you're reading - honesty is a pretty good band-aid - don't stop doing that like too many business that already have.)

For the money, I would definitely replace. Shoot, for the money two has been GREAT b/c you get the same polyphony as a Roland XV-? and EMU Proteus 2000 and have the flexibility to stack without running out of voices.

Easy to use. Good manual. This is an extremely useable piece due to it's wide array of sounds. A little trippy to program but well worth it.

Built in effects are Alesis strongpoint. I have the vintage synth and the EuroDance Q cards and with those 2 cards loaded in there at the same time with the factory presets, you have a pretty wide range of sounds.

Has a decent Mellotron Strings but no Mellotron Choir! Can't figure out why they didn't put that in there.The QSR is best for mono leads and ambient washes and evolving sounds. Strictly use it for synth pads. Most other things, EP's, horns etc.. are crap. I have a whole studio full of all kinds of analog and digital gear and I find myself using this more than my Kurzweil K2500. Kurzweil is the most overrated cocky company around and their hardware is crap. Attitude wise they are like the keyboard version of Digidesign. Anyway, Spend some time programming and you'll come up with some really cool shit. That's when this thing comes alive. No bunches of knobs which kind of sucks but there are great waveforms in this box. So what it has no filters. If this is your only piece of kit you are so hating but if you have other shit with filters in it it is kind of nice this one doesn't just becuase it's different. I don't want a full plate of anything. Program it you preset using GM pussy.

Never had it shit on me. It's in my gig rack and I take it everywhere I gig. Watch out for the kind of loose and sloppy midi sockets on the back.

NAAWWW

There are a bunch of folks at Alesis that used to work at Oberheim and they helped make this thing. Need I say more? Better than any assembly line, porno soundtrack, no soul, steamy pile that Roland makes. Other than the JD-800,Roland was cool 1986 and earlier. If I had to choose a favorite 1U rack this would be it. A beauty way to go for 500 bones.

It was a toss up between Korg Trinity Rack, JV 1010 and QSR. The PCMCIA card thing swung it in favour. I tested out QS keyboards before, and thought they sounded great. Then after a while you play it, the rhodes don't seem that great (they're not bad but you yearn for something more). The piano's are ok - they are quite bright though. My opinion - my XG sounds better for drums and bass - the GM mode in the QS series sound weak. You need a patch editor as well full stop. Getting Soundbridge to work was an effort. The manual is so so but wasn't very helpful. Alot of sounds sound really good in performance mode but weak in multitimbral mode. Alesis can't be blamed for that really. They guy who sold it to me said it would be a Lionel Blair trying to get the samples across via Soundbridge and he was right. What a palaver! I have got it working now though. DO NOTE - YOU HAVE TO SWITCH BETWEEN MIDI/SERIAL PC all the time from the front panel - so if you are using e.g. Atari ST for midi and PC for editing - you have to keep going into the menus and moving from one to another - I was really suprised about having to do this and it is very frustrating. Why can't the QS tell which to switch to?
OOOH AND another important point - I bought this for live playing/burning Midi files on to the flash cards. I eventually got it all working - then guess what - you can't play back midi files and your keyboard at the same time. If I had of known this I wouldn't have bought it. Manual does not mention this at all. The QS6/7/8 is different I believe in that you can play piano whilst the Midi file is playing as well.

Built in effects are good - flanger and delay very flexible. But programming them on the front panel is horrendous - like typing out a computer game on a spectrum 48k. Don't even go there. You think JV1010's are bad for editing - try the QS rizzla screen. Most of these synths are the same though - can't expect a big display for #450
The PCMCIA card idea is good - but very fussy about which cards it will take. Transferring sounds can take time over the serial connection and isn't that reliable. Go make yourself a cup of tea whilst it is doing this ( or lunch maybe !) Soundbridge v3 is better but it is not a properly integrated windows program ( recently used files don't appear which is annoying). Would like to be able to load Soundfonts as well - that would be really useful. I haven't tested any of the other cards. I really wished they'd put a proper filter(s) in the unit - but that's why it cost me #450 - you can't have it all.
I was aware of the lack of filters before buying - but the effects make up for it IMOP.

Very subjective all this. You can get board of the EP's quickly. Organs are great. Synths ok but not that useable (filter thing again )Pianos are good enough for me - better than the XG pianos (you'd expect that though). Drums not great - rock drums sound a bit weak and the snare's suck - sorry Alesis!. How do I take down the sustain of one snare? Not easy to work out. Midi files play back more punchier( and lower quality) on my Yamaha xg module. Strings are good,nothing spesh. Reverbs are clean enough. Flexible q2 effects.

It has hung once or twice and I find it switches back to midi when in PC38.4k serial mode. Maybe it's just me?
It has been good on the whole. I'd use it at a gig - another chunky power supply though that looks like a custom Alesis power supply - points off for that Alesis!

They were quite good in helping me out. Considering I bought it second hand they were supportive which was kind of them. I have no gripes with Alesis on this front.

I have a few modules now - technox :( xg:) and the qs. Money was tight. I looked at jv1010's but the lure of samples/flash cards grabbed me. But teh QSR ain't easy to use. You need a computer full stop. Effects are great. I bought this so I could gig with it and play back midi files from the cards ( which I can ) - but you can't play over the top of the midi files ( why not Alesis when you can with the QS6? ). Wish I'd known that. I'm still using it now and determined to get my money out of it. If you were going to use this as a sophisticated drum machine it's great - but trying to map samples/instruments like pianos and stuff is still difficult. Let's face it people - #400 ain't alot for a module - but remember Yamaha samplers are #600 with filters/3 fx/polyphony. If I get my hands on the techno card maybe I might change my mind. If it were knicked no doubt I might go for a jv 1010. But then looking at reviews of that editing on the QS looks a breeze compared to the nightmares people are having with the JV1010's! I still use my Yamaha XG most for the funk/rock stuff - and the QS for the piano.

I hate tiny screens with submenus below submenus. All of these rack synths should have either a built in KVM setup or a computer host program. The data wheel feels flimsy. Fortunately there are several programs on the web for programming this from a computer. I can't imagine setting up drum patches without it. Soundbridge is what I bought this for however, to burn my own cards. hey Alesis, get an editing program out there.

Polyphonic power! Yeah, try setting it up on homemade patches without the shareware. It has two PCM slots for expansion which is why I bought it. I also got the Vintage synth card.

Piano is yucky, sounds like the cheesy Yamaha/Casio keyboards for kids. Haven't tried the QCard one. Didn't buy it for standard sounds, bought it as a sampler using Soundbridge. But I find the shriller sounds, including the piano, come into my Mackie board with high freq end splatter/hiss/fuzz. I doubt its my boards pre's. The sample rate looks to be 22.5K, BTW. The effects, as stated in the manual, are Midiverb II. Use outboard gear. the less internal circuitry this goes through the better. Building layers on factory patches starts adding the splatter into something that sounds to my ear like tape hiss. bleh. Too many synth patches also dissappear trailing a ratty pink noise hiss. I cut the tails and let outboard reverb ring them out.

hasn't died yet.

haven't been exposed

For less then $500 I get a sampler for playing with my own drum loops and oddities, and I can take wav based grooves out to play. I can assign each loop to a different key. I looked at an AKAI with less memeory for the same price that used diskettes for storing sounds, or you loaded from an added cost SCSI CD, and liked the Alesis better. Of course I would have liked the Triton, or the S5000 but I don't have the cash. I'd buy it used again as I have flash card investments now.

Not too difficult to use. The manual pointed out what everything is and what everything does. It requires some work editting sounds from the value knob and edit buttons, much easier from SoundDiver. I'm rather new to editing so I might not be the best to comment on it. What I did was compile a list of all parameters which was helpful. Although not easy to program, it can be done. Since it's not very easy nor is it very hard. i give ease of use a 5. right in the middle.

64 polyphony, 16 track multi-timbral. can be played in Program or Mix mode. Has one user bank (128 patches, 100 mixes) that can be edited. has a display to see menu option or program/mix number selected. Has an 8din connection for computer hook (you'll need a cable to connect to your pc). Midi in, out and thru. normal stereo outs plus two additional auxiliray outs plus headphone out. features are pretty good for this low-end synth.

Well, it sounded much better in the store coming out of stereo speakers than it did coming out of my Peavy KB/A 100 amp. I was not really impressed with the sound. It was just usable. The pianos to me were too bright and tinny. The flute sounded very excellent though. For the GM sounds, my Casio WK1800 sounded better. I was not impressed with the sounds. Although a few bass patches inspired me to write a few funky riffs, I'm not big into funk so how long was that gonna last for me? The horns weren't bad nor were the synthleads. They were all usable but the pianos .. well they hurt me when I played it almost to the point were I couldn't play anymore. It bothered me. I had double the piano's with my Casio's in order to get through it. I'm scoring Expressiveness/Sounds well ... a think a 6

Not really sure I could depend on it. every once in a while I'd get weird sounds just for a second or two. Several times I had to turn it off and on just to make sure it was re-initialized. I didn't have this unit long because I was not overall satisfied, so over the long haul I don't really know how it would hold up. But since I did have to re-init it a few times..... I'm giving it a 5 for relaibility.

Not good. I emailed them about 6 days ago.... still waiting!!!! There was a q-card give-away promo with the purchase of any QS seriers synth. And my salesman told me where to address my letter. I noticed this address was different from the address to where I was to send my registration card, so I called the 1800 number. The woman I spoke with had no clue about the address I was given. Then I told this to my salesman who was to call me back and 2 days later I still didn;t hear back.... So that was it. I brought the unit back for a full refund. lack of support from Alesis on this one. It was not good.

I took it back. Overall I was not satisfied. I was considering either the Roland JV1010 or the Alesis QSR. The jv1010 costing 400 the QSR, 500. The q-card give-away helped me to decide on the QSR, but since I never got the card and found the unit lacking in expressiveness, it went back. From another dealer I purchased the JV1010, took it home and it was much more expressive and 100 dollars less!

It's been easier changing a water pump on my SAAB then trying to get a decent sound out of this crap. About 18 great sounds. The rest are shite. Weak ooutput. Analogue bass sounds are powerful though. Got a Novation BassStation though,wow! goodbye.

Lots of Polyphony. But hey it crashes. MIDI in, output nothing, why?
Apparently it has like a Q2 or something reverb unit built in. If you can program this thing then you could rule the world. So many menu's and sub menu's. It still sounds crap

About 18 decent sounds.
Only buy it if you've got every other module in your studio and you are bored with money burning a hole in your pocket

My bowels are more regular than this crap. It crashes! I wouldn't mind but it's not cheap.

Out of Guarantee, I's only 18 months old. Like i sent the guarantee card of anyway, twats

I would not buy it again unless i was really rich and really bored.
That promotional CD they toss out for it sounds nothing like it.
Go for big sounds out of the box, don't piss about, you got song's to be written, you fanny's. As far as I'm concerned, if it don't sound great out of the box, then the manufacturer is a prick who should be beaten with his crap products.

Im using Cakewalk Pro Audio 9 with it for my sequencing needs. I had to go to alesis website and download the updated serial driver and soundbridge software before it would talk to the computer though. Editing patches is a little cumbersome, but thanks to the soundbridge, i just get new samples and burn em to a flash card, I've gotten used to it. The onboard presets are great for live applications, I especially like the piano patch on bank 2, .. the strings and pads leave a bit to be desired, I liked the warm pad general midi on my old casio better than on the QSR. The manual is typical of any alesis product, just enough to get you started, then you're on your own.

it has 64 voice polyphany which makes it better on that end than my k2000, but as far as effects.. its a bit of a drag, they get taken away quickly on only one channel. It will expand with the overpriced, and not too impressive "Q cards", the pcmcia ports being directly on the front of the unit. I use them for blank flash ram and store sequences/ patches on them. It supports great velocities and a lot of the presets take advantage of aftertouch. (i use it with a fatar studio 610 plus midi controller).

The strings are a tad too attacky.. the pads need some tweaking , but the organs are good, the piano is good, the brass is okay, and the synth1 bank always has something for me. It works great for my live applications, I play rock with a similar sound to faith no more, so it works well there. The onboard effects do not really impress me however.

I'm finding it to be a real brute for travel. I have been using it outside of a rack, just stacked on top of whatever I can sit it on.. it has fallen, I have ruined midi cables dropping it, but it still keeps a ticking. I do use it without a backup.

The one thing I will give Alesis is their tech support on their website is pretty decent, I got the updated versions of the QSR drivers easily and they installed quickly.

I would definately say my QSR is a keeper, the uniqueness of the sound in a live application and for studio use make it a little bit of an obscure choice. I'd put it right next to my K2000 in rank of importance to my distinct sound. I wish it was a little more easy to use, and that value wheel can get just a little touchy. The most annoying issue, however is patch changing on the same midi channel while sustaining a note. there is a small gap in the sound when the channel changes.. how annoying. BUT for a small little workhorse, it does the trick quite well.

O.K. Dealer...you got me. I'am very dissapointed with this unit. Not one Patch in this thing sounds warm. Pianos are so-so but those Effects... and don't try to edit them unless you have some Asprin. Those Effects sound like the old Quadraverbs. The EP'S in my Opinion Suck bad...Some even sound like a Clucking Banjo. The Leads are Kinda o.k. but not enough to make me want to keep this. All other sounds (in my Opinion) sound pretty lame. I would think a Module coming out of L.A. would at least kick some ass( The techno card I'd give a 6) But I will admit this... While writing a song I was looking for a Sitar..and the Qsr had the best one.

I'm using the software originally installed on to the unit. The presets sound okay, but a lot are too outer-space-like, and some, like strings, just suck. Editing patches is cumbersome, time-consuming, and often very confusing, as only ONE parameter is displayed at one instance. The manual reads like Greek unless you invented MIDI, and is very sketchy in some areas.

Polyphony is okay because you can limit the amount of sounds overlapping on one channel, so then you don't take up all your polyphony with one sound. The effects are cool [see below] but sometimes hard to use...Configurations are a pain in the butt. It can expand to 16MB more sounds with 2 VERY expensive QCards. Full MIDI capability, but no sequencer.

Well, drums are just OK. However, the program "DM5 Drums" sounds nothing like the sets in the actual DM5 module. As for the rest of the drums, some are okay, but their originality disappears when placed in Mix mode, where you have to choose ONE MIDI channel from which all programs in the mix get their effects. The electronic drum sounds are too "Casio"-sounding. There's like, two good snares on there in the electronic genre. The keyboards are pretty good, but some seem to "creamy" sounding, like too smooth. The strings just plain suck. I checked the raw samples in the unit, and there is only one string sound [ensemble, I mean] that is designed to sound real, and it has a very sharp attack and sounds fuzzy and harsh. NOT good for realistic string applications. Pads are pretty good, except there's a lot of dumb bird chirping and rainforest stuff in a lot of them, which...unless you're writing a jingle for Jack Hannah's Animal Adventures, won't always help, and sometimes will be a pain to get rid of. The rest of the pads are pretty "outer space" type. I don't really have an opinion on wind or brass.
The effects are pretty good, but the fact that you have to put them into Configurations is very time-consuming and difficult if you want to have a leslie on an organ but just reverb on every other program in a Mix. If you have an ADAT and can lay down each track one at a time, and just switch channels in the EFFECT: MIDI CHANNEL parameter, go for it. However, beware -- the effects processor distorts very easily. Velocity is okay, but my keyboard doesn't have aftertouch.

I've dropped it from 2 1/2 feet up in the air onto a carpeted floor and it still seems to work fine. On the other hand, I can also depend on it to piss me off when I can't get it to do what I want it to. I would use only the internal sounds in my little PSR-630 as backup, because even though those sounds aren't great, it's not worth it to me to actually bring along a backup that isn't already going with me to gigs.

Well, I haven't had to contact customer support yet, so I guess that's a plus. It has pretty much done what it's supposed to.

If it were lost or stolen, I think I'd buy something else, because I think the best sounds on the QSR are the sounds that aren't really the foundation for a good song. The pads are okay, and SOME of the drum sounds are pretty good, but strings suck, drums are unimaginative, no cool filter noises or vinyl noise, and white noise is a sample, not pink noise. I tried to find pink noise to create a filter sweep, but all I got was white noise and instead of changing tone, it just got quieter. I really didn't compare it with any other products; it was my first module. I chose it because it was cheap. I wish it had better raw sounds on it and better filters. It doesn't really help or hurt me at this point, I've had it close to a year and haven't done much with it besides ARRANGE two songs for my church, that, by the way, I had a hard time creating.

Good presets. Sounds great out of the box. I find editing patches easy, and the manual is good, although some items (like connection to computer and use of expansion cards) was REAL WEAK.

Polyphony with 64 voices. No keyboard as this is a synth module. Effects are built in and easy to edit. It does accept cards and more memory. It is fully MIDI capable. No sequencer.

Most of the instruments are quite realistic, although some are awful. Harmonica sucks. I imagine it would work well for all music, and I use it for rock and it fits my needs. Effects are good. Since it's a module, it's fairly static, although you could set it up to be reactive. It reacts to my controller well, both velocity sensitivity and aftertouch.

Dependable, use it without a backup.

Somewhat hard to get a hold of. Answered some questions, not others.

I would probably replace the unit as it's so versatile, and I don't think you can find anything as functional for the money. Been playing for 30 years, but keyboards only 2. Use it with pedalboards (like Rush), for which it works well. Compared it to other synth modules, this one best value.

If you are in to programming your own sounds, you will both love and hate this machine. It has programming options galore, but it's screen gives too few options available at anyone time. Lots of page scrolling, which is OK if you know exactly what you want to enter, but not good for creativity. You MUST have a computer and editing software (included with the QSR) if you want to do any programming. Otherwise, the QSR is easy to use in a MIDI setup.

TONS of features. The polyphony is great. The effects are incredible for such an inexpensive synth, but I must admit, programming them seems daunting. Still, it's fun to try a sound with random pre-programmed effects for sometimes interesting results. The expansion capabilies are a big bonus, you can load 16MB of new waveforms via the 2 PCMCIA slots. With the included software, you can even download different waveforms from the web in a number of different formats and burn them to a PCMCIA card. I haven't tried this yet, but it seems fun. Of course, you have to program your own sounds to use these waveforms, but I bet using them with some of the pre-programmed sounds would be OK. In MIX mode, the QSR works well with an external sequencer, and setting it up to do so is easy. The one thing Alesis did leave out, and I wish they hadn't, is four controller nobs to control sounds in real time. Many of the sounds in the QSR are programmed to respond to MIDI controllers A-D, but if you do not have a keyboard with 4 contollers (besides the usual mod wheel and pedal), and most peole don't, you can not utilize this bit of programming. This is too bad since some of the effects possible when using the 4 controllers are quite astounding (especially on the organs and sci-fi sounds). If you have the money, buy a QS6.1 instead for this feature alone! (the QS6.1 is the keyboard version and has 4 mod sliders). Also nice is the MAC/PC interface. This makes programming simpler since youdon't have to go through MIDI. The QSR has the most features in a synth for the money that I've ever seen.

In general, the synth sounds great. It's sounds are crips and punchy and cut through a mix. This synth is great for rock, pop, r&b, country, experimental, ambient. It is decent for techno/hip hop and the like. If you are more inclined to play orchestral pieces, DO NOT BUY THIS SYNTH!!! Clearly, this synth was not made to do this. The strings are particularly laughable. Seriously, I was shocked at how poor some of them sounded. The FAKE string sounds are good though (pads and the like), but when it tries to emulate a string, the QSR fails. The horns are better, and a few of them do well, especially in a mix. Again, the FAKE horn sounds are better. The woodwinds are OK I guess, but no synth has really impressed me in this categegory. Personally, I think synthesizers should sound like synthesizers, so I love the way the QSR sounds. The piano is real enough sounding to me, more so than most synths I've played and the organs are ASTOUNDING! I don't even like organs very much, but I find myself playing the organ sounds for hours at a time. The drums are decent, could be better. For experimental music, the drums used with some kind of weird effect sound pretty cool. MIX mode allows you to layer or split up to 16 different patches (each with up to 4 sounds) and is an extremely powerful function. Some of the mixes on the QSR are terrific and inspiring or just plain fun. At first, I really liked some of the groove loops, but these get old fast.

I have only had the QSR for a few days ( and have been playing it constantly) so I don't know about its reliability. However, the fell of the main data entry wheel seems cheap and flimsy. I would not be surprised if it gave out eventually. Maybe I'm wrong though.

I'm not sure about this one. I have some other Alesis equipment, and about a year ago, I emailed their website with some questions. I got a good response in about two days which I thought was excellent. However, before buying my QSR, I emailed alesis and still have not received a response in over two weeks. Maybe they ignored me because I didn't actually OWN a QSR, I don't know. More recently, my QSR was supposed to have a CD-ROM included but didn't, so I called alesis, got through immediately and they said they would ship it the next day. So, I think they've done a good job, but it seems like they are pretty busy these days and I have yet to really test them!

The QSR is definitely worth what I paid for it. I already have an Alesis S4 and I liked the way it sounded, so I looked into the QSR. I played the QS6.1 (its keyboard equivilent) for several hours on multiple days before buying the QSR, so I knew what I was getting into. Like any synth, the buyer needs to really question what they are going to use the synth for. If you are looking for realistic orchestral intruments, steer clear of the QSR. If you are a piano player and want a portable piano synth, PLAY the QSR first for several hours if possible using good speakers or headphones!!! Synth players who like electronic music and do not stress realistic orchestral instruments will love this synth. It souds clear, crisp, loud, and bright. I don't think there is any synth on the market for under $500 that matches the QSR. I'm sure there are better ones out there, but for double the price. To be honest, if I had lots of money, I probably would have bought something else, but like most people, I'm on a budget and the gear I buy needs to reflect that. This is a terrific synth for the money. If you like the way it sounds, have an extra $250 and some space, you might consider getting a QS6.1 instead. The keyboard and 4 midi controllers are probably worth it.

The QSR that I purchased had whatever the latest software was at the time that I received in 2/99. It was not very difficult to program or edit and the manual was pretty good. It also has a nice size screen.

It has plenty of voices and polyphony and it's effects are fair. I did not try editing them because I sent it back. The unit does have room to grow, but I didn't care for the sounds at all.

The sounds on this module are terrible. It sounds very cheap. They are bland and uninspiring. It is no wonder the price has come down like it has. I feel sorry for those folks who bought it when it first came out.

Alesis makes well made products, I imagine this unit would be as reliable as the rest.

Didn't keep it.

I would not have bought it in the first place had I heard it first. This module is for entry level musicians who have extremely limited funds. For those folks making serious music and doing production work, do not even consider this unit. Save more money and get a Trinity rack. The sounds on the QSR are for beginners only.

This is a strange beast. I found it very awkward to manuver thru its parameters. I like to tweak sounds while I'm inspired, but this interface seems to hinder that spontunaity. I also felt the manual could have been put together far more clearer then it was.

The amount and distribution of 64 voice polyphony was impressive. In the multi-timbral mode, I was able to create lush and massive sounding sequences with this unit alone.
The built in effects seem to fall in line and audio wise, sound very much like the Alesis FX units. These effects are used to mold the sounds of many of the internal patches that come with this unit.

How are the sounds? The ever so-hyped Stereo Grand Piano (True Piano patch ) is adequet in a mix, but falls short of its claim. I personally prefer the Kurzweil Micropiano to this one. The electric pianos are usefull ( I especially like Rayz Roadz for that 70's suitcase effect ) in the mid and lower octaves, however; the higher octaves render these patches useless.
The organs sound great. Here is where the internal effects shine to add realism and bite to the Hammond sounds. The keyboard sounds ( Harpsicord, Vibes, Clavinet, ect ) are also very pristine and useful as long as you don't play in the very upper registers.
I'm used to using sampled guitar sounds, so I found the guitar patches in the QSR lacking in realism. There is a nice variety of bass sounds and patches. The pad sounds are lush and well programmed and the analogish Emersarian lead synth patches are fun. The percussion and drum sounds are a nice addition.
The winds and brass patches are fair at best, however; the Flugelhorn patch is very good around the middle octave and if played correctly, can be very realistic.
Probably the biggest dissapointment with the QSR's sounds, lie in the Orchestral strings and ensemble patches. These sounds are terrible, unrealistic, and completely useless. What were they thinking when they approached sampling and creating these patches?!

So far, I've had no problems with this unit.

If it were lost, I'd probably check out some new units. But would definatley still have the QSR as a consideration. Compared with the Korg, Kurzweil, and Roland products , I don't feel that the Alesis meets or comes close to their standards. But I own alot of synth's and modules that are manufactured by Roland, Korg and Kurzweil and I find that the QSR is a nice compliment and has enough sonic power to add to the sounds of this arsenal.

I had no trouble adding this box to my midi studio. I use it mainly in multitimbral mode, and it's very straightforward. I'm more of a tweaker than a programmer. It's very easy to put together instrument mixes, which is the main thing for me.

I don't expect to use many of the features this machine has. It's certainly got everything I need.

I should explain that I bought this machine for its sampled grand piano, which I think sounds better than the Kurzweil and Roland (I appreciate that's very subjective). Any other usable sounds are an unexpected bonus. The organs are a very pleasant surprise, as are the drums. The ochestral sounds, particularly the strings, are disappointing. The electric pianos are a mixed bag. I was surprised to discover that my old Korg M3R (rackmount version of the M1) does better Rhodes and Whirly emulations.

This box feels less solid than my other modules (Korg M3R and Wavestation SR). It's only 4" deep, so it doesn't look like a serious piece of gear. There are annoying pops when you power up or down, and the program changes aren't entirely clean (i.e. some of the sonic characteristics of a program carry over to the next program for the first note or two). Having said all that, I bought my QSR second hand. It's two years old and seems to work perfectly.

N/A

If it were lost or stolen, I would buy it again provided I could get as good a price.

Pretty easy to use. Manual is well written and in plain english. Interface can be a pain sometimes for there's a lot of scrolling involved. I get the feeling that they did this to reduce the amount of buttons on the unit. Oh well, what can you expect from 1U.

Holy features batman! Check the website for full list. The PCMCIA ROM cards are a great idea but they'll have to figure something else out for 8MB isn't a heck of a lot nowadays.
I would have loved an extra set of outs (6 instead of 4) though.

Very pristine sounding output but the patches are not realistic sounding and most of them do not respond to aftertouch. You could add your own samples via PCMCIA however but I cant be bothered.
Because of this I would say this unit is for mostly dance and techno (although this unit is really lacking for filters). Don't even think about using this unit for orchestral pieces. You could get the Orchestral expansion Q card but from after hearing the demos on their demo CD rom I wouldn't waste your money. Pianos are great though.

Seems sturdy enough to me.

I usually received replies via email within 2 days.

It mostly collects dust in my rack. I mainly use it for stereo piano sounds or ambient FX. If I wrote dance/ techno stuff I would probably use it more. Not a big selection of sounds unfortunately. I could add more but you're really limited by the 8MB celing on those PCMCIA cards (btw, does anyone know how to use them????).

Not too bad for the features it has. It starts to become more involved when you get into editing your own mixes and patches. If you read the manual carefully, it will become clearer. The only complaint I have with the manual is it doesn't explain the concept of flash RAM cards very well - I really had to hunt down the info I needed. There aren't as many buttons to use compared to the QS6.1 for exapmle, but it is only 1U rack space.
I would strongly recommend a patch editor.

PCMCIA cards for your own samples and sequences, two pairs of outs, optical - what more could you ask for?

Here's the thing. I've always found QS's to be too "sampled" and unrealistic sounding. The samples are delightfully crisp and clean, but not very inspiring. I found this synth to be better for techno sounds than natural sounds. I wasn't overly impressed with the Q cards either. I guess it tried to be everything to everyone and thus doesn't do one thing very well.

Seemed to be pretty sturdy. Never locked up on me but I don't think I used it long enough to find out.

Alesis customer support is great. They're kind, helpful, and reasonably prompt.

It's a great synth for the money but I just wasn't happy with the patches - not very expressive and inspiring. I could have added my own samples of my liking but that's too much farting around for me. I'd rather be composing than adding and editing patches and samples.
It is for this reason I went to a Roland XP30. It was exactly what I was looking for.

Ok well I better start by warning that I don't often give 10's unlike most reviewers (how could a synth be perfect?) so bear that in mind.... The QSR is pretty easy to use...it's only got one knob so anyone who buys it should know what to expect. The menus are pretty logical, though and editing is pretty straightforward with a nice big LCD. It'll be a while before you need to edit anyway, cos there are 600 presets to get thru.... Manual bad at all.

16 channels 64 voices you get a lot for your money plus the option of the Q-cards, this box could be the main work-horse for your studio...but be aware that very few of the sounds are quite as good in multi as when playing them solo (effects?). Still, a very impressive synth for the money

This is where some thought is needed before you buy. Alesis seem to have gone the Roland way and saved many of their best sounds for the expansion cards. Don't get me wrong there are some great sounds here...... most of the acoustic sounds are really good, it's maybe worth getting for the piano and steel guitars alone. But to make it the all-round killer it could be, you should budget for at least one card. Anyone hoping to make techno straight from the box will be disappointed, the "wierd noises" category is a bit lacking in "wierd". I've heard very good things about the Eurodance card......check them out before you get any QS, or you'll need to spend long hours editing your own patches. With this in mind, it's not QUITE as good value as it seems but it's no dog either.

it works ok so far

Two e-mails to the company were unanswered...why is this ? Common courtesy should demand some sort of reply. Now that some companies (Novation etc) have interactive help forums, this isn't good enough I'm afraid.

It's worth what I paid because it fits perfectly in with my other synths (Audity/Super Bass Station/CS1x...all pretty budget stuff) and I don't need to ask it to make squeaky bleeps. However if this is gonna be your only synth you better budget for the card of your choice. I should mention that for those with a PC, you can equip the QS series with Flash Ram cards capable of loading Audio samples from computer, turning the synth into a sampler. I haven't tried it yet, but it may add a definite advantage to the QSR when you weigh up the competition.

Well the QSR's Ease of use can be roughly divided in two parts: the selection and use of preset sounds and the editing. I play keyboards since I was 14 and have recently bought this awesome expander. Initially I was only interested in improving my tecnique and learning songs, so I mainly used about a third of the potentialities of QSR. Using single programs or mixes is very simple, intuitive and fast. Recently I started editing and making new sounds and entered the second part I was taking previously. Editing and creating it's obviously harder, but I had to learn the basics of sound generation and it's sure they have to be learned anyway, indipendently from the expander you use. Many are the editing parameters, so you can do almost everything. The manual is well done, there's everything to answer your questions and explain. All the parameters are divided in sections which contains more sub-sections so editing becomes fast and intuitive.

Having no keyboard, the QSR is fully centered in making sounds perfect, and so it does. 64 notes polyphony, lots of effects mixed in four "effects send". Each program (a piano for example) is made of four samples mixed with lots of parameters. Programs and mixes are grouped in variuos sections (pianos, chromatics, choirs, guitars, basses and many others) underling the rational disposition in QSR. Perfectly compatible with MIDI (I use the QSR with a computer to compose music) and fully expandable: You can buy expansion PCMCIA cards (divided in sections such as vintage, disco, organs, old synths, ethnical etc....) or you can buy an empty PCMCIA card and put in programs encoded with Alesis software (also the utilities that come in the CD with QSR are well done). This means you can record a laugh, a noise, a note of a guitar and make from it a program. GREAT! If you experience problems, the manual is ready to be consulted and solve them.

The QSR can handle the aftertouch, velocity, modulation, pitch and many other real-time modifications. You can select which action a controller does, so you can modify in real time almost any voice or effect parameter. Initially, I bought QSR because of it's wonderful sounds. I needed an expander with no tons of strange and never heard sounds, but with realistic pianos, guitars, electric guitars, basses etc. By using it, I found it's great for everything. Great pianos, organs, harpsi, clavi, guitars, basses, brass, winds, choirs, drums, and many others. I also found that there were many synth sounds and dance sounds. It's great for everything, it's capabilities cover all the range of musical expressions. Having more than 600 sounds and 400 mixes, I bought it an year ago and I still used only a forth of them.

There's not much to say. The QSR is sure and reliable platform. If you want to make backups you can save on PCMCIA cards or on SYSEX files. Nothing to say, it's perfect and safe.

I never experienced the need to call Alesis for anything I could ask. Therefore, Alesis has an internet site at: www.alesis.com. There you can find upgrades, patches, docs, and everything about their products and other musical happenings. After having bought the QSR I phoned to Alesis to ask about their expansion cards and I found them extremely kind.

It's great, only an example to note this. I like metal and recently bought one the last of Stratovarius' albums. I listened to the sound the keyboard player uses and found it great. I searched that sound in QSR Synths section but, also if the preset synths were great there was noone perfectly equal. So I edited one of the similar sounds and now I have it, perfectly the same of that one of Stratovarius' keyboard player. I don't have a great experience in sound editing and creation but I succeded, beacuse QSR's potentialities made this possible.

Easiest if you own a computer, but only as reliable as your computer. On the other hand if you have a good knowledge of synths, and you don't mind flipping through menus, programming without a computer is very simple. The manual is readable but not very to the point, they probably could have expanded in some areas and make it flow a little bit smoother.

64 voice polyphony, up to 4 layers per patch. 4 effects buses (limited to 5 configurations) two PCMCIA slots - you can buy Alesis QCards which add an additional 8 megs of sounds per card to the QSR, which already has 16 megs, plus you can get a Flash ROM card which lets you store samples, Std. MIDI files, and additional patches and mixes. The QSR has 4 assinable outputs, ADAT optical output, MIDI in/out/thru, built-in computer serial interface for fast transfer between computer and QSR, and a 48kHz sample clock input. The QSR also comes with a CD-ROM loaded with demos and a few registered version programs, like Sound Bridge which lets you transfer samples and SMF's to a blank card. and it comes with Cubasis.

The sounds on it are excellent, they would work well for any type of music, I write a lot of dance and ambient music, and I have not even finished playing with all of the preset sounds. The sounds are very full and unique because of the use of four layers. The effects are very distinct, I think they sound great, although they are very basic effects, reverb, delay, flange, chorus, overdrive. And they are already preset to five differnt configurations, you can edit every parameter, but you only have 5 configurations. The QSR does however, have a non-resonant filter, a resonant filter would be greatly useful for techno/dance music. Each preset does have 4 assignable controllers and they can be programmed to numerous parameters. The effects parameters can also be assigned to the knobs.

So far it has been very reliable, most of the problems that I have had with it have only been caused because of my computer (unreliable). The QSR has two play modes, program mode and mix mode, in mix mode you can arrange programs over 16 MIDI channels and set the effects mix as well, this feature is very nice because you don't have to worry about setting up your synth to play a sequence, every time you want to play it.

I got my QSR with the free FlashROM card/serial cable promotion, it said that it would take 6-8 weeks for delivery, but it only took about 2 weeks. Their web page is very helpful, you can download the manuals from it for free. I did that before I bought mine, and it was nice to be able to go to the store and play with it before I bought it.

The QSR is an excellent sounding synth, and for the price it is more than worth it. The QSR comes with more features than any other synth I've seen for it's price, and even for more expensive synths. A resonant filter would have made it ten times better. I would still buy it again just because it is an exceptional deal.

For: Incredible sounds and effects; the included CD-ROM is packed with useful software for Mac or PC; straight ahead manual; actually easier to navigate than the QS8 because of the display; connections a-go-go.
Against: Change a patch, get distortion (some of it rather interesting, though); manual could use an index.

Module: Single-space ROM: 16 megs (expandable to 32) programs: 640 (128 user-defined) mixes: 500 (multitimbral; 100 user-defined) Poly: 64 note Effects: 4 effects bus (reverb, chorus, distortion, delay, EQ, rotary speaker) Outputs: MIDI In/Out/Thru; 2 Stereo Outs; digital in/out; serial port Slots: 2 (for PCMCIA-format cards, QCards) Extras: CD-ROM with Mac & PC editors, patches, demos

I'd say the QSR has rock and pop in its soul. The acoustic sounds (winds, brass, etc.) or fine, but they don't shine like the Top 40 selections. Excellent organ simluations (a match for Voce) are in this machine with a Leslie that is darned impressive in its speeds. Guitars are another highlight, expecially using the control wheels (and of course, you have to try and play like a guitarist). Synth pads and leads are hot, too. Finally, there's the vectorish patches, especially the drum-patterns, which are fun to jam over. The drum sounds? What can I say, they're from the Alesis drum machine. And the effects, especially distortion, are splendid.

To early to tell, but I've yet to have serious trouble with any module I've ever owned or borrowed.

I've only used E-Mail for customer support, but my mail was answered promptly. I also got good response from the dealer, Kraft music, which I'd put up there with SweetWater.

For price, features, and general WOW, this is a worthy machine (and yes, there's GM if you must have it). The big effects glitches when switching programs can probably be worked around by creating a special mix if you plan to use the QSR live. For MIDI mavens, the multitimbral mixes are easy to set-up (especially using the Unisyn Mac software) are wonderful since you can maintain the same effects used in the original programs. Spif. I can't wait to use a PCMCIA card and the included software to turn this into a cost-effective sampler!
I'd buy it again.