Roland JV-880

It is easy operation.
but,There is a defect in a part of the function.
That is patch memory size.
little,very little.
The patch that I like "new sound" will be removed.

24poly and 8part.
This will be active enough if it isn't completed one unit.

Bright sound.
Specially, the sound of the bright piano is the superlative degree.
He has the still useful power.
D/A part is very Hi-Fi.
I like this one, my best of Roland PCM.

This broke once.

A repair fee is expensive.
A technological fee, $70 and parts fee, 5$??
Though a store cleared that.

It is old, and there are a few patches.
But, such a thing is not the factor which the superiority of synth is decided as.
He told me that a thing.
You should capture it.

Presents sound ok (typically Roland)
Editing is not difficult but hammering buttons gets boring.
The manual like most (read: ALL ROLAND products is a mess).

Good presets and FX processor.

Tiny display!

Midi is good.

Typical Roland sounds not VERY impressive but some sounds are very convincing.

Depends on the price you pay for this module wether it's a steal or not.

Roland so I expect it to work for ever.

Roland and support?
No PDF manual on the site etc.

Yamaha et al does a better job here.

Nice module under $225 mint with manual etc.

Cant't go wrong, sounds ok.

This is very easy to deal with sound editing. Presets sounds are OK.

28 notes poluphony. Thst'd kind of small.Effects are Rev, Chorus and also panning delay. This panning delay is attractive, nice. 8 multi-timbal.

Most best part of this unit is the sound. It's very very brite. It's not like mid-high, it's over 12k to 16k. That's what I'm feeling. I use bunch of present Roland's model, such as XV-5080, JV-1010. But I can grantee this has better sound. Listen and compare the sound called "Wave bell" and "Brass sect." You can know the difference immediately.

Great! I use this unit with UNISYN that is editarian software made by MOTU. Also, I installed VINTAGE SYNTH Card into this machine. Sounds come out from this unit is more better than recent analog-like synths. Listen to the "Frange Pad" from the card.

I don't feel like Roland has best team for Customer support. I asked many times to fix my S-760, but they can't even discover what I was having difficulties.

Let's say, A++ !
That's a lot.

After I worked with the 880 for a while, it became very easy to use.

I think polyphony is 28 or 32. It accepts one JV expansion board, but you can only use 64 voices at a time.

I really like the acoustic sounds-acoustic guitar,strings, bells,flutes. Those are the main sounds I use from the 880. There are also a few good basses. Don't like the piano sounds at all.

I have used the 880 on the road, and never had any problems. Only thing I did was have the internal battery changed.

I called Roland one time concerning a problem with an XP-50, and they were very helpful.

I sold my original 880 and recently purchased another one. I would probably buy another one if it were lost or stolen(unless I was able to buy an XV-3080).I also own an EMU Proformance piano module(my personal favorite piano sound for sequencing, EMU Planet Phatt(LOVE this module),Roland MKS-20(great rhodes sound), and a Yamaha RM-50 drum module. I don't think there's anything I wish it had-I feel it's a great deal for the money.

The presets sounds good. Nice pads and guitars, but the piano sounds are less. Editing patches isn't difficult, but there no submenus. So there is one series of a lot of parameters. A patch editor makes the job easier.

The polyphony is 28. But most presets consist of more tones, so the polyphony will be lowered. But it is good enough when you use the JV-880 only for one or two instruments. There are 2 effects on it: reverb and chorus. It isn't easy to attach an effect to a preset.
It's a disaster to make temporary edits of voices via MIDI. For example, on most modules you can change the attack of a sound with CC73, but this can't be done on the JV-880. So you have to change the attack parameter on the unit itself (or by using an editor) and save it in an user preset. You can rarely use CC11 (expression) to make dynamic envelopes.

The guitars are very realistic. Strings and pads sound good as well. But the pianos sound bad.

I simply wish that you can edit some parameters of sounds via MIDI, so that controllers 71~74 are implemented for example. Or that you can adjust most of the parameters with NRPN.
But the unit has some very good sounds.

This is a pretty clean Roland PCM synthesizer with a straightforward structure. I use a Macintosh patch editor (was Opcode Galaxy Plus Editors; now Emagic SoundDiver 3.04). Using a patch editor makes a real big difference. By today's standards, the number of PCM waves seem puny (just over 100), but I do have the Orchestral JV card added. The presets sound clean, albeit vanilla (for the record, I create my own patches for my songs, which are obviously tailored to my styles). The manual is okay, and as long as you don't mind the occasional English-As-A-Second-Language attempts to explain things, it's straightforward.

Only 28 voices of polyphony (a single patch can use up anywhere from 1 to 4 voices)--but for a synth that was designed 10 years ago, that's not bad. Built-in effects that can be set to either patch or multi-timbral performance modes. The effects are on the simplistic side, although they are useful. The performance mode allows for up to seven parts (patches) plus a rhythm part. There is one slot for expansion card (JV-series), plus a waveform ROM and patch RAM slots on the front panel.

I really can't speak for the genres that I don't (or haven't) do, but I find the JV-880 to be very useful and functional for both styles of music--Gothic and Industrial (disclaimer: currently there are about twenty synths in my studio, so I generally try to play to the strengths of each synths, as opposed to trying to do everything with just one unit). When I'm writing rough sketches for songs, I always wind up using JV-880.

One of the best ways to "mangle" a sound is to use the Frequency Cross-Modulation (FXM) parameter. I've created patches consisting of four such "dirty" tones, and they work well for industrial atmosphere and ambience. For Gothier stuff, I wind up using waveforms from the Orchestral expansion card, sometimes layering the strings with synth string patches. I use little on-board effects. My favorite types of sound to create on the JV-880 include industrial noises, Gothic strings, acoustic piano patches, cold digital lead sounds, and electric bass sounds. I make use of the two LFOs per part.

The best features of this synth are the aforementioned FXM, the choice of Soft or Hard resonance, and Analog Feel.

I have played live with the JV-880 once. No issues whatsoever.

Never had to deal with them.

The JV-880 is a wonderful, functional synth which works well for what I do. I've had the unit for over five years, and it has made its way onto several CD tracks that I have done over the years. I would buy this again in a heartbeat, although at current market prices for a used JV-880.

I've been creating electronic music since 1993, and playing live since 1996. Although I probably wouldn't want to take this baby on live performances anymore (since it is racked up in my studio), I'm still using this synth on almost every track that I've done since 1996. I value my synths based on how much I can push the envelopes (no puns intended) and boundaries of what it can do (as opposed to staying happy in the Presetland), and I am satisfied with the programmability of this machine--despite its limitations, it is a useful synth.

Not sure of the O/S Version. The sounds are good. The unit is a little archaic for today's standards, but it is still a good sounding unit and works well in my rig. The patch editing is hard for two reasons:
1. It is a Roland.
2. There is a 2 Line LCD Display.

The manual us also standard-fare Roland.

This unit has 28 note polyphony. It is a rackmount version of the JV-80 and sounds like all other Roland gear (except possibly the new XV series and Fantom). It has built in Reverb and Chorus and also has 4 outputs. Here's the deal;

When you use the two output mode you can have the Reverb and Chorus.
When you use the 4 output mode, the effects are disabled.

To me this has not been a problem, since I am in 4 output mode all the time and run effects on my outputs seperately.

You can also expand the unit with their JV Series expansion board. You can only put one board in at a time(kind of a pain for guys like me), but at least you can put a board in there.
This thing has a good MIDI set too, but is Pre-GM. But the format is so close to GM that you can get away with just about anything in GM stuff.
You have two mode in which this unit operates:

Patch Mode:
This is where you have single programs with up to 4 tones in the program. It is Mono-timbral and you can select wich channel you want to receive from.
Performance Mode:
This has up to 8 programs per performance. This is where the multi-timbral part of the unit shines. You can have full orchestrations (up to 28 note poly) and mix each part independently. You control the output assigment from each part, transpose, pan, level, and other variables. You can also set a voice reserve for each part for maximizing polyphony.

Editing in Patch Mode is kind of hard though, because of it being Roland and because of the 2 line display. Anyone with a Roland can sympathize. You can get third party editors for the unit and they are always better.

The sounds are good. The pianos are typical Roland and can work well. The basses are good as are the drum sounds. The strings are really good (I really like them). Horns are good too. The choir sounds are kind of weak. The sax sounds could use a little more presence and depth to them. Lead sounds are okay I guess, but I do not use them. I have other synths for that and they sounds better. On the whole, the unit sounds the best when used in a mix and to me, no sound really stands out as spectacular in solo mode. I have used it for almost every song I havae written since I bought the unit in 1994, and use it mostly for drums, bass and some keys.

I really like the drums sounds on it. I created my own kit and it works great. The 4 output setup I set it up for also helps with the drums and bass, as I send them to the Sub outputs and mix them seperately than the main outs (where I throw the keys and strings).

Again, as I have said in my other reviews of my gear, it really depends on how you use the instrument. Do not try to stretch the unit to make it do things that it cannot do well. Each maker has a certain thing they do the best. Utilize that and you will not be let down.

I can depend on this unit. IT has survived both road and studio use since 1994 and I love the unit. I did have the piano expansion board in it until I got my XP-60 7 months ago and put it in there. I still use it for drums and bass and strings, and mated up with the XP-60 for drums, my sounds are really good. I always like to layer different snares to get the right one. I am not the type of guy who like to spend hours and days writing new programs and patches. I like to plug them in, and play with them (and make a few changes if I need to). Overall, this unit has provided me with years and albums full of great sounds. If you can plug it in, and play the onboard sounds with little change, that is a thumbs up to a good company. With a good controller, I could use this unit solo in a gig I suppose and it would do well. I really like layering sounds, so I think that I would need more boards at once, but in a pinch, Icould make it work.

I've not had to deal with Roland directly, but they do seem like a good company.

If it were lost or stolen, I would contact my insurance company in no time and get them to replace it (and everything else in the studio). I have been playing for over 25 years.

I also own the following:

1. Alesis QS6 (great leads and Rhodes)
2. Ensoniq SQ2 (great orchestral and leads)
3. Korg X5 (great pads and guitar patches)
4. Roland JV-880 (reviewed here)
5. Roland XP-60 (great pianos and strings and others)
6. Roland VG-8 (the only one I really have to program, but then it begs to be programmed)
7. Yamaha DJX (fun jam keyboard)
8. Yamaha TG-33 (great pads and strings and some good FM stuff)

Isuppose there is nothing that I hate about it. I like all my gear for what its strong points are. I do wish that it had a bigger display, but that is about it. It has helped me make music on 5 out of my 7 albums now and will probably continue to do so in the years to come. When you get ready to buy gear, ask yourself a cople of qiestions first:

1. What type of music do I want to play?
2. What types of sounds is the unit good for?
3. Are they compatible?
4. Do they have 3 rd party sounds that can help in my music creating process?
5. How much does it cost?

If all of us could go out and get the latest offering from Kurzweil of something, then the lower priced units would not really be out there and everyone would have to conform to the high standards of perfection of the current technology. Since we don't, the lower priced units have shortcomings, but with research, can be worked around. Make an educated choice when buying gear. (If you want examples, e-mail me and I'll give you some horror stories, LOL)

The presets are mostly very good and useable which is good because it's very diffucult to edit on this thing and the manual is not much help. All Roland manuals are pretty bad. I'm very knowledgeable about synth programming and still have a hard time tweaking patches. Haven't tried a patch editor. There's not a lot of useable organ patches which I think is Roland's way of forcing you to buy their expensive expansion sound cards to get the really good sounds.(One of the things I don't like about Roland.)

Polyphony is only 28 notes, and that's with only one tone per sound. Kind of limited by today's standards but I use it almost exclusively for live stage work and it's great for that.

Built in effects are reverb and chorus only, wish it had a true delay. It will do a kind of midi delay but it's not very adjustable and is pretty cheesy.

It will accept one expansion board, I have the 60's & 70's Keyboard card and it's really good but expensive. I paid $400 for mine but they are down to about half of that now. The bad thing is you can't access the card directly in real time, you have to save the patches to internal memory or to once again expensive data cards. There is also a PCM card slot for new sounds but don't count on finding any PCM cards for sale. Roland has virtually abandoned these cards which sucks becasue they are the only way you can quickly and easily access new patches and waveforms. If you can find one of these with patches you like, buy it by all means because they are rare.

The unit responds to all midi messages adequately, I've never had any problem in that area. My major bitch with this thing, and there always is one with Roland gear, is that you can't program a keyboard split even in performance mode. Again, I think Roland is trying to force you to buy a controller keyboard in order to do splits. Greedy.

The sounds in this thing are for the most part really good which is why I bought it. It's good for all types of music depending on what expansion board you have in it.

I've had this thing for about 7 years and haven't had any real problems with it. The display has occasionally blanked out on me until I pushed on the case right below it. Only happened a couple of times and hasn't happened in a long time. It's my main sound source and has been for about as long as I've has it. I really don't have much of a backup for it.

Haven't dealt with Roland on this product, but have on others with mixed results. the bad thing about their support for this unit is that they stopped production of the PCM cards. I have to think they just want to force everyone to buy the much more expensive and hard to install and acceess expansion boards which is pretty greedy and lousy.

If lost or stolen, I might opt for a newer unit, but would probably get something similar. Roland's sound patches are outstanding but their design and programming is really not that good. I own several pieces of Roland gear and there's something really dumb wrong with all of it. It's like they design and manufacture instruments without asking working musicians what they want or if they're any good. Overall, this unit is well worth having, but Roland needs to get their act together in the design department.

This unit will take a novice time to get used to it. It is set up somewhat like an old analog synth. It is difficult to edit because of the very limited input structure (i.e., several buttons and a scroll wheel). The presets that came with the unit are suprisingly still usable. Pretty good for a synth nearing its 10th birthday. By editing the patches that it came with, one can realize that this synth still has alot of potential even today. The manual is somewhat helpful but one may get lost in all the technical jargon. I suppose that a patch editor (if one is available) would be very helpful.

This unit comes with 28 voice polyphony. However, this polyphony may be reduced to only 7 voice polyphony when the synth is layered. The effects are useful and easily set in the patch mode. However, in the multimode, only one effect is available for all the patches. For its time this was a very versatile unit.

The preset sounds are very useful. I've played the sounds at weddings, church, in a rock band and in a country band. The MIDI present on the unit works well with my Roland A-80 controller. It is very expressive.

I purchased this unit in May 1992. It has never been to the shop in the last eight years. It has never lost any of its programs. I do not need any backups. This is still my #1 module.

I've never contacted Roland. I have never installed any of the sound cards that are available.

If this unit was lost or stolen, I would not hesitate buying another one. However, since Roland has come out with the JV-1080 and JV-2080, I would probably purchase one of those for the increased features. Roland is #1 in my book. I purchase my first Roland polysynth in 1982 (Jupiter 8). I've also had a Jupiter 6 (1990), Juno 6 (1991), and Roland A-80. They are the best IMHO.

This is as much a heads-up as a review. As new synths keep coming and street prices slide for Roland's 1080/2080 modules, these earlier versions of that system seem to be showing up as trade-ins at tempting prices. I certainly couldn't resist any longer. This module seems awfully limited by current standards in polyphony, multitimbral parts, preset memory and effects. It has just one thing going for it: It sounds terrific. Did six years ago; still does. It's too limited for one-module, all-around use, but it could make a great additional set of sounds and playing capabilities for anyone who has built up along the GM route or the current analog-retro route and is looking for something different at a human price. It is not GM compatible though the sounds are organized in roughly the same way; but they aren't necessarily in the correct patch-number places.

Polyphony: 28. Multitimbral parts: 8. Presets: 192, with 64 of them user over-writable. FX: Only reverb and chorus. The module is compatible with Roland's very good JV expansion board series, so you can get some wonderful additional sounds, though not as conveniently as in the newer Roland modules. The 880 doesn't address the expansion board patches directly. Instead, you have to import patches to the 64 user-memory slots, one at a time or in blocks of 64 (the expansion cards typically have 255 patches). You can, however, directly address the waveforms in the expansion boards (typically 250 or so new waveforms) so you can program new patches using them. The 880's MIDI spec is very good: It will respond to all the standard keyboard controllers, incuding release velocity if you have it. Because the patches themselves can be programmed so responsively, playing it from a good keyboard is a joy. (It does not respond, however, to the now-widely-used set of GM control changes -- CC74 for filter cutoff, for example. You have to program such things into the patch and address them with aftertouch, modulation, expression pedal etc.)

The sounds are almost uniformly top drawer. Bass and drum samples seem a little dated on the basic set of presets, but otherwise these patches were well done from the beginning. There are only 129 samples to work with, including percussion, but they are excellent samples. No little piddly things with truncated attacks and instant looping. The programming/layering depth is such that you can take this sample set to far-away places. The ROM presets (and the 64 different factory presets available for the user bank) are strictly bread-and-butter pop/MOR/jazz stuff. No orchestral voices to speak of (except string pads), no world/ethnic, no death-metal guitar samples. You can use the expansion cards (it will hold only one) to focus in a particular genre. The standard ROM nevertheless is well-selected within the Pop genre; strong suits are pianos, organs, acoustic guitars, bell-like things and, especially, synth pads. As for effects: the downside is that there is only reverb and chorus (or, you can have delay instead of reverb and the chorus effect can be programmed as a flanger). The upsides: you won't lose sleep trying to figure out how things work; the coolness of the patches is a product of sharp programming rather than exotic effect schemes; and, really importantly, since the same effects are applied to individual patches and globally in multitimbral use, you can have your patches sound pretty much the same in multi, sequencing mode as they do individually -- an area where a lot of newer synths will disappoint you. As for responsiveness -- it it outstanding. This is a module from the middle period of synth design: post analog knobs & sliders, and before the current age of anadigital knobs and sliders. All realtime control works off the old-fashioned set of velocity, aftertouch, mod wheel and expression pedal (plus pitch wheel and keyboard scaling). Having succumbed to knob fever myself, it was genuinely refreshing to rediscover how PLAYABLE this older scheme can be when the patches are well programmed. All the control is right under your fingers and feet, quickly and naturally. You can get lost in time playing some of the patches: I'd put the sound quality roughly on par with Korg's TR-Rack but with coolness living in the patches rather than the exotic effects.

The module I bought is obviously several years old and well used, wearing some kind of gunk I had to scrape off the LCD (which is growing a bit dim, incidentally). It works perfectly, however. If you get one used, have the dealer put in a new memory-backup battery while you're in the store.

If I can find another one at the price, I'll buy it. This joins three others synths so only has to pull limited duty; specifically it's great for big billowing, textured, evolving pads, something a little lacking in my more current synth and modules. (My principal use is sequencing/composing). The value/useability of the 880 is much enhanced if you have a software patch editor/librarian. Easier to program; easier to bank variable sets of user patches for the 64 slots. I've had a much fun with this as any product I've bought the past three-four years. I think of it as a player's synth more than a composer's synth (I wear both hats). Composing, you need more options. Playing, though, the 880 is involving and rewarding.