E-MU Proteus 1

This module is pretty easy to use. The only reason I leveled it with a 7 is because the patches beyond 127 have to be re-routed to a lowe patch in order to be accessible from a MIDI sequencer. With a little practive the cursor button and stepped dial knob make navigation of all the modules features a breeze.

With a 32 note base polyphony this synth was hug for its day. No effects are built in, but that's why there are external effects. It does however feature 6 quarter inch jacks which believe it or not can be reconfigured as inouts OR outputs. This way you can send to an effects unit and get the return directly from the proteus without using a mixer. I thought that was a pretty darn cool feature.

The factory presets are wonderful. I love the strings and choir sounds this thing can generate. They are truly amazing. I use it a lot for composing new age music and many of the wonderful sounds fit nicely to the genre. All in all it doesn't have the edge to be a primary sound module, but it is superb for backing with strings, pads, choirs, and many other great samples.

Its hard plastic case is a little cheap compared to the metal cases most other modules are enclosed in, but I think it can take just as much of a beating as any other module before something will break, most likely inside. Mine did stop working at one time. Unwilling to give it up I opened the unit and looked around inside. I determined that the problem was with the power supply board. The unit actually has 2 seperate boards inside, one is the mother board, the other the power supply board. I realized the power supply board supplies +12v +5v -5v Grnd to the motherboard, the same power an old ATX style computer power supply uses. I cracked on open, moded it a little to fit inside the proteus case, and was back up and running within a day.

Never used 'em

I give it an over-all 7. It would never stand alone, but makes a great support module. If I were to lose it again I probably would not replace it, but rather look for something with better samples.

The presets sound awful. Editing is not hard with a patch editor. The manual is very good.

The original Proteus 1 was expanded. Midi implementation is ok.

The instruments are basically dreadful. They sound worse than what you could get on a kid's toy synth nowadays. There is absolutely nothing here you can't get better on just about anything else.

Reliable but tends to run a bit hot. Never had a problem.

They suck at support for later products, never mind this one.

I was glad to sell it awhile back, though not for much. Not worth more than $100, and is basically useless in today's world. Probably the worst sounding synth I ever owned, although tied with the Proteus 2 there, which was just as bad.

Simple, just dial and away you go.
The Presets are Superb, Dont listen to other reviews,(probably written by Button Pushing WA***RS who expect every preset to be a sound effect.
The Proteus is chock full of stunning samples and although there is not a great deal of editing facilities......Who cares?....The reason this machine kicks ass is that every preset does exactly what it says on the tin.

If You use this beast as your main sound generator you will run out of polyphony very fast,
No built in effects, unless you count chorus. (In the old days this was called de-tuning occilator 2.
Midi response is excelent and keyboard response can be tailored to whatever keyboard you are using.

Instruments are very realistic, and if you use this machine for what it was intended you could not fault it.

The plastic case was crap, but it has never buggered up in 14yrs of gigging

Never needed them.

Proteus 1 is like a DX7, they wont paint the full picture but they dont half supply some of the best colours.

Easy, easy, easy. Prests are bloody awful and editing doesn't help that much.

See Below.

Lots of sounds, sound like crap, effects are weak.

LCD busted, scratch contacts on output, external case cheap and plasticy. I wouldn't gig with this because of the sounds.

Never needed

Bought it unheard, unloaded it a month later at 100% profit, can't complain there but it really sounds like a cheap, nasty old rompler which just won't cut the musard these days. Don't buy.

lo tengo que escribir en espa?ol, o no puedo expresaar lo que voy a decir en ingles, lo se muy poco y prefiero expllicarlo en mi idioma.
Solo una simple perilla, acceso rapido a los menus, me lo dieron sin manual con unas cuantas cosas mas que he comprado para montar mi peque?o estudio de grabacion.
Me lo dieron casi regalado, porque venia con un monton de cosas.
facil de usar con un controlador, y nada muy facil

la falla que tiene es por la polifonia, yo solo conectaba las dos salidas en estereo, y se cortaba mucho.
alguna vez he editado u n preset, los chorus suenan un tanto tyny, pero me gusta, muy pocos parametros para con e l modulo

Para los a?os 89, era el maestro de todos los modulos.
no me gusta el piano, los violines o strsings son mu reales, muy dificil encontrar sonidos analogos, muy buenas guitarras, el bajo standart sonaba como un bajo de los 60 muy a pick bass, los brass falls son exelentes y verdaderos, para que mas decir sobre este modulo, una exelente eleccion en 1989, a pesar de haberlo comprado en Panama en 1997

Tengo problemas con la perilla de datos, y hay veces en que no prende bien, la pantalla suele ponerse oscura

e-mu nos ha regalado un exelente modulo que ya forma parte de la historia musical del mundo entero.
si me lo roban, tal vez no lo compre otra vez, puesto que no lo necesito.
he comprado unos soundfonts que se llaman modulo mania, y ahi en uno de los cds viene mi recordado proteus 1, qeu lo utilizo muy a menudo en arrangemes y live stages.

First, sorry for my poor english.
I buyed the proteus 1 in Panama in 1997 in conjuction with others accesorys for make my first studio work station: A Taskam 8 track recorder, a Samik mixer, 4 speackers, Yamaha amplifier, 2 yamaha fx proceser, Alesis mmt8, and the Proteus, only for $500!. I cant have problmes with this module, verry useful!. about the poliphony, is sux!, works wel with my old mmt8 sequencer and tel now with my Cake welk pro audio demo

Exelent quality of sound in only 3 mb wave memory!, the pianos is good, the acoostic guitars is good, basses is for my taste old samples of the 60 bass, realistic strings, and i like the brasses and section falls!

Oh, sadly my proteus is invallided no works any more

about the technical suppor is a pain, dya cant repare my proteus

My proteus now is in the garage with old thinks, but i purchace the Modulo mania colection in soundfont format, and use my Virtual rpoteus 1 as a soundfont.
using my reality software synth

Piece of cake. No problems. Very easy to use this puppy.

Great features. Lots of cool varieties of parameters to work with. Good MIDI functions. I would like the case to be metal but thats about my only gripe.

Well, I got the Proteus 1 with Protologic chip installed and that adds another 128 sounds so Im kinda in love with this unit. It has so many good generic sounds to work with--320 of em and I am very pleased. I can always find something I need in there. This unit get lots of use.

Not a problem so far. Seems to be built solid. And it works 100% of the time. no crashes!!

Emu is one of the best companies out there. Very friendly and nice to customers--even if you own older gear like me. :-)

I will have to give this a 10 since it has never given me any trouble. And with the Protologic chip installed, I have soooooo many cool extra sounds to work with. It was really worth the $ I paid. I would have paid more. This is a keeper. Get one with the Protologic chip if you can find it. Its worth a little extra searching. You might pay a bit more, but definately is worth it IMHO.

Easy to use, but with some, although sometimes wading through menus with the data knob gets a bit tedious. There aren't a whole lot of controls to work with, although you can do some cool things with crossfade, etc. Be aware that modifying the envelops for some samples will not do what you expect it to do...you can't (for example) expect to add sustain to a short bass pop sample simply by increasing the sustain levelof the envelope. Using a PC based editor/librarian is a definite plus.

You get what you pay for...when I first bought it, the polyphony and realistic (sort of) instruments were a godsend. Now, as I am layering more and more sounds, I find myself running out of polyphony (especially if you are relying on this module for percussion). The MIDI implementation is sound, and the ability to link another unit to it (which will receive MIDI overflow) is a decent solution to running out of polyphony.

When I first got it I thought it was great. Now...the sounds just don't cut it. The pads and strings are flat and thin...there is nothing behind them. I get better drum sounds out of my Yamaha RX-8 than the Proteus. It's great if you are you want OK replications of classical instruments, but not for anything rich and expansive. On-board effects would be great, but even outboard effects don't add much to the sounds. There are some things you can do to make it more expressive. Routing LFOs to different parameters makes playing more expressive, but it's sometimes difficult to gauge what you need to change to create the effect that you want.

Great little box, so far. Had this one about 8 years, and no problems so far. The front pannel is plastic, which worried me at first, but so far no problems.

It's a shame that companies tend to ignore older models. There is no longer any info on the company's web site, but there is plenty through user groups, etc on the web.

The ultimate use for this box would be for TV jingles. The sounds are just enough to get by (in simulating real instruments). As long as you don't overtask it (too many sounds, to many layers, etc), it performs reasonably. If you're looking for great sounds for the 90's, though, skip it and go with the ALESIS QSR (twice the polyphony, much better sounds, on board effects and the ability to load your own samples).
I am reminded of another little box in the 80s that was used for sequencing extensively, the Roland MT-32. Not much in the way of sounds, but enough to get you by and it was cheap.

The Proteus/1 is a very simple module to use. It is really a plug and play machine. The layout is fairly intuitive, and although having to deal with the single data-entry knob can be a chore, it's something one can learn to live with.

The Proteus/1 has 32 oscillators, but each patch can have up to eight oscillators assigned to it (by using patch links), which can severely limit its usefulness as a multitimbral sound source if all you use is thick, densely layered sounds. Using single or dual oscillators, you can achieve decent orchestrations. There are no on-board effects:(, but if its used in conjunction with other effect-equipped synths, you don't notice it much. Also, no filters make it less versatile.

The piano sound just flat stinks. Strings are decent, with plenty of bottom end. The looped-cycle waves are fairly useful if you under- stand how harmonic structuring works, but other than that, trying to create a useful sound with them is really a shot-in-the-dark propostition. On its own, the Proteus doesn't fare well, mainly because of its lack of effects, but integrated with other instruments, it can be deadly:).

I have owned mine for eight years, and never have had a problem. Extremely reliable, set-it-and-forget-it module.

Never had to deal with E-MU. See above.

I really think my Proteus/1 works well in my MIDI setup, but if I ever had to replace it, dollar for dollar, I'd probably get a module that has effects and possibly more polyphony. Maybe a JV-1080 on the used market, or something like a Korg X5DR. Overall, the Proteus/1 is very chamaeleon like in some of its sounds (which I find an asset), and in others, clearly identifies itself, such as its basses and guitars. I like a synth whose sound can't be easily identified. Like a D-50 sounds like a D-50, and every time you hear it on somebody's record, you think, "That's a D-50". DX7 is the same. In some aspects the Proteus/1 falls into this category. In all fairness, though, it is a very solid, reliable synth and will perform VERY well for someone who knows how to program and isn't afraid to roll up their sleeves and dig into the programming arch- itecture.

Editing patches is pretty straightforward, though you are limited to a small, two line LCD display. Patch editing in an editor/librarian on your PC or Mac would be much easier. The manual is decent, not great.

16 voice polyphony, though a ricer, layered sound will use up at least two voices per note. No effects save a cheesy chorus. There was an expansion board available from a company called Pro-Logic, as far as I know it is no longer available, though if you can buy a Proteus with this expansion, it will sound significantly better and be worth another $100-200 US. Responds to mod, aftertouch (i think).

Pianos are passable, basses ok, drums kits ok. This is best for sequencing pop or jazz tunes, as there are no decent synth/rave/techno/hip-hop sounds in the unit.

I'm on my third, never had a problem with it, though I never took it on the road. There are some hidden checks you can do by holding down certain buttons at startup. Before buying one make sure you do these checks. You could find out what they are by contacting Emu or a Proteus user.

Never dealt with E-mu.

This module is best for a beginner that needs something small, cheap and usable. Add a cheap 4-octave controller and a PC with MIDI interface, a cheap sequencing program, and you're up and running pretty cheaply. I've recently gotten back into MIDI stuff after a 4 year hiatus. Ive had a lot of different gear, Casio FZ10M, Roland Juno2, Boss drum mach. Do not pay more than $300 US for this module!
If you're just starting with MIDI and don't have a lot of money, consider this module.