E-MU E-Synth

Having never used a hardware sampler before, I was both nervous and looking forward to using the E-Synth. Having heard good reports about the e-Mu sound library, I was looking forward to some killer sounds at my fingertips.... on neither of these issues was I the remotest bit disappointed! The sampler, presets and sequencer are easier to start experimenting with than your average kitchen appliance, yet there is enough depth and sheer power in this machine to keep the most hardened gear-head happy.

The basic unit comes with 64 note polyphony, with 64 complex filters of widely varying types (20+, including Morpheus-style Z-plane filters) a 76-note keyboard (which has excellent action despite not being piano-weighted),a large, backlit LCD screen, 2 powerful effects units with the requisite reverbs, delays, phasers, distortions etc (excellent quality of course), a powerful 48-track sequencer, 8 analogue outputs and a SP/DIF digital input/output. It's all extremely logical in operation and the entire keyboard is based around E-Mu's latest EOS 3 operating system, which is also used by the entire EIV range of samplers. If you grow out of the unit's basic capabilities, you can be safe in the knowledge that it can grow with you - up to 128MB or sample RAM, an extra 16 MIDI channels, another 64 voices, ROM upgrades, hard drive kits.... did I mention that it reads all the major sample formats (EOS, AKAI, Roland) without any fuss?

The "E-Mu Team" must have been trawling their archives for a good few months to select 255 pristine sounds to whet your appetite. 16MB of ROM is supplied as standard, and the standard is excellent! Punchy acoustic and grand pianos, succulent string/orchestral sections, a generous number of drum kits, the usual complement of organs, tubas, shamakamanototos and xylophones and the sheer programability of the whole lot means that there is a great deal to get out of the presets--- this is before even considering the sampling capabilities of this machine, which are among the most powerful available anywhere! Basically, the expressiveness of this keyboard is limited only by the person who is playing it. The E-Synth is as close as I have seen to a complete music production facility in one box.

Over the few months I have used the E-Synth, I have had few problems with it - by its nature it holds the majority of its information in a removable storage medium (I use a ZIP drive and find it excellent). It's a great machine for gigging, as up to 50 sequences can be held in memory at a time. The sequencer is as reliable as I have seen on any workstation, and I would have no qualms about using the keyboard as the centrepiece to a 'live' setup - although at 16kg it is also one of the heaviest synths I've ever used.

E-Mu have a good website and a customer helpline which I have personally never had to use! However, I have heard good reports about the tech support from fellow E-Mu users.

A few words to describe the E-Synth : Excellent, Powerful, Rugged, Superlative sound quality, Expandable, Very easy to use... one or two minor niggles aside, this machine is the business. The only things I wished it had are the things I can't afford to upgrade it to... yet!! Don't be put off by the price tag, as you will be getting the best Synth/Sampler combination around, with more features per kilo than anything I have played... and this is one HEAVY machine!