Korg EA-1 Electribe

Firts of all, I'm writing this review about 8 years since this machine came out, and about 6 years since i saw it last. I'm not doing much music anymore.

If there ever was a standard for "Ease of use", this thing set that. Really basic operation, the display (minimal) does its (minimal) job and it's mostly needed for the sequencer. You can tweak little of the sound but you'll find that this "little" actually does a lot.

It's a TB-303 of the new millenium, if you know the TB-303; and if you don't, I'll explain: it's two monophonic synths with less-than-basic filters coupled with a nice and easy to use step sequencer, all analog-style, and it's better suited for arpeggios, bass lines, and propelling electonica background rhytmic sounds. But once you get started, you'll find more fun in this baby than you'd expected. If you ever thought of getting a TB-303 (ridiculous, in 2009!) get this instead.

Well the machine is marketed for Electronica; don't expect pads (it's monophonic), pianos, horns. It provides few sounds, but they are all aggressive, dynamic, propulsive, and very analog-y. As far as "how analog does it sound?" goes, I'll just say this: the people who'll listen to your music won't really care as long as it's slammin', and this thing delivers.
I usually laugh at analog freaks who'll split hairs in two looking for the perfect waveform; in fact, I've fooled many of them with simple digital synths, only very well EQ'd...
It has delay and little else, and it suits it very well.
Also, if you connect a real midi keyboard to it, it'll play piercing and poderous synth solos like a 1976's Minimoog, from the lowest to the highest note of the scale. 'nuff said.

It's a simple plastic box, shouldn't have too many problems unless you drop it too often.

Never needed it.

I'd give it an overall 10, also because of the minimal price tag you'll get it for these days .
Its sibling, the drum-oriented ER-1, is not as versatile and gets boring real quick. Its younger brother, the sampling ES-1, is lame. The maxed-out version, EMX-1, with real tubes inside and more features, leaves the fun home and packs the same amount of problems most grooveboxes have: you just don't get any feeling with them, that's why it's one of the most sold-off items on ebay: people try it and then tries to get rid of it asap.

The presets are great. Sure, the are some things in there that I do not like but others may like them. I think of the "presets" simply as demos. The guys that programmed the demos did an excellent job of showing what the thing can do if you really work it. Editing the sounds is completely simple. Most people will find the manual very helpful for the sequencer section but without it you could figure it out with enough time. The "keyboard" is hard for me to play on so I have to connect a real keyboard to really play it.

2 monophonic synths in one box. That is cool. It would be cooler if there were a button that would allocate two voices to one program, giving you a duo-phonic synth. You can do layered sounds though by setting both parts to the same midi channel. This is a nice feature. The distortion is on or off and it is not very good....but...sometimes I want a bad distortion. The delay and chorus/flanger are great. No pressure or velocity, which is a sad thing. The sequencer is old fashioned and it is what it is. My only complaint is that you can only have one knob move per part. So, if you want to change the filter you can ONLY change the filter in that pattern. You can change it constantly throughout your pattern but you cannot change the filter and then the oscillator tuning, etc. I just do all of this on an external sequencer as a work around. Also, no LFO, no EG for the amp section, the EG for the for the filter section is as basic as it gets while still being present, and you cannot change the pitch of oscillator 1.

It cannot sound very realistic when compared to sample playback, and physical modelling. However, certain sounds can have a realism to them if you think in terms of old analog synths. It reacts to your playing if you play it. You must tweak it while playing to get it really expressive. This thing is perfect for anything from baroque to bluegrass.

Seems reliable to me but I would never use anything without backup.

Never tried.

I picked it up because it was used and DIRT cheap. I do think that it sounds good though. You can get around the lack of LFO by sweeping the desired destination and recording that movement into an external sequencer. I really do wish that it had a button that would be the equivalent of patch/multi. This would make it possible to play two notes at once with one sound. And of course I would like it to be velocity sensitive. I cannot give it too high of a recommendation because I would not have bought it unless it was so cheap but considering what I paid for it I really like it.

It takes some time to learn all the features it offers. But the user interface is very well designed. From this point of view the ea1 is my favourite machine.

pros:
+ a lot of pattern memory
+ very good sequencer
+ good filter
+ absolute reliable midi master
+ external input processing capabilities
+ extremely clean (dynamic and noise-free, almost high end) output

cons
- limited variety of effects
- no memory card support for expansion or backup
- max bar lenth is 4 bars per pattern

Nevertheless a lot of bang for the buck

this is the weak point:
you can get some - but unfortunately just a few very good sounds out of this box.
An EA-1 synth does not come close to a JP8000, MicroWave or AN1. Also the EA-1 is not a tb303.So what.
It is crazy and rude. And kinda brassy. I like it.

MK2 is well built. No problem.

I use the EA-1 together with a Zoom drum machine in order to compose backings for practice and my own tracks. For me as a bass player this box does not have to be the main ingredient of my music making.
It is fun to play and fits in my setup. No regrets.

For a beginner on hardware-synths (befor i used software)as myself it was indeed very easy creating the first pattern. The presets are a good from my point of view and gave me an orientation on what this baby can produce. The manual is great, not like rolands cryptic manuals.

2 Monophonic parts, well a third one would be very usefull strictly for a solid baseline, specialy when i am in song-mode, a waveform more like a sine would be nice, effects are ok, chorus/flanger is a little bit thin and the delay is very good. The sequencer is very easy to use. I'm still missing a simple ADSR. Ring, Sync and the other thing the 'Decimator' is very good!

Pure electronic sound. It could produce very harmonic sounds (sweet and subtile) and on the other hand very harsh music. The EA1 is for sure not a high-end equipment but it serves me well. Also the so called 'liquid sound' like the Novation can be archieved (when resonance is far on the right. When compared to the other gear from Korg like the EM1, i still prefer the EA1 sound-sets (it sounds more realistic and authentic). So overall i would say it with one word: GREAT

The EA1 never let me down till today and if you can imagine i treat this engine like a psychotic person (thanks god i'm not), tweaking and twiddling as hell!!

Never had any problems!!

If it brokes, i would buy a new one. I'm relativly new to the hardware-universe! Before i used Reason. I've got an ER1 and an EM1 (which i will sell in the future), and i also bought an Roland SH-32 which i sold after two weeks of using it (sounds to synthetical and not like a analog). Because of it's limits i'am have to be very creative creating patterns. Korg you are great!! Maybe the MS2000b will be the next!!

ea-1 mk 1
The presets are ok-ish maybe a little cheesy, but you get the idea of what it can do, and it's not gonna be long befor you have replaced them with your own. Editing patches is so easy.
The manual is good enough (though I had to get a pdf)

1 poly per part is a real shame.
only being able to record one controller change is a crime.
not having the knobs available as midi controllers is close to criminal. I have overcome the previous 2 problems using the fruityloops ea-1 dashboard and linking the controls to my phatboy controller at least allowing me to overcome controller change recording restrictions within the ea-1s own sequencer.
The lack of stereo channels made me go and buy a mixer.

for analogue modelling it's great, more poly would have been nicer. The chorus and delays are superb fun and sound awesome, I can play for hours with them.
receives midi fine.
Does what you would expect very well.

seems to have been seriously abused by its previous owner!! works like a dream.

Having the manual available online rates it higher than an mc303 for me.
never needed support other than that.

I love my EA-1. I wish it had more parts and more poly (or that I had about 10 of them and a big enough studio!), which is the only reason I won't give it a 10, but for the price it deserves a 10.
It's very easy to use, very addictive, great value for money and as far as I can tell better than an mc303 (which on version 1 was rubbish in sound module mode). It's great for productivity and works well with electronica and dub.
I wish I could get the mx-1 for the same price as that would probably overcome my gripes with the ea-1.
I would buy it again.

As easy as easy gets , presets show what its capable of or most, manuals as good as you could wish for.

well i wont go into features.Its does what it says it should.

well the sounds are interesting . its odd.I have the korg z1 and a nord 2 , nord mod and basstation and some fm synths but this still fits in well.Its sound could be considered VA , its a character of its own for sure , i guess i would call it trashy or something , its like rude analgueness , very funky hard edged leads , basses nad stuff.Its fat , but i seem to be liking the ring mod edgy sounds more or the cheesy nasal leads and stuff it can do , has a lovely hollowness.Its features are basic.You find yourself looking for an
lfo or adsr or amore complex envelope but this is a very cool little box for the money which gives imediate access to some very cool sounds , i go a little hot and cold with it , i think its similiar to a basic phochecy voice maybe , has a nice portamento and the onbaord sequncer is basic enough.....i prefer to use as a module....
the built in echo and flange / modulation fx can be cool and handy.Distortion on it seems fairly normal , this box can rip for sure with that on , filter seems fine , not analgue in the classic sense of the word but fine , quite z1 like.The resonance i find to edgy and not so cool but fine.....for 100# or so its a good buy if you after bass and lead sounds.The presets i found very goa like....some loevely leads that whilst simply i dont have elsewhere.
The ring mod and sync features for the oscillators i love....thast where the mad stuff is though it can also be very smooth and liquid like and do some nice bendy 303 like sh101 stuff....

seems solid like all electribe stuff aside from the main dial which ive found on numerous electribes to be a little flawed or gratey if misued.You need to turn in a light fashion or they start to rub....

not sure?

a great little box which goes well with the er1 and es1, all are good machines even if you have high end gear these machines are highly creative and can do stuff ive not found eleswhere.I'm looking forward to the mx !

If you want to just listen/tweak the preset banks, that's easy...but superficial.

It's taken me about 3 full days (so far) of slaving over the manual to really start understanding the editing proccess. The manual is unorganized and sketchy overall, plus it has a bunch of completely unnecessary and confusing diagrams.

About 75% of the presets sound pretty bad and distorted (too much "funk" style), but they can all be edited.

Polyphony, shmolyphyony - I have no idea what that means. I can tell you that the "keyboard" will only play one note at a time (no harmonizing) and is usually sketchy when playing over a preset.

The effects are so-so, but I really do like the "analog" delay.

It does have an on-board sequencer, but I haven't completely figured that out.

It also has MIDI, but I haven't progressed enough to hook my keyboard up to it.

The "keyboard" has no velocity (touch sensitivity) and I would have to say it's quite "static", but for an extremely inexpensive machine with a "modeled" (digital facsimile) sound, I am really impressed how close it sounds to those old MiniMoog's. I just bought it for some occasional etherial sounds on my recordings, so I'm stoked.

Super light and "plasticy" seems to be the trend for Korg these days, but their products are more dependable than they feel (I've dropped my PX3 several time with no problems). For the price/sound ratio, it's good enough.

Don't know.

IMO, the EA-1 are only worth about $99, but I had a fixation with it and at $150 (used but MINT) I couldn't pass it up. I'm actually a guitar player and I've never owned a synthesizer (but since I already have a cheap Yamaha MIDI keyboard...).

If it were lost or stolen, I'd sell my keyboard and upgrade to a MiniKORG.

The korg EA-1 is very, very simple to use. Most of the presets are wack, but you need to tweek it out to make it your own sound anyway. I love how you have 3 different ways to create/edit patterns. Live recording, step recording, or just inputing a sequence manually. And the manual does an excellent job explaining the functions.

I love the FX it has. The delay does some funky !@#$. The flanger could be better, but it is good for the price i suppose. There is one problem, the flanger seems to also run a slight delay. But that creates some cool sounds sometimes.

The MIDI is ok. It's nice to assign a MIDI keyboard to 1 part, and run the built in keyboard for the other part so you can be playing both at once. It could have been better if you could assign external controller knobs to run the filter, volume, fx etc of the EA-1.

The sequencer is good for the price range. Working with patterns is excellent, although i wish you could adjust the volume for each step individually. But the gate time and pitch is very well done. The song sequencer isn't that good in my opinion. It doesn't do anything of any use to me.

The range of sounds you can extract from this piece is quite large. Larger than i expected anyway. With such a small amount of tweekable parameters, you can really go off and produce a wide array of sounds. I surprised myself with some sounds that you would have sworn were from an FM synth. And it makes thick + full sounding subbass with ease.

Overall i'd say this piece of gear is well worth the money. Is is limited in some aspects, but really shines in others. And you can even use it as an FX unit for other sources, so its kind of a 2-in-1 deal. The MIDI could have been a bit stronger, and it could have a few more parameters to edit via the knobs. But for the price, you can't complain.

10 minutes in, your laughing at how simple the electribes are to use.
I love that about the electribes, big bright numbers and easy to find in the dark pads etc.. I don't fancy writing songs in ultra-lit environments...It's all about the vibe man-dudez..
Presets?... We all know the answer to that now don't we?
Manual? .. Don't even need the manual... but it's idiot friendly:-)

Features?
Well... Is there ever enough features? (they got to keep us buyin next years model)..
polyphony-2 wah.......
Tweakable and changable enough to keep things fresh for a while :-)

Well for quality.. it's a little thin and in the analog emulating end of things,.. but it has a large spectrum of sounds and the variations are seemingly endless.. Think of "rewired Atari/speak and spell/acid indigestion/bubble gum ice cream"... I love shiny things that change color when tilted!!... It's a freaky fun sounding garnish to anyones plate of gear.(yum)

Here's why I actually wanted to write this review, It is my very humble opinion that Korg makes very disposable fragile gear in general. Unfortunately, they make my favorite sounding gear... I believe that the reason they do this is so that we will have to buy the EA-2 & 3 & 4 and so on... But, Is it really necessary to make the headphone and ?ins/outs? so fragile that immediately after the warranty runs out, the static starts? I mean they can fit a miniature imitation Moog into a box the size of a Chihuahua, but after all these years they can?t make a sturdy Jack?? What the F@#$ is that about? ? ! ? ! ? !
It?s that consumer conspiracy? Just like Microsoft Windows, Chapstick or deodorant.
Anyway, I know these things are made for DJs and the likes of, but I think that one good fall and it could be game-over with this thing (we?ll see).

I love this thing.. Like anything with "this years sound" in a couple years there will be no more use for it I'm sure... but hey, in another 15 years it will come back again... so keep it in your box with your Speak and Spell!!! I would replace it if it were stolen, I dig it........ I have been playing music all my life (since I was 7), I am now 32 (I spent the first 8 years on the drums though, does that count??...haha).. I allso own a Korg MS2000 (for freehand playing) an EM-1, a loaded up PC (running a Delta 44 soundcard), and a Roland VS880 & a sp-303, for small time sample fun. I really like Korg and Roland A LOT!!
Wish The EA were a little sturdier and had more various outputs...
and polyphony......
Thanks Korg for making some cool gear to help those of us that aren't rich enough at least fake their way through music with affordable great sounding modern easy to use live stuff... YOU ROCK...

Uhh Billy?!? You cant be serious....

"this is my biggest gripe - VOICE 1 GOES OUT OVER THE LEFT CHANNEL AND VOICE 2 GOES OUT OVER THE RIGHT CHANNEL. If you only have 1 voice, you have a MONO device. Even with 2 voices playing, it sounds weird because each is playing in a different channel. I supposed you could ghetto-rig it and split, then combine the outputs but it's a pain in the ass and is the only thing keeping me from using this in my setup. " ---

This is a two part MONO synth, you dont need it in stereo, and there are no Stereo(L R) outputs, only Part 1 and Part 2 outputs witch you patch into a Studeo or PA mixer and mix from there. If you want to "ghetto Rig it" to plug it into a DJ mixer, all you have to do is get a Balanced 1/4 plug (With two stips) that has a female stero 1/8th input, and get a RCA to 1/8th inchand pronto, you have stero output with your EA1.

"Haven't used it in a gig yet because of the stereo problem "
Obviously you havent giged at all...

"It would help if it was in stereo and not mono .. that just irks me to no end .. what kind of producer is going to need a mono bassline? I would have taken it back if my 30 days weren't up (spend 30 days trying to figure out if there was a setting to change to make it stereo) .. other than that the noises are nice and its easy to use."
..."What kind of producer is going to need a mono(output) bassline?..." let me ask you this "What king of producer is going to need a stero bassline?" There are dozens of famus mono bassline machines out there, such as 'Mini Moog' Roland 'TB303' 'TR808(Has MONO OUTPUT)', SH101, SH09, MC202 Korg Monopoly, Arp 2600, Oberheim Matrix 6, damn so many to list, and you dare ask "What king of producer is going to need a stero bassline?" Have you no shame...

The electribe is awesome, I use it on gigs using a 16 CHANNEL ANALOG MIXER... {hint hint}

It sounds good, one of the good features it has is it has Indi Outs! and also a STEREO OUTPUT on the HEADPHONE SECTION, witch could be easaly "GHETTO-RIGGED" by using a insert patch cable

I depend on it, and I use BACKUP on to a yammie Mdf3,

Korg is awesome customer servace

I lost one, so I baught two, and ill never loose one again, thank goodness I saved those patterns

easy to use machine and manual. overall simple.

not to much poly or voices. its a synth module so you have to midi to a full keyboard. midi iz good but no sound cards or Xpansions. real time knob movements.

made for jungle, techno, ravey type stuff. the eFX are basik with flange and delay. distortion button iz a great feature. its a good synth for mood or texture, but not a good lead synth. no arpeggio.

has a great 2 part sequencer and very dependable. you could play it live but i would rather have fatter soundz. i use 2 many syths 2 sync live.

no probs.

i think it would be a better synth if rack mounted. its only 4 voices i think so i would rather get the ms 2000r. the ms 2000 or ms 2000r is a fatter version with a vocoder. has kewl spacey trancy type stuff. you can get good jungle or dirty basslines, but not good as a lead synth. no arpeggio paterns!!! overall its worth checking out and a reasonable price NOW.

Some of the presets are ok but most are crap noise .. nothing really cohearant .. editing patches is a bit of a pain the ass but not something you couldnt speed up with time. The manual is pretty easy to read .. it's not a very feature-rich groovebox .. it has 1 purpose .. nasty acid sounds ;)

it has a 2 voice polyphony but this is my biggest gripe - VOICE 1 GOES OUT OVER THE LEFT CHANNEL AND VOICE 2 GOES OUT OVER THE RIGHT CHANNEL. If you only have 1 voice, you have a MONO device. Even with 2 voices playing, it sounds weird because each is playing in a different channel. I supposed you could ghetto-rig it and split, then combine the outputs but it's a pain in the ass and is the only thing keeping me from using this in my setup.

It only has 2 built in effects (delay/chorus) .. and a distortion button which is not really tweakable

The keys are not pressure sensitive and it does not to pitch bends, which kind of sucks but for the price what do you expect (besides stereo :P)

The sequencer is easy but it doesn't let you get in very tight between the steps so complex patterns are not possible unless you speed up the tempo, then you lose bars :(

It makes nasty sounds, which would be great if it was in stereo

Haven't used it in a gig yet because of the stereo problem

Korg has excellent customer support .. I haven't had any problems with the EA1 yet but I've had problems with some of their other products and they are always good to me

It would help if it was in stereo and not mono .. that just irks me to no end .. what kind of producer is going to need a mono bassline? I would have taken it back if my 30 days weren't up (spend 30 days trying to figure out if there was a setting to change to make it stereo) .. other than that the noises are nice and its easy to use.

if you are familiar with the elctribe series this is an easy peice to work with. It's tricky to actually master it completely, but read the manual.

The featers are quite nice on this. i first owned the er-1 when it came out. I used that as my main drum sorce. I heard that they went well together but wasnt really sure. The pre-sets at guitar center were all messed up so that didnt help. Luckily, two days ago, I asked a teachers son that i knew at my old high school if he wanted to sell it. he said sure. it fell into my lap for 75 dollers. For me, it was perfect. i would have paid much more. The two machines work really well together when mid-ied up. I love the sequencing on this machine. Only because i use the CS1X for a sequence controller on it. Like everyone says, the 16 onboard keys are a pain to play anything in real time. I love the real time affects. i actually use this close to a 303 type.

if you get this, expect some wierd sounds out of this machines. you really have to dig deep into this machine to get the sounds you want out of it. i dont care for the pre-sets. i could flip to a pattern and i would hate the sounds on it. but, hook up the controller and tweak those knobs and you can get great sounds out of it. I like the fact that you can get by tweaking the knobs, two completely different sounds out on part, inside the patern. For any progreesive type stuff, it works great because i can drag out many sounds with the knobs in real time.

I like the reliability of the electribe series. The er-1 has lasted me well and i'm sure the ea-1 will too

Customer support is great in that you can go to thier sight and get manuals and books for it which was very much in my favor.

over all ratng i would have to say i am very impressed with this machince when i hooked it up to my er-1. the sequencing is great when you get it hooked with a controller and the sound curve is great for buzzy sounds but can also be dragged smooth for anything you want. I really felt that i have mastered it in that when i have an idea, i can now get it out on to the ea-1 right away. it took 2 days, but 2 really long days. About 10 full hours of just cramming with the manual and experimenting. buy this if you get it at a good price, which i think even 250.00 new is great.

One of my buds sent me his EA-1 because he couldn't figure it out; I mastered it in about an hour, the only synth I've ever used before was a Yamaha RM1X that just kicked off on me. This is my go between for now nad when the RM1X gets fixed.
It's really simple if you have any background in synths, there a couple little quirks with it; it'd be nice if it autosaved as you went, but you have to put it in "writing mode" to do that... kinda ghetto, but I guess I'm spoiled by full-info dot matrix screens and the like.
The presets are good for an entry-level, specialized beatbox. Nothing amazing, but good for techno/trance/house sorts of stuff. The manual is a big help, I read it on the crapper for five minutes and then hammered out a dozen beats.

Dual polyphony, I think. The keyboard is just fine, I actually like it more than my Yamaha, it feels more like a pro setup than a playstation. The distortion is simple; I'll probably feed it through a Boss DS for more fine tuning. To get the distortion to work, you just push a button and it lights up, then use a knob next to it to adjust the level. Simple as it gets.
I don't really know how expandable it is, I'm not all that into it. It seems like it is an expansion in its own to my existing rig, as my Yamaha can do lots of amazing stuff but can't get the phat bass sounds this can.
For its size & cost the MIDI capabilities are commendable; in, out & through. I don't think the keys are pressure sensitive, but you can "bend" it from one note to another by holding down the existing key and pressing another key, which is sweet.

The only thing this is really good at is fat bass sounds; the farting, ripping ones from old Ataris, deep analog belches & stuff like that, and then the high chirps that correspond with that further up the scale. Excellent for dance music.
As I said, it's best to supplement with a Boss distortion pedal, the orange one, or even an MT-2 Metal Zone guitar pedal if you want it to really distort. The onboard sounds more like ripping.

It's disconcertingly lightweight; it kinda freaked me out the first time I picked it up, I'm more used to my Yamaha, which weighs about as much as five of these. It's simple enough though that it'd probably hold up to bumps and whatnot, it also has a big plastic bumper thing on the front and sides which helps out.

Never dealt w/Korg.

Awesome as a supplemental tool, or a beginner's unit. I do prodigy/NIN style rock/techno, and this thing is great for basslines, especially when used with a real bass. I also do some cliche Autechre style stuff.
It's a very limited little thing, as I said it's only really good for a few things, whereas a Yamaha or E-MU or one of the bigger Roland's encompass a number of different bases. My Yamaha does some great realistic bass stuff and the drums kick ass, but can't do the analog-style bass that this thing does.

Korg would be smart to take the price down to $100-150, I think that the $250 my friend paid is a bit steep. I rmember lookig at one a year and a half ago and it was like $300, way too much. Now you can get them at Mars for $200, which isn't bad. Again, this is more of a beginner's unit or something to supplement a larger, more specialized rig. But definitely not a toy.

Easy to use. Bought it used after playing with a friend's ES1. Suggestion on buying used, don't listen to the presets, just reset it to factory first. Learned almost everything about it in a week. Some presets are cool, others aren't. Editing patterns isn't hard as long as you don't use the keyboard in real time. Weird stuff going on there. No manual came with it but the manual downloaded and printed off the Korg site is excellent. Little pictures and everything for the illiterate and impatient.

Polyphony, two parts. But it's not made as a stand alone unit. The ER1, ES1, or EM1 alongside is the way to go. Personally a buddy has the ES1 and we get together and jam. The keyboard as discussed above leaves something to be desired in real time recording mode. Built in effects are ok, but have a tendency to be hard to control when switching parts. I haven't had any trouble with MIDI OX, Sonar, or Acid pushing or pulling. Korg's site even has new patterns from some guy named James Bernard to download and push to your EA1.

Realistic, no. Fantastic, yes, and very controllable. Dance, Techno, Trance, etc... Onboard effects are a little touchy sometimes. Doesn't exactly get what you expect every time but I think that's what I'm looking for sometimes too.

Haven't had any problems... don't gig... just jam.

Haven't dealt with them, but I haven't been able to find a support number on the web site either. Oh, I haven't looked.

Yeah, I'd find another used one. Fun toy. Just started a week ago playing. Hasn't worn out it's playfulness yet and that's saying something for my short attention span on new toys.

The EA-1 is as easy as it gets. Turn the knobs and choose wave-forms to create sounds. The sequenser is easy to learn although I prefer using cubase as sequenser for this little piece of machinery.

Well.. I bought this thing because I needed a synth for bassline's and as a TB303 substitute. If you plan on using it for something like this you will become VERY happy with it! it is a wonderful machine and for the low costs it makes it one of the synthezisers I would say is most priceworthy. But if you are planning on making a complete song with it you can forget it. The machine can play two voices at the same time, it has no velocity or aftertouch and it is Monophonic. In short: This machine should be used for bassline's, FAT lead sounds and bisarre spacey sounds!

The sounds on this cheap little baby is VERY warm, fat and analogue! creating fat basslines with 303 like sounds or creating warm sweeping analogue leads are no problem! For this price you get some of the coolest analogue sounds you can get! if you're looking for strings and piano or drums then I'd suggest you look somewhere else.. But if you look for the spacey sounds of Dance and Trance then this is a machine built to invoke power on the danccefloor!

Well what can ye say.. it's plastic and its leightweight.. I wouldnt drop it if I were you!

I've never dealt with KORG so I cannot say how they are to talk to..

If it was lost or stolen I would definatly buy me another one.. I love this little tweakin' monster!

This is for the guy that wants to use it as an FX unit. Do this:

Set OSC1 to Audio In, and turn the OSC balance all the way to the left. Max your cutoff, and turn resonance off. Now record a long sustained note into the sequencer (or 16 steps with 100% gate time) and start it playing. Now you've got the distortion and delay or chorus running on the signal. Enjoy!

This box is a piece of cake to operate. About 10 minutes after it came in, I was tweaking some presets and making some funky sounds. If you know how to operate a sequencer and you know how to turn knobs, this should be a breeze.

The features are pretty good, in my book. Nice selection of filters (resonance, decay, cutoff, etc.), selectable waveforms or audio-in on oscillator 1, delay, chorus/flanger, real-time or step sequencing... A few problems with it are polyphony (it's monophonic, yecch), no velocity-sensitive, although I think you can hook up a velocity-sensitive keyboard to it no problem. Except for those small things, it's jam-packed full of features.

This is where this machine truly shines. Nice fat, warm analog sounds coming out of a digital box? Korg has their act together. The filters are a LITTLE bit slidey, but almost as good as the real thing. The delay on this box adds so much to the warm sounds. You can pretty much construct your own instruments by tweaking the knobs, which makes things really great to create signature sounds for the dancefloor. BEAUTIFUL!!!

I've had the machine for about a month now and not had a hint of a problem with it, but then again, I am a fanatic of keeping my gear clean and as scratch-free as possible at all times. The knobs are a little wobbly and the machine is a little too lightweight. Also, the rubber grips on the bottom of the box don't seem to stop it from sliding on the table very well. I am considering taking the 'Tribe apart, reinforcing the knobs, fixing small sandbags to the interior of the case, and putting new rubber grips on the bottom, so that it doesn't fall off my table just by tugging a cord. I would gig with this thing without a backup just on the principle that I don't have much cash or decent gear! I definitely think that if cared for properly (I recommend a heavy-duty flight case) and cleaned often, it should last a lifetime.

Luckily, I haven't had a single problem with it so far, but by looking through the manual and warranty card, it seems that repairs, if needed, would be quick and hassle-free, as they have a LOT of authorized service centers all over the world.

If anything should happen to this machine, I'd cry and then save up my money for another. This machine is a very cost-effective alternative to the very expensive, older analogs. Still not as nice, but for the cost, it's a masterpiece by Korg. I've been making electronic music since 1996, but just recently got away from my computer's sample-based software into outboard gear. So, for all you outboard-veterans who think this thing sucks, fine. For the majority of musicians and beginner musicians, you NEED to buy this thing. It stomps all over Roland's competition, the MC-303 and MC-505. True, this box doesn't have drums, but the analog sounds are MUCH warmer than Roland's roovebox series. Couple this synth with the Korg ER-1 and make some serious waves on the dancefloor. One thing I wish this synthesizer had is velocity-sensitive keys, but that's something I can deal with.

This thing is a cakewalk. If you're a complete idiot you can still twiddle knobs and make some funky noise. Two parts yadda yadda. The sequencer is easy to use and anything you would need is completely obvious where you can find it (such as tranpose, tempo etc) without a zillion menus and submenus on the lcd. The little menu light area is extremely helpful.

Hopefully no one has the conception that this can compose an entire basic song like an mc-303, 'cause there are no drums sounds. Just tweakable bass and funky noises and leads. Anything you can come up with it. Some presets suck, some don't. Mostly I think of the presets as tone generators, find some cool sounds, delete the sequences, tweak the sounds a bit and record a new sequence. The thing has tons of memory, i don't think anyone will ever -truly- use all 256 pattern spots. The waveforms are good, just about anything you'll need is there. No velocity but the expression is in the filters, you can record for each pattern one motion sequence (cutoff, decay, resonance, eg int.)(I think you can assign velocity values via MIDI though.) Maybe I'm a deaf idiot but to me most of the motion movements sound pretty smooth, maybe it's cause my amp isn't "good enough" (roland kc-500). The effects are pretty good, the distortion works just fine for me even without a knob. The chorus/flanger sucks but the delay is awesome. Be warned though, I thought when I bought this thing that you could run like a sampler through the audio in and assign the delay, chorus/flanger and distortion to it. You CANNOT. You can only have it go through or have the audio in act as an OSCILLATOR for a pattern on the EA-1. Which is kind of neat but the fact that you can't use it as an fx processor bites. I could be wrong, and if I am someone please correct me but I haven't found anything in the manual.

Well I guess I kinda covered this. If you're looking for some real pianos or strings or whatnot, well learn what you're playing with first. This thing is only for janked up bass and leads and other random video gamey noises (not that it cannot be used professionally.) Right now I am using it to write parts for the hardcore-industrial band I'm in, and it's my most useful piece of equipment yet (against my alesis qs6.1 and sp-202 sampler). I've written some lovely, sweeping synth parts and some janked up acid-sounding breakdown things. So this thing can be as expressive as you want it to be, I think. Definitely a major bargain for $300.

This is where I am disappointed. I haven't had the EA-1 crash or anything, but it's case SUCKS. I have yet to play a gig and just between carrying it back and forth to 3-times-a-week practices, it has gotten quite a few knicks and scratches just in about 3 weeks. And the lcd cover has a few wrinkles in it. Once all my parts are written I will probably sample them on the 202 and play the loops that way (that sucker is built like a tank), but that kind of demeans the idea of the EA1 being a live performance tool as opposed to a "studio instrument".

Never had to contact Korg, the manual has explained everything pretty good except for how the heck to process the fx onto an audio in device. oh well.

All in all yeah i'd buy it again if it were lost. Or maybe I'd wait and see what the EM-1 is going to be like. I just wish the case was a bit more rigid (watch out for those knobs too.) Just take good care of this baby and he'll treat you well. An absolutely bargain and worth every penny, despite the sucky case.

The EA-1 is a simple bass/lead machine for silly electronica music, anyone thinking its for complex music making should take it back to the store and get Reaktor and a powerful PC. The presets are just horrible cause i bought the floor model, so im deleting it all. But the layout is simple to understand- realtime editing or step sequencing, just a basic dance machine.

i love it cause i've hooked it up to my TX-7 (FM Power) and the sequencer rocks over london, and it does well with octave range (no bach's on this little too though) I wouldnt use it for aphex twin type music or BT style either. And the sounds are great, they make all the fun space noise ive been looking for. I think price wise it kills those german power synths. But of course sound wise it cant even compete.

And the sounds are great, they make all the fun space noise ive been looking for. I think price wise it kills those german power synths. But of course sound wise it cant even compete. But if your into Plaid or Miami bass music, this is the tool to use for heavy bass or wierd tweak noises.

Cant say, havent gigged with it.

i hope i dont have to use it.

This is the second groove box ive bought in the past 3 years, my first was a silly Roland Dr-202. It was cool for about 3 months, then i got rid of it and bought a MPC2000xl- but the one thing i missed about it was the bass. Well im glad i got rid of it and got the EA-1, it solved my bass problems, and fun child like tunes. If your looking for 5 year-old based electro, then i would buy this and a elektron drum machine too. Too all those morons that hate this box, get a life and buy reason or reaktor for gods sake.

come on! This thing is so hands on. You can't walk past it without just having a quick tweak. I have had it for a couple of days and am creating some really nice sounds. It is all there in front of you and with a midi keyboard you spend all your time kicking around new sounds rather than scrolling through deep menus. The presets (a bank and b bank) all sound kinda day-glo and hands in the air but the d'n'b give you some good base bass to start fecking with. VERY EASY

Two parts blah blah you probably know the stats. The little rubber buttons are no replacement for a keyboard but then when you are somewhere without your k/board they are completely lovely. Shame about the distortion but it does give some nasty edges to bass drones so i'd rather it was there than not. It midied up fine and is such a godsend compared to my jupiter 4 and polysix. I wonder why i ever mucked around with pre-midi noisy synths when something dirt cheap like this can do so much.

It bleeps squeaks and hums all the sounds quite nicely. I was unsure wether it would give me what i want but just a wee bit of playing around and its replaced a much bigger heavier box'o'analog. And all for NZ$400, which is like US$200! And i'm glad to get such clean sounds no noise floor!

I got it second hand, the box is light and plasticy but so what. don't soak it or throw it across the room and it will be fine i'm sure. The guy i got it off hadn't really touched it but i did notice on someone elses ER-1 that the knobs can get a bit loose. treat it well, it never did you any wrong. And i will use it live as it has no drives or delicate bits.

I've never tried. I found the web to be the best resource for mods and upkeep of other bits of gear, and i checked this list of reviews before i drove three hours to look at and buy this little beauty.
If something goes wrong, its probably happened to someone else and they've written all about it on a web page somewhere, and besides, korg are busy writing manuals in crazy talk. Attention KORG! employ me and i'll translate your manuals into logical speak.

So cheap, less than a third it's retail and its hardly used. I don't think i'll find one this cheap again but i would replace it unless i could afford an MS2000R. It sits in with my juno2 and drum machines very nicely, doesn't take up too much space and when sampled is absolutely killer. I've tinkered with lots of unreliable older gear and am sick of it. This thing is so much stronger with nice stable sound and easy to use. I have written three tunes (using it and other gear) in one night all seriously thanks to the EA-1. I get sick off all the analog stroking as i like crisp sharp sound and this thing can really cut through.

This machine makes all of them look like shit. The best unit to fall out of the mothership hands down.

The unit is basic when it comes to features, but thats what I want. I wanted analog ms-20 sounds with oscilators, and basic effects to tweak in real time. Finally a company understands what this genre of music is about. Its not about polyphonic, filters, unwanted effects, its about tweaking sound on the fly and creating a thick synth bass groove that gets you movin. Any one who complains about this box shouldnt be making music, just stick with a sampler and Emimem tunes.

This is basically up to you. If you like generic techno you wouldnt change a thing, but if you want some funked out space porn, start tweaking. You know what its fun doing it thats why I bought it. I use to own the rm1x what a peice of shit. The mc 505 sounds like elevator groove music. Generic and watered down. Everyone has to remember back in the day when beasties, new order, joy division, bauhaus, cure, public enemy, these are the bands that started it all, and for $300. you can basically do everything they did back then for a fraction of the cost, and less equipment. This is not a synth with keys its almost beiggining with no end and thats exactly what electronic music is about.

Korg has been around for years. If it breaks they will fix it.

If you need customer support on this you better buy ACID pro 2.0.

My overall rating on this is.............. Ill let you figure it out.

The Electribe has to be THE easiest synth to use. It was designed that way, so that anyone from beginner to expert can make music with it. Pretty much just hit record and start playing the mini keys and twisting knobs (one at a time, however). If you want to make something that sounds decent really fast, this is what you are looking for.

This is a monophonic two part synth, with one part sent to the right channel, other sent to the left. Not a problem except it is not possible to make pads hardly at all. The effects are limited, but effective and very easy to use. Modifying them in real time produces some interesting sounds. It is not velocity sensitive, which tends to limit some of the expressiveness. Distortion is either on or off, not adjustable at all. The sequencer automatically quantizes what you play, and also features step record. Basic, but it works good. Overall, a very limited machine. In fact it is mostly for the beginner just getting started in music making. I have had the EA-1 for a few months, and would like to move past its basicness and get something more advanced and professional sounding.

I can't say I have heard an analog synth that sounds like the Electribe, or one that the Electribe sounds like. The machine has its own unique sound, to be sure, but there are much better analog emulators out there. It works great for fat basses, leads, and some interesting sound effects, and has a niche in the studio, but does not lend itself to a wide range of electronic styles. For the price, it is quite good as a beginner instrument, and has some very crunchy sounds. The biggest downfall of this instrument is that it is a low cost digital emulation of analog. Which means that on certain knobs (most notably filter cutoff and oscillator 2 pitch offset) it is impossible to get a smooth sweep as you turn the knob, because it is digital. If you turn the filter cutoff very slowly, you will not get a long smooth sweep. Instead it will be stepped, as the knob jumps from one value to the next. Likewise with pitch offset, you cannot get a perfect fifth or third offset, and the pitch jumps as you turn the knob, sounding somewhat like the pc speaker in an old DOS game. There are indeed many sounds you can get with this unit, but they are mono (unless you copy one part to the other for both channels), and not-the-greatest-quality sounds. The Electribe just doesn't sound really professional unless you record and modify the sound on a computer, which is time consuming. One other drawback: The internal clock is slightly slow, which means that unless you have the instrument synced to an external device's clock, it will quickly fall behind and lose sync.

I have had no problems yet. Manual is a breeze. I have not used this in gigs, but for a quick slamming sound, it would work very well played live.

N/A

I probably would not have bought this if I had played with it first, simply because it is too limited for me. It is not a bad machine at all, but you do get what you pay for. If you are a beginner and want some pretty wicked sounds, it is perfect for you. But if you are serious about making professional music, you will want something much more advanced. Overall a very limited, but very good sounding synth, if used with taste.

Well, first off I think that some of the presets are pretty cool, others are not so spectacular, but the one thing that they do is give you a good idea of what you can sqesze out of this box. It's great that you can get rid of the presets, but I'll keep them on there for awhile until I get this thing figured out. I had a Boss DR-5 that had the worst presets in the world, I hated them and I couldn't get rid of them. I was listening to them one day and just said, "This thing sucks!", and the next day I traded it in for the EA-1. Good choice, no regrets.

Editing patches is easy, even without the controller keyboard hooked up to it. The step sequence programming mode should be simple for anyone who's ever used an 303-type sequencer, I have no problem with it anyway. I haven't tried it with Cakewalk yet.

The manual is alright. Some of the stuff is a bit vague. I find that if I just mess around with the EA-1 for a few minutes I can figure just about anything out on my own. I've only had it for two days now and I pretty much have it cased.

It's a two part monosynth, which is fine by me. I don't know what some of the reviewers were expecting when they bought this thing. Did they think it was going to be a damn Supernova? I don't think so. This isn't going to be your only synth. At best it will provide a foundation to be layered upon or for making some tweaked-out sound effects. The bottom line is you're not going to get too many lush pads or chords out of this thing. (You can fake some chords and pads occasionally, but you're better off leaving that to your other gear that is actually made for doing that type of thing.)

They keyboard is 16 rubber buttons at the bottom of the box. It's not so bad, they're a bit squishy, but they do the job. If you don't like it, go out and buy a cheap controller keyboard. They're good enough for doing some simple realtime or step sequencing when you're sitting on the couch with the headphones on.

Pretty good effects, if you don't like the one-setting distortion, run it though a dist pedal or something. Experiment with it! I ran it though my Line 6 POD and the tube emulation warmed the sound up quite a bit, plus giving me access to some more effects. The whole reason why I bought this box is so I could actually try some real-life stuff with it. Sure, I could run Rebirth through some amp sim plugin in Sound Forge, but you get so much more feel from tweaking real knobs. I also know that you could get a midi controller, like a Phat Boy or Native Instruments 4-Control, but I don't want to be in front of the damn computer all day long, you know?

This thing sounds great. Okay, so I've never even seen a real analog synth, but when I turn tweak the filter bank just right and get a totally screeching, twisting, morphing sound I find it hard to believe that the sound is all virtual. It's more like a guitar feeding back and making a whole lot of droning weirdness.

Well, this thing is obviously best suited for some type of electronic music. Dance, industrial, whatever.

No velocity, no aftertouch. And that's fine.

It's only plastic, and the sound skips when I shake it. That worries me a bit.

I just know that they don't support warranties from outside the States. Not good.

If it were lost or stolen, I'd buy it again, I think. Like I said, I've only had it for two days.

My other gear is all computer-based, so I guess that you could say that the EA-1 is my first synth. Hardware synth, anyway. I also use Sonic-Syndicate's Orion (Great program, rival to Reason, and cheap too,check it out! http://www.sonic-syndicate.com/), Cakewalk, and a variety of other soft-synths/plugins.

I've played a lot with Rebirth and found that I didn't like it all that much. Maybe it's just the fact that I don't like using the mouse to tweak onscreen. You can't beat hands-on tweaking, that's for sure.

I wish you could motion-capture multiple knob movements without hooking it up to a software sequencer. But despite a synth's limitations, you can always come up with some cool sounding stuff (hopefully).

This box has impressed me so much that I'm almost surely going to get the ER-1 as well when I get the cash. I think that for the price they are very solid machines, great for beginners and an excellent addition to any setup.

I've been using the Korg EA-1 synth for quite some time now, both for its sequencing, and synthesis capabilities; I use it to drive external modules when playing live and to generate "backup" sounds. I was quite impressed with the features on the EA-1, as I was with the entire Electribe series instruments. Kudos to Korg for not including a dreaded preset ROM. THe Manual for the EA-1 is clearly illustrated and informative, but I was very disappointed not to find a full MIDI implementation chart. Luckily, I later found one on the net, but never found much use for it since most of the parameters are tweakable from the front panel.

The EA-1 features 2 monophonic 2 oscillator parts. You can copy one to the next for massive "unison" patches reminiscent of the old Korg Mono/Poly. The onboard effects are great, the delay nice and lo-fi with motion sequencing and the chorus/flange hybrid having a surprisingly wide range. When coupled with mad ring-modulation and the onboard distortion, it is possible to achieve some very dramatic results. I was also happy to find an audio input to "feed the unit to itself", but was a bit annoyed at the output routing; the "mix" output being a loaded down (passive?) coupling of outs one and two. It would have been nice to have the machine's effects come out in stereo like the delay of the Electribe ER-1 drum box.
The onboard sequencer alone is worth buying the unit for, as you can use it to control extenal boxes, and the keyboard-like arrangement of buttons is also useful when travelling light.

I was impressed with the EA-1s overall sound, save for its filter, which sounded a bit weak to me. This situation can be improved by running the unit through an external filter bank or by feeding the unit back into itself, but for all you CAN do with the unit, this is a minor gripe. Some of my colleagues manifested their upset at not having access to an envelope generator, but I assume this omission has to do with the logistics of going from one patch/pattern to another, as it would be difficult and costly to either morph or set up separate DSPs to handle the overlaying of one patch to the next.
I found the convenience of being able to store 256 patches and sequenced patterns far outweighed the envelope problem.
Also, I would have enjoyed some sort of pitch wheel or assignable ribbon controller for pitch-bending, as you can do so (with pleasing results)from an external source, but not from the EA-1 itself.

Although the EA-1 is of "light" construction, it is well designed enough to stand the rigors of the road. I did however, have to open mine up a couple of months back to realign the alpha wheel which kept skipping values by two. This excursion into the innards of the EA-1 proved to be very interesting, as I got to see Korg's clever settup of grounding tabs (preventing hum and other nasties) and the tight but clean PC board layout. I also noticed little plastic posts were added to the shafts of the pots (knobbies) you are most likely to tweak madly and I have since decided to add my own (providing I can find them) to insure further road worthiness. To those of you who say the Electribes are built cheaply, consider how long the silver R----d boxes have been around and that tey too were made of the same petroleum derivative.

I have voided my warranty. I did not send in my warranty, and no, I have never had the pleasure of dealing with Korg. If I ever got to meet Mr. Mori, the genius behind the MS-20 and as I believe the man responsible for bringing Korg back (after a long absence in which he founded Zoom, Mr. Mori returned to Korg a few years back, just before they started coming out with cool products again...) I would shake his hand and thank him for years of amazing synths.

I'm really big on the Electribes right now, either for live or studio work. I reviewed the ES-1 sampler a few weeks back and forgot to mention they should have made them in yellow, but then again, yellow is "chi"; four; death in Japanese, and this is bad luck. The EA-1 is a nice deep blue color and has brought me nothing but good luck. The entire Electribe series is what I've been dreaming of since I first put my hands on a R----d MC-202 back in 1986. If you're curious to hear what I'm doing with the Electribes, you'll have to wait until my next album comes out. http://www.davidkristian.com