Roland MC-505

Well, if the question was "how easy is it to make this thing sound like a toy, and playback cliche techno phrases from 4 years ago?", it would get a ten. If it were "How easy is it to do anything moderately useful or creative with this machine?" i doubt it would even rate....so i settled on a 4, somewhere between the two.

These things are for sale all over now, with the announcement of superior competition from Emu and Yamaha. It accepts smart media, but not for importing new sounds or samples. Nope, if you are the kind of person who cant live within a tiny ROM block and thirsts for new sounds, go elsewhere..these sounds are pretty lame, but those are just the presets...problem is, the samples are going on 4 years old now...if you are making dance music, this is a problem. how many DJs do you know that play records that are 4 years old? thats what i thought...the new Yamaha machine samples, and the new Emu at least you can expand the ROM periodically if you want more sounds.

I suppose in 1998 when it came out, this *might* have been a techno hit making machine. Maybe I have a jaded opinion, and remember kids, I have all the gear this thing tried to replace (909, 303, juno, etc), but I dont like it at all. I bought it over the net on a friends recomendation, and needless to say, I was not happy when it arrived. Maybe its my fault for not hearing for myself before i laid out a couple hundred bucks, but I guess i cant rely on reviews in Keyboard Magazine alone!

hmmmm...my 909 is holding up well after 15 years, so I guess Roland stuff is in for the long haul.

Lets not even go there. between their tech support never returning a single email, the sketchy hours they hold, and the way a man claiming to be a sales representative for the company physically pulled me away from other products in the store to show me roland products (what
was he even doing in the store anyways?!? he didnt work there!), I have an extremely low opinion of their company (and the sleazoid that took it upon himself to bother me). I love my 909, my 303, and my juno, but they just dont make anything useful right now.

I didnt own this for very long...why bother answering this question anyways? If you cant tell my opinion of this piece from the rest of this review, you need help. But dont take my opinion, check it out for yourself...when the new Emu and Yamaha pieces ship soon, theres gonna be a TON of these things looking for a new home!

If you have ever used a software synth like Fruity Loops you should have next to no trouble using this machine. Even if you have no experience you should have no problem using this machine. I don't know why people put down the Roland manuals so much but I found that the quick start manual got me going in about 30 minutes.I have been working with keyboards for about 2 years now, and it took me about
1 week to master pretty much everything. Editing patches is simple all you do is hit the "wave select" button on a preset and choose some more tones or take some out, and set the parameters like LFO and filters on each tone. By the way, like most machines the presets are absolute garbage, they were entertaining for about 30 minutes. If you ever want this machine to live up to it's "built for the profesional market" reputation then you will have to make all your own patches.
I don't see much use in a patch editor here it is simple and does not take much time to edit a patch. If you're a beginer and you need something that has some professional sound than this the machine for you. I would not reccomend the MC-303 because it's sounds are far too simple for professinal use. Besides, I don't know how the MC-307 and the MC-303 users can do without a parts mixer, It's a very useful tool.

64 voice which is more than enough for this machine. It has 16 little sequencer keys which can serve as a keyboard, but if you're looking for velocity and after touch get a MIDI controller and plug it in.
The effects are good but the truth is the real good sounds lie in the effects(reverb, and delay are almost a must). Without effects this machines sounds would really be plain. Although, I feel the biggest downfall of this machine is the fact that you can only use one special effect like phaser once in a pattern and that is the only special effect you can ues . You cannot add more effects to a pattern
than one with the exception of delay and reverb. Delay and Reverb can be put in and out of a part via the part mixer and are the only 2 affects that are really versitile in this machine. If you pick a phaser for your bass line and adjust the settings for it then if you want to use a effect for your strings you are forced to use a phaser with the same settings that you used for the bass line. Anyway, it can accept smart media for extra memory but I have not used it yet.
I briefly tried the MIDI with cakewalk and the timing seems to be there but I don't have much use for MIDI in that way. The sequencer is the standard 16 steps step sequncer very similar to that of fruity loops. The cool thing is you can record in 3 different ways,real time,step sequencing, and RPS. You can acatually play a chord in real time and the machine will input your notes and duration of those notes into the sequencer and play it back. You can use RPS to just hit notes on keys playing them like a keyboard and it will play them back. Also, you have the standard step sequencing that everyone uses.
Roland could of done a better job in the features category but it's not too bad. If you gain experience with this machine then you can really use it to it's potential for example technically the machine is only 8 track but realisticly it is 17 track but even more realisticaly I could fit 30-35 tracks into this machine. I wont say how cause I don't want to type for the next 2 hours.

If you need more info on things like this or if you want to hear this thing in action and have ICQ just add me 65603107.

The piano sounds like a toy, but who cares it's a techno box.
The presets stink as always,YOU NEED TO MAKE YOUR OWN PATCHES.
I would only reccomend this machine to the techno head, no other genre's would work well with this machine. If you want to read about the effects read the features category. But know this, the key to good sounds is effects even if they are limited like in this machine.
If you get a MIDI controller the machine has velocity and after touch
so it's not a bad investment. The filters are OK just like the LFO, but what were you expecting you're paying $600US for a machine that can do almost all.

For some reason I had it freeze on me once, but I'm pretty sure this is rare. It's a reliable machine, I would do a gig with it. Now we come to the D-Beam, it was fun for about 1 week I haven't touched it since. It has no real music application but it's fun once in a while.
I would not use it live though, sometimes if you're lowering the tempo with the D-Beam it can get stuck at a tempo and not let go and you have to correct it manually, same goes for the other D-beam effects like resolution.

I e-mailed Roland Canada once with some questions and they did not get back to me until I wrote a mail saying I would never buy another Roland machine because I don't have the info I need. They always answer my mail's now. Other than that I have not had to deal with them.

It's a nice machine but don't expect to get huge overnight with it.
You can get good sounds out of it but in my opinion you need other gear to go with it to make a song sound real good. It's a good all around machine but those damm effects(or lack of them) just kill some of the sounds.
I definately think this the best "groovebox" out there.
Although, I have never tried it I think it could beat the RM1x hands down. Maybe when I buy more gear I'll sell this guy, but maybe not.
The cool thing is that it has basically a 909 a 808 a 606 and 707
drum machine in it, so there is thousands of dollars there. If you're on a budget this is a awesome choice, paired with the SP808 this thing is kick a%#. Anyway I want my gear list to be MC-505, SP808, JP-8080, Korg MS 2000R, and Yamaha EX-5, I think this would be a awesome setup.

If anyone wants to hear my newest song made entirely on the MC-505
get in touch with me via ICQ# 65603107

The MC-505 is the first piece of electronic music gear that I ever had, I couldn?t be happier. The MC-505?s biggest triumph, in my opinion, is the way that Roland has developed an instrument that is so easy to understand even when is so fully featured. Depending on who you are, you?ll think of it as a great pad for sketching ideas, or as the main sequencer of your set-up (as I do) both for playing live and in your little home studio. I bought it used, and I?m not sure of what OS am I using, and I?m not aware of any improvement? no that it needs a better OS, by the way.

When you first power on this ?groovebox?, you may be amazed by the hard sounds of the presets. I don?t like the presets much? I think they don?t push this machine to its limit, as they should. Same with the sounds? some of them are cool, and the drum kits are stunning, but there are plenty of cheese sounds and EFX that I guess I?ll never find a good use for. Preset patterns and patches (sounds) are not erasable. There?s a lot of user memory even if you don?t own a SmartMedia card, but it could have been nice to have the possibility of erasing them (so you don?t have to hear ?Psy Trance 1? once again). As I said, I bought it second hand and it didn?t came with the Quick Start guide? I found it later on, in the Internet, and it?s neat and easy to follow. The Owner Manual is? confusing. The Spanish translation is a pain in the neck, and some important things are hidden, but I managed to find nearly everything about this machine on it, so I have no important complaints about it.

An impressive number of features. A very good sequencer, a lot of sounds and ways of editing them (kind of stripped down JV1080 synthesis), usable effects (though they?re not as spectacular as I think they should), a lot of real time edition (lot of knobs, faders and buttons), arpeggiator, etc? I love ?grooveboxes?, and I love knobs and the tweaking that goes with it. The keyboard is? well, it?s hard to call it a keyboard. Better buy a controller keyboard, but you can use the on-board keyboard without any problem (tough is not velocity sensitive) if you need to. I sometimes do. Polyphony is 64, and I never need more, but I tend to be minimalistic? For the same reason, I have never needed more than the 8 parts that the MC-505 is capable to sequence (7 + 1 Drum Kit). If you really concern about this issue, you must know that you can trigger Real Phrase Sequences live, increasing the layering of sounds (up to 16 RPSs can be triggered, so in practice you can sequence up to 24 parts?). Some people gravity towards the Yamaha RM1X because of its 16 parts sequencer, but I don?t like its sounds? too cheese, too clean? You can like them or not, but the sounds in the MC-505 are hard, phat and noisy. The arpeggiator is very catchy, and easy to use? great for Moroder-like stuff, you know.

The sequencer is great. It can send and receive any kind of MIDI message, and though I sometimes have had problems driving other gear from the MC-505, it works Ok most of the time. If you?re new to MIDI sequencing, you may be lost at first, but you?ll end getting round to it. This machine is perfect for chaining patterns on the fly. You can mute and unmute parts (and drum parts), and go from a pattern to the next at ease. Megamix mode allows you to mix parts from a pattern with parts from another. Great for jamming. Song mode is more limited than it should. You can chain up to 50 patterns to form a song, and it works good but could have been nice to have some kind of linear recording. Anyway, patterns can be up to 36 measures, so you can fake linear recording working with very long patterns. It works perfect.

You can back-up and have extra user memory for patches and patterns with SmartMedia cards? Sadly, it only accepts 2 and 4Mb 5v. Cards, and they?re expensive and hard to find. You can always dump data to an external sequencer, but it would have been nice to use standard 3,3v. SmartMedia cards. Also, the MC-505 is not expansible? you are stuck with the waveforms that it stores.

Well, the sounds. They?re polemic, aren?t they? The presets are so so? Some lead synths and basses are really good. Pianos are awful, as a lot of ?real instruments? here. Edit them a lot and, with practice, you?ll get where you wanted. As I said before, there?s a limited number of waveforms for you to play with, but edition is so complete that you can make a lot of cool sounds. It?s kind of a challenge to make this unit sound the way you want to, so tweak a lot, work the envelopes a lot, play with the effects. If you?re not a purist, you?ll be happy with the analog feel that you can get out of this machine. The sounds respond to modulation, pitch-bend, velocity and any tweaking, so you can program very expressive music with this machine. Also, I love the lo-fi character of its sounds, but... well, maybe you don't.

The drum kits are great. Very cool sounds from the Roland TR series, and more.

Very reliable? Never had any problem with it. One of the Part buttons is a bit deaf and dumb, and sometimes it don?t light up when I press it, but that?s my problem I guess. I have heard of people having problems with the LCD screen, but I never had any. I could play live with it, yes.

When I bought it, user memory was corrupted, and I guessed that maybe that was why the previous owner had sold it so fast. Called Roland Spain, and they were nice, and fixed it for a little charge. My only contact since then? I always get into mailing lists for information. Check groups.yahoo.com/group/mc505. Also, Roland web pages are nice? at www.rolandgroove.com you can get some useful documents. Sadly, Roland Spain is probably the worst web page that I?ve ever surfed into?

I love this machine. I think it?s a modern classic, and I recommend it for the unpretentious and for the creative. I would be desperate in the event of losing this machine, because I?m still paying to my bank for it. I guess it?s too expensive to buy it first hand, so if you?re not sure you can check the also fantastic Electribes from Korg, or the classic MC-303. Anyway, when I try another ?groovebox?, I always miss a lot of things from the MC-505? even the ones that I never use! What I like about this MC-505 is its concept, and the way that everything works so great together. As I said, I don?t miss much in it, except for maybe some sampling, but I understand why it?s not featured (it?s expensive enough the way it is!).

The MC-505 will help you develop you composition skill whatever music you make. I was amazed to read in a review below that you must ?never use this machine for a music style apart from the ones it was intended for?? hell, what? Use it for anything that please you, maan. I write electronic glam pop with this machine, kind of Brian Eno jamming with The Glitter Band at Korea, and I can?t see why I shouldn?t. If you want to know how this machine sounds, and how creative you can be with it, buy Grand Royal?s ?At Home With Groovebox?, a Lp with tracks from Beck, John McEntrie, Cibo Matto, Pavement, etc?, using just the MC-505 and little more. Also, check ?Will Save Us All? from Chicks On Speed (a B-52?s influenced German combo), whose hit record ?Glamour Girl? is in fact presets ?House Garage 1? and ?House Garage 2? from this box.

Groove On!

After reading through the previous reviews, i must say that most people who reviewed this unit either a) are newbies and dont know what the hell they're talking about b) are people who have fooled around with the unit in a shop but got nowhere because they don't know how to use it properly, c) people who own beginners eqipment and have played the mc 505 and are jealous coz they can afford it, and finally d) people who own analog equipment and think that that gives them a right to put anything 'not analog' down, even though analog sounds are emulated perfectly.
My introduction out of the way, for ease of use, i'll give this a 3 for when u first buy the unit, because even though the manuals go into great detail about most things, its still easy to get confused, and it will take you a few weeks to learn all the controls and remember where the hell they are. As for ease of use after u've owned the unit for a few months i'd have to give it an 8, because all of this machines features can be accessed by a maximum of 3 'menus'. That means.. everything is a maximum 3 button pushes away. Thats not a lot is it, considering how much stuff you can achieve with this thing.

I use this unit to make make all different kinds of trance. That means melodic trance, hard trance, tech trance, and so on and so on. I dont use it for any other style of music making so i cant comment on how efficient it is if u want to use it for, lets say r 'n b. Trance tends to be a style of music that relies heavily on effects. This unit has all the effects that you need to make a song of yours sound PROFESSIONAL, and sound just as good, if not better than music u may have bought on CD. A lot of people put the d-beam controller down by saying that its lame. I fully understand why they say that, though they miss the point entirely. The purpose of the d beam on this thing is to achieve sounds or effects that you wouldn't have a chance programming into this thing. The dbeam simply saves time, and is useful for creating wacky sounds or sound effects, that would take quite a while to program. Having said that, lets move onto the next topic.

The sounds and expressiveness of this unit vary a great deal. As much as i love this thing, I must admid that most of the preset sounds sound terrible. They sound very... bad. They lack expressiveness or any great depth, and when u compare them to the sounds in today's songs, they sound incredibly outdated. (as an example, a friend of mine owns a 'hard house/rave' album that came out in 1996. I was listening to it the other day and instantly recognised the sounds on it, they sounded like mc 505 presets. I guess that will give u some sort of an idea. The 505 was designed in 1996/97 and i guess that makes sense. I'd also like to comment on other presets such as preset patterns, and preset songs. They are all terrible. The people who wrote these songs may be known in japan as djs but the stuff they programmed on this thing is absolutely horrific. If you got into electronic music 2 days ago, u might find them entertaining for a while (a few minutes) but if you are into decent music and labels (ie. Perfecto, Globalunderground, Sasha/Digweed, Oakenfold, etc. you will know what i mean. The people who wrote the preset patterns on this thing should be killed. They used none of the effects/features of this thing, and the ones they did use they stuffed up big time. They didnt tweak anything right, the sounds they used suck too. So, if you listen to any presets, they will put you right off buying this thing.
On the other hand if you have an ear for music and you are talented, you can achieve ANYTHING. I have had this unit for about 6 months, and in that time i made my own sounds, drums, patterns and songs. I tweaked things and i tweaked them right. I used effects the right way, and paid attention to all sound settings and every miniscule detail. What did i end up with? - Songs that sound BETTER than the albums i have bought on cd. As an example, my tracks sound identical to those you'd hear on the global undergroud series. I am not talking out of my arse by the way. It took me a few months to get it sound this good, but i got there. When u think about it, u can compete with artists who have 10+ instruments in their lineup, and here i am, achieving the same sound with a single mc505. The bottom line is, if you are not good enough (u may be good, but you have to be GOOD ENOUGH) if you are not good enough, this unit will frustrate you, and you will brag on about how much this thing sucks and how all your songs 'sound the same' - as one previous reviewer has stated. Its all up to you. This unit has all the features you want and need to make professional songs. Its up to you to tweak things right, and put time and effort into whatever you are doing. As the saying goes... what you put in, is what you get out! Then i read all these reviews and people complaining about how this thing is not analog. I DONT CARE IF ITS ANALOG OR NOT, WHEN I CAN MAKE IT SOUND BETTER than MAURO PICOTTO, OR TIMO MAAS, OR SASHA, OR ANYONE ELSE. I DONT CARE IF ITS NOT ANALOG WHEN I CAN GET FAT BASSES AND FAT SYNTHS AND FAT, PUNCHY DRUMS HAPPENING, JUST LIKE THE ONES I KEEP HEARING IN SONGS ON THE GLOBALUNDERGROUND SERIES. (by the way, if you know about globalunderground, you will know that those cds shit all over anything else out therer as far as trance or progressive music is concerned) This machine can give u the basslines u want, the drums u want, the synths u want, and whatever u want. You just have to tweak it right (Otherwise it will sound like shit) So anyone who has complained about the sounds, can go and stick a carrot up their arse. As for people who complain about the realism of the sounds, for example how the piano soundds dont sound like a real piano, etc. Hello its not meant to sound like a real piano, its meant to sound like the piano sound that you keep hearring on cds, and etc. the same goes for any other instruments that they complained about; ie guitar. That sort of complaining is so immature and narrow minded

Never had any problems. Very sturdy. If you drop it thats your fault.

Never had to use customer support coz i have common sense. Whenever i needed help with something, i thought about it before i started asking other people.

Overall its an excellent machine. I manage to make professional songs with it. If you cant, (like most reviewers before me) then u suck. So go hit something, or better still, kill yourrself instead of embarrassing yourself by complaining about something you dont know how to use properly. In conclusion i will sum up this machine in a single sentence. It is excellent for trance, and you can make it sound professional, but only if you put time and effort into it, and only if you are truly talented, otherwise, it will sound very amateur indeed plainly because it was designed like.. 4 years ago, by people who werent really talented to begin with. I dont know wether to blame that on the japanese in general (how many famous japanese artists/DJs do u know of???) or Roland themselves, for hiring lamers as patch/pattern/song producers. Either way, you have to be very good to make this machine sound pro, and that really is all i'm saying :) If you need any help with anything, or just want some advice, or want to have a further discussion, drop me a line at squarepusher60@hotmail.com

The presets are ok, but the real fun to be had is when you start morphing them into your own style. Editing the sounds are easy once you realize how many ways there are to change them. It comes with 2 manuals. The quick start one tells you some of the basics and then there is a thick one which explains every parameter in detail.

It has some good built in effects that are all able to be edited. It has an onboard sequencer that lets you record up to 32 measures of music with 8 different tracks. My only complaint is that you have to be dead on with your timing. If you aren't what you record will not be what you hear when it's played back.

It's a digital instrument so a lot of the sounds that are listed do not sound just like their real counterparts, but this is to be expected. It would work well for any electronic based music.

I have owned it for 1 1/2 years and have never had a problem with it. I would definitely play live with it.

If it was stolen I would get something else just because the sounds are quite dated now. I also own a Nord Lead 2, Roland SP 808, Yamaha PSR6, and used to own a Novation bass station.

Very easy if you study the manual carefully. Its not as easy as the MC-303, but it has more features too.

The features are wonderful. This baby will do almost anything. I am still learning more and more features on this unit every day.
Very impressive.

The sound quality is remarkable! There is so much to work with and each sound is so tweakable. Also there are many many sonic flavors that you wont expect in a unit like this.

Solid Solid Solid

Roland is really one of the best companies out there.

This MC-505 is one of my favorite pieces of gear. It does so many functions that its become indespensible for me. Its a very creative and inspirational device.

HA HA HA HA!!!!! this thing is like layers upon layers of different functions for all the same knobs. you need to be a rocket scientist to comfortably be able to tweak anything that isnt in the top layer (eg. changing the rate on an LFO - the knob to do it will change the depth unless you change the function of the knob which is annoying to do all the time), which is real unfortunate because if you have an idea it taskes like ten minutes to figure out how to do it. not like the mc 303 where all its features had a corresponding knob, thats what it did and it did nothing else. nice and easy and fun to tweak.

It does have many many features, almost TOO MANY. One really crappy feature is whenever you save a pattern it saves over all the patches you used in the pattern. So, for example, if you make a little tune and change the organ sound or something, instead of just saving the pattern you have to individually save every patch (sound) you changed. so it is very very very easy to save over patches that you already used nad therefore the chance of screwing up all your other patterns is a possiblilty everytime you make a new pattern.

For the longest time, I really hated the sounds on this. recently i have made a handful of cool sounds, but it is hard because when you scroll througgh the sounds you are only scrolling through the sound patches, it is a little difficult to find the actual waveforms - which in my opinion you need to start from when making a patch because every patch on this thing is like copyright free sounding cheeseball stuff, the patches seriously sound like something on one of those commercials for local business's that are recorded on camcorders , you know what im talking about.

oh yeah, we've dropped it and kicked it and stuff. It hasnt erased patterns because of a glitch or anything.

N/A

This was supposed to be an MC 303 replacement, but i want my old mc 303 back more than anything. It is like a pile of features all poured randomly into a very confusing design, and its sounds are weak. Sure with enough tweaking you can get almost anything to sound cool, but there is some weird quality about these sounds that is almost unsavable. With all its features and everything it has become nothing more than a slave driver for other synths for me.

Most of the presets suck. The manual is very in depth. I feel the need to take music classes to understand some of it. I have to read one thing over and over. And you can't just find a section you need to know about and read it you have to read the whole thing. I hate the manual. I am going to order the video manul and see if that helps. Editing preset patches is easy but I have loads of problems editing my own.

good features, I guess.

I wish they had put in more strings and voice-like sounds. This box needs softer sounds!!!

I never had problems

I tried searching roland's site and cannot find where to e-mail them.

The more I find out how to do different stuff on it the more problems I have. I wouldn't buy another if it got stolen. I would find the person who took it and hand him the manuals. I would have punched the sh t out of it already but it cost too much.

********** I NEED HELP WITH THIS THING!!! ************ If anyone thinks they can help me with my millions of questions PLEASE e-mail me

*** justinbaloun@hotmail.com ***

First of all, when you get the unit, you'll be way too excited to start reading the manual without touching the thing. So you find yourself trying to make sense of what is in front of you, namely a lot of buttons and knobs which seem very overwhelming at first. I found myself starting to refer to the manuals when i got frustrated by not knowing what i was doing. The quick start manual is okay, but its easy to be mislead while reading it. It goes into considerable detail, but its easy to take a 'wrong turn' while following its instructions, so i found myself going back and forth, having to read and try the same instructions over and over again. Once you have all the basics covered, give yourself about a week to remember them. The second manual is great, nice and big, the only problem with it is that it goes into extreme detail about things you don't really need to know. And the things you DO NEED TO KNOW, are mysteriously NOT mentioned in the INDEX. So, with not much help from the index, i had to go through the contents pages to find what i was looking for. (Major pain in the ass) Other than that, you'll be OK after about a month. Give yourself a month with this thing, and you'll know it inside and out!

U know the drill. A million people have talked about its features, I wont bother repeating them. One thing it lacks is a sampler. If Roland wanted to make an ALL IN ONE PRODUCTION BOX then they should have included a SAMPLER instead of the DBEAM controller. Speaking of DBEAM, its one of those features that you think will be fun to play with, and it is, but only for about 10 minutes. What it is good for is making experimental music. Thats the only decent purpose i can think for it.

Some instruments sound like absolutely shit, while others sound better than the CDs you have. It pisses me off how people in reviews slag off the sounds, with comments like, "the piano sounds cheesy" or that the "guitar sounds sound cheesy", and all that. My comment to those people; If you want a piano, then BUY A FRICKIN PIANO, if you want a guitar, BUY A GUITAR. These complaints are not justified at all. I mean, any sane person would conclude that a metal box is not going to sound like a guitar, and therefore not have any realistic expectations. Having said that, there are about 512 sounds (patches) in the unit, and i must say about half of those are utter crap. (Crap in a sense that you can't really use them for anything, because they sound too bizarre and just dont really have a pleasant sound to them that you hear in trance songs) The other half are good, but basically, the whole techno/trance music scene is reliant on just a handful of signature trademark sounds. By that I mean, a nice bass, a nice lead, some nice strings, the tr 909, and basically u got yourself a nice sounding song as good as any you'll hear on CDs. So, in essence 512 sounds is a lot, considering you'll only ever use about 10-15 of them to get the sound that you're after. Some of the patches (instruments)may sound a little bland at first, so what you do is tweak them to your liking, then save them, and you will find that they sound absolutely fantastic. This unit can sound unbelievable with the right tweaking.

It works best for dance/trance production. Onboard effects are good, but u can only ever use one effect at the time (plus delay and reverb + cutoff + resonance). It reacts well to tweaking most of the time. Sometimes the machine can slow down a little, and also, give it about 5 or so seconds when you are saving a pattern. It has no velocity and you dont need it coz it was MADE FOR ELECTRONICA, not a concerto.

I can depend on it. The only thing that is annoying, is that this unit makes it very easy for new users to accidently 'save over' their previously saved stuff. I wouldnt use it on a gig coz i just use it at home. I've never had any problems with it.

Never dealt with Roland.

If it was lost or stolen i'd buy it again, or just go for a roland jp-8000. This thing should have a sampler dammit.

Don't know what OS is running.
Most presets sound allright, but some are really horrible (see Expresiveness/Sounds).
Editing is easy as f*&k especially thanks to the nice 'n retro buttons just inviting you to turn them.
The manual is written as though the reader is an idiot, which is probably a good thing...

Polyphony is great; sure, add another tone, it won't hurt!
The keyboard might be considered crappy, but is great for recording drums live or step time. Complaints? Just buy a midi keyboard for $ 150 and shut up about it will ya?
Expansion sucks BIGTIME, all of it !Luckily, the box is pretty complete as it is, so I'm not really bothered.
Sequencer is very simple but DOPE for dance and hip-hop. It is EZ to use and a good thing. Stop bothering it with your criticism.

Once you tweak the sounds they are P-H-A-T. Before you start whining, just try and fuck with the ADSR envelope for the filter OK ?
Dance is its natural habitat. Hip-hop elements can easily be incorporated due to the great drum samples (808-909 etc.)
Effects are OK no more no less.
It just sequences what you play people, so it won't make your crappy playing sound like Mozarts produced it.

It fucked my memory up for no apparent reason ! I was pissed of and wanted to break the silver motherfucker into bits.
It is, however, sturdy and I would haul it anywhere.

When the memory was fucked, I returned it to my dealer, who sent it to Roland, who did nothing about it but leave the memory card they probably used for testing in the machine :-) so it saved me a lot of money.
Transferred the songs to the card, formatted the machine and trucked on.

I would buy it again under any circumstance.