Yamaha RS-7000

It's very easy to use once you get used to it.. It's very straight forward actually. THe presets sounds good enough especially the drum kits.. THey are fat and includes everything you need to create dance/hip hop music. It's a great drum machine. Editing patches is simple..

The effects especially the reverb is top notch. The effects are my bread and butter to make the RS sound cool and professional..

The EQ per track is very good.

I wish the RS has more flexibility on the Arpreggio though. It's very limited..

It's perfect for old school electronic music stuff which I like.. It doesn't do glitch stuff thank God. If you want to make straight up synthpop/hip hop/electro dance stuff this would be it.. For Trance the sounds might be a little 90's. If your going for trance go with the computer.

I'm sure it's fine.

I came from the RM1X sequencer from 2000 - 2006 before moving to Ableton Live(the best audio sequencer ever). So I'm familiar with this unit. Easy to use indeed once you get used to it.

I did read the manual which took me a couple of days.. I know the unit inside out.

64 note, great delays, cool reverb as you gotta have reverb for this unit.. The effects are the only reason why your patches can sound valid. You gotta mask it.

I like the fact that this can be the center piece for your other synths just like Cubase, etc but hardware. But then you still have to record it to audio so you have to go back to your Pro Tools, Cubase, etc.

I take it outside my studio and use it as a sketch pad.

THE EFFECTS and EQ(per channel) is one of the highlites besides it's sequencer.

I haven't really sampled... I should cause I've been sampling single hits as oppose to loops.

Also, smart media cards are widely avail on the net.. I never done it but I heard you can edit on the computer, put it on the card and load it up on your RS.
This is perfect for synthpop music which I make.

I really want to like it sounds.. I really really really do.. I've had this thing for about 8 days now and in the beginning I had that wow factor.. The last two days I wanted to check out the banks and phrases and they do sound digital you have to mask it with a little delay and reverb..

Anyway, if you get this unit I'm sure you'll find sounds in it that could be your staple sound anyway.. I mean bands or producers use the same sounds.. Was I impress with the internal sounds? some of them.

The RM1X was definetely reliable but I didn't have to save on a smart card though.. I don't know why I have to save on a smart card on this one.. And on some I have load everytime I power up? I'm new to it..

Haven't talked to any of them.. I have talked to a Yamaha rep in their motorcyle department though... Does that count? he was pretty cool.

I traded this unit for my Micron. I wanted a new instrument that I can create music with one box(even sample).

I don't like the fact that I have to get an SCI hard drive or Zip.. I probably wont because I don't use big loops anyway. I can probably get by Smart Media cards and load them up with single hits like kicks, snares, bass, fx from my sampling collection. I won't be doing that soon.. All I want is to get the vibe, melody, by creating patterns and choose the ones I like so I can reproduce them on Ableton Live.. I will never leave Ableton Live and I will probably be doing hard disk recording .. I better.. THose UAD and TC cards rock.

Some Functions aren't mentioned at all in the manual..
..

Amazing

Fantastic

A Digital Brickstone..

..Some Key Features aren't mentioned in the manual..
Look up Rs7000.org for this,

This is the most slept-on Hardware Sampling/Synth Sequencer since..
Top sound,features and a solid unit all together.

There is nothing like it in terms of Hardware sequencing..

IT'S NOT THAT EASY TO USE BUT MOST EXPENSIVE MULTI FUNCTION EQUIPMENT IS. I WILL SAY IT IS WORTH IT TO LEARN HOW TO USE THIS BEAST.

IS HAS 16 TRACK SEQUENCER, 1000 SYNTH VOICES, MAD DRUM SOUNDS A SAMPLER WITH SLICE FUNCTIONS, EFFECTS, MIDI DELAY FUNCTION, EQ ON EACH TRACK.4 MEGS STANDARD MEMORY CAN UPGRADE TO 64MEGS CAN INSTALL 6 OUTPUT EXPANDER FOR TOTAL OF 8 OUTPUTS
2 VELOCITY PADS LIKE ON AN MPC.I HAVE RECORDED VOCALS INTO THE SAMPLER AND DONE FULL SONGS WITH THIS THING.

I HAVE HEARD BETTER HAVE HEARD WORSE JUST BRIGHTEN UP SOUNDS WITH EQ ADD EFFECTS SAMPLE RESAMPLE FILTER EDIT VOICES.THE KEYBOARD IT FLIMSY BUT I BABY MY EQUIPMENT SO IT IS OK.
I DO HIP HOP AND R AND B IT CAN WU TANG PETE ROCK TIMBERLAND J DILLA WITH NO PROBLEM IM AN OLD SCHOOL MARLEY MARL 80'S BABY IT IS USED BY MOST PEOPLE FOR TECHNO I DONT KNOW WHY MORE PEOPLE DONT USE IT. IT HAS A BIT OF A LEARNING CURVE THE TERMS USED PATTERN CHAIN CAN BE A ***** AND COPYING SECTIONS I JUSTDO DIFFERENT PATTERNS IN CHAIN INSTEAD OF DIFFERENT SECTIONS IN SAME PATTERN.MIDI SYNC IT TO 8 TRACK LAY VOCALS AND EDIT PATTERNS AROUND VOCALS MUTING OUT PARTS OF EACH TRACK TILL IT IS A HIT.

I BOUGHT GOOD MEMORY CHIPS AND OUTPUT EXPANDER GOT LATEST OS UPDATE AND HAVE NO PROBLEMS IF YOU HAVE TOO MUCH STUFF GOING ON AT 1 TIME SEQUENCER FARTS A BIT JUST TAKE SOME STUFF OUT. I HAD CHANCE TO GET AN MPC 2000XL FOR 391 OFF EBAY CHANGED MY MIND GOT THIS AND IM NOT MAD AT ALL
EVERYTHING IN 1 BOX I LOVE IT

HAD QUESTION ABOUT SAMPLE TIME MAX WITH MEMORY UPGRADE E MAILED YAMAHA THEY E MAILED ME BACK IN A WEEK . NO COMPLAINTS

IF LOST OR STOLEN SOMEBODY BETTER WATCH OUT I WANT ANOTHER ONE NOW.BEEN MAKING BEATS SINCE 1987 HAVE KORG ESX-1 GATHERING DUST(ITS SEQUENCER SUCKS) I HAVE USED AN MPC BEFORE AND YEAH IT'S EASY BUT IT'S JUST A SAMPLER EVERYTHING YOU CAN DO ON AN MPC I CAN DO ON THE RS 7000 I MEAN EVERYTHING AND MORE IT HAS MORE TO DO WITH YOUR SKILLS NOT YOUR GEAR YOU GOT BASS SYNTHS PIANOS DRUMS FX .

Version ? - the one with extra combined filters (LPF & BPF combined).

Very intuitive to use (tho' I did come from the QY100). The massive plus here is the real-time tweaking which include clock shifts, midi-delays, Octave switches, LFO, pitch, effects, filters...responsive and makes you feel like a musician rather than a programmer. Navigating menus and sequencing is easy, fast and ergonomic.

I always use the "Song" mode...great for live use and non-linear real-time track recording.

Can't really edit patches (the presets can and do sound a bit weak). One has to play with the various knobs and use your ears.

I have rarely referred to the manual but it seems well-written enough.

Forget the on-board keyboard (use it for certain basic percussive sequencing) and use a decent midi keyboard. I recommend one with a good velocity range (the Roland PC ranges are good, 5 octaves for abt ???130).

LOADS and LOADS of features, tasks, settings...a lot of them real-time controllable (with recording too). Tasks (or jobs) for almost anything you can think of...apart from pacth-editing or LFO programming (although there is a limited LFO-editor).

Built-in effects add a lot of meat, space and mystery to the neutral presets. Only being able to assign 3 effects in a whole song is limiting and one also can't choose a flange and distortion simultaneously. But the effects are fairly editable.

The on-board sequencer is the heart of the RS7000 and is flexible, powerful and easy to use. Might be weird for Yamaha newbies but I like it. Not a match for top-level Cubase or Logic sequencing tho'.

With a good midi controller you have the full velocity range of 1-127. The RS disappointments somewhat with its western real instruments sounds (guitars & pianos) but is better with ethnic patches. Some synths sound a bit washy and most all the drum-kits unexciting (as in standard) - again, one has to twiddle the knobs to personalise and excite the sounds. Example: for psy kick-drums select BEF filter with cut between -55 to -40 and resonance on minimum (-64).

Although it seems a lot of guitarring rock musicians use this for drum backing...and I gather hip-hoppers use it too, I use it for dance beats. On quality sound-systems and with an external hardware compressor (I used a Samson) I played some FAT sets with the RS reacting very well to live-jamming. In a techno club environment suddenly all your doubts about the RS-sound are blown away. RS also works well for non-linear ambient music.

I want: more adventurous presets, the ability to choose more effects for one song.

I like: massive editing functions to make those presets sound better and much more interesting.

Well...I have had it for about 5 years and played dozens of squat parties, gigs and partook in many more bedroom jams. It's also crossed the north sea successfully. The whole time I only ever wrapped it in a soft suit bag with towels wrapped round it! It has a few scars but and two real defects:

1) the master volume control is iffy, possibly due to a knock or spilt liquid.
2) sometimes a song will become stunted and start farting and playing out of time...I know of no other solution than to give up on the song.

Seen as it has been in some quite harsh environments I judge this to be a strong, robust baby.

never had to.

I would miss it if it were gone. I can make a complete techno song from a blank song within 10 minutes and real-time jam away for hours thereafter! That live aspect I would miss.

Other gear have more been accompaniments to the RS: Zoom RFX2000, Samson S-COM, Roland PC midi-keyboard, some battered old mixer, mics/guitars and other instruments (not played by me), TC Electronics FX-box, Darkstar synth (hardly used).

I rinsed the RS a long time ago but can still have fun with it. I briefly played the Roland 909 and 505 but they somehow left me cold (granted, I didn't spend too much time on them). I started playing music with the Yamaha DJX in 1999, progressed to the QY100, then the RS in early 2002. Nowadays I jam with the RS but also play around with software (not as fun).

The thing I hate most about the RS:

a) that bloody bug which stunts the song (see "Reliability section). I think this might just affect me as I haven't come across any mentions of it elsewhere.
b) after 5 years rinsing this baby...sometimes I feel sick of any sound it offers, effected or no...and curse its pretend claims to proper sounds (a banging gig is a good cure for this).

Thing I love: Well...lots of stuff as already mentioned. The fact that I have easily spent over 2000 hours playing on it since purchase mean it has achieved "Legend" status for me.

Interested people can check out:

www.myspace.com/elseedydeutschland

for some unmastered, unadultered, straight-out-da-box RS action!

i've got it running thru the motu ultralite via G5 MCintosh.
second OS I suppose, wrote to yamaha with a smart media card, sent back me loaded with the new OS. the grid functions are over upped, and a few filters added. all the most you can punch in when recording...really a thing that lacked when i bought it

don't give a fuck about all those polyphony things, all you have to do is get the groove.. really has it. i've trIed all lot of pieces of gear, MC303 AN200 DX200 JX305 QUASIMIDI REVOLUTION, also vintage stuff as SH101 JUNO106

might try to get the multi out expansion, certainly expanses the capabilities of the thing

who's telling the sounds on this board are dull ?? have you ever been in the analog thing? just sweep the knobs, get crazy and be patient. Really great sounds if you seek for them

in my opinion always get it running with the multi compression effect ... really boosts the sound in a good way

seems to be be quite sturdy.... if twikkled the filter knob so much the paint on the board has got white. I like yamaha stuff because of the quality. i've go the HS 80M monitors that have such a powerful sound!!!! who cares, just rely on the long twikkling thing...after a few years you know who you can rely on

quite good, sent me back the new os on smart media

the best machine ever. get sequencing and knob twiddling. i'm a guitarist and often play with the thing without even knowing my fellow musician is a robot.

i love drum&bass, electronca, jazz, blues (really a blues guitar player, with a good old strat and mesa boogie).

the best thing in the area.. really

I use it with a 72knob analog tone generator drum machine the DRM1mk2 made by Vermona,AN200,DX200,roland mc303 and Ihave it all running through a 16 channel mixer,cd scsi burner,this allows me to make any sound I want just recording through soundforge,I can snap my fingers
through a mic and when I save it to a data cd,I can downld it right into my RS.For those of you who think the sound sux...keep tweeking,When you turn it on to start it always has that dull sound,incorporate always!master efx is a must,also set your boost up in the mixer mode,set the velocity high and dont be shy,what I love is the lenghts,and the hands on ability it offers,I spent a good penny on it and I have been using it for 4 years.If you are having trouble with your RS and want to know all the simple tasks that you can incoporate with all your aggrivation night after night Joker101010@hotmail.com
I still learn more and more about the real real time control.In the beginning I felt dissappointed,but now everytime I glance at it,its just nice to know its on my side,during a performance the power wowed the audiance,open mic night with string pluckers live drummer bass player the whole bid RS7000 still sticks out as a front lead.RS7000..........thank you for being a friend,as for its companion....Thank you Vermona for working so well with the RS7000...with out you I would not have killer analog kiks.....Jason from the underground group home

10

* Latest OS whatever that is.
* Editing patches is a breeze.
* Its OK, once I learned a few simple things I almost didn't need it for anything after that since navigation on it is very intuitive.

The only thing negative here is the first initial use can be overwhelming when all you want to do is something simple, but ten minutes after learning what you want to know then there is no stopping, not even for a gasp of air.

* I believe its 64 note poly. which I have maxed out on occasion.

* It has a mini-keyboard style keyboard, and what makes it great is the keys are staggred like a real keyboard which helps for quickly programing chords and playing proper notes.

* Yes, it has built in effects, and yes easy to use, except they are not chainable.

* Yes, 64 meg memory, which is a must, and AIEB expansion which isn't all that necessary and probably only needed for a few specific purposes where it could be really helpfull. My understanding is that with it, it can seperates out some tracks to some added extra outputs, say like for seperating drums from the synth parts so you can send those off for extra effects processing, or not. Otherwise, I wish it had more expansion capabilites, so say you could put an AN board in it, but it don't, your stuck with just the AWM2.

* MIDI is fully featured, pressure sensive pads if needed.

* The on-board sequencer is simply the best out there, when used properly it makes this unit the ultimate pattern looping/chaining and linear song produceing beast. It is just missing the ease of use in sequencing transposes as what made part of the QY series special. If you didn't use it, you won't miss it and their are work arounds for just about everything else that might be missed.

* By default most everything is set to sound fairly dry and neutral. Spending some time learning patch editing on it will result in some of the deepist, distorted, and sticky sounds you've ever heard come out of single voice patches. It doesn't excel at realistic sounds since it only has one voice per patch, but in my opinion its more true to the feel of modular editing on classic synths then most of the newer synths out today, and there are many little tips & trick you can do to fatten or thin the sucker out. Overall it has a great midrange sound which don't seem to clash and works well with most other gear.

* It has a master effect which is eaily confused with its regular effects. The 6 or so master effect isn't all that usefull in my opinion except for resampling them and Master Compression. While you have a choice of up to 64 various effects that can be added incramentally per track ontop of the normal delay/reverbs, they are not chainable, meaning only one at a time but some have more than one sometimes up to a whopping two effects added together if that makes any sense. They are still great and I love the distortion & amp ones the most, however they tend to drown down the original tone a tad and therefore usually have to be amplifed again in its EQ area.

* Industrial, Drum & Bass, trance, house, experimental. Probably great for anything except maybe being the more organic or natural types of music.

* It reacts, don't let it sit there, it begs to be tweaked, and will add new dimensions to playing and mixing live for shows.

* If you want velocity and aftertouch sensitivity, it has it, but you'll need to use its pads or an external keyboard, otherwise its set at what you set it at.

* You have to tweak this thing while its doing its thing, otherwise you might as well go back to DJing other peoples music. It has plenty of knobs to draw your attention.

* Its a fairly tough bastid, have had it for 5+ years, only scratches and wear marks thankfully. However, don't look to yamaha for OS updates any time, they have saddly and apearently abondend one of the production and support of these, one of their greatest units.

* I've giged with it often, in fact if I was limited to one piece of gear with no backups to gig with then it would be the RS7000 with no hesitation.

* Yamaha does not support this unit at all. However, it has a decent sized online support community.

* Never needed upgradeing except to the latest OS, and never have needed to have anything repaired on it.

* Not only would I replace the thing, I'd probably get an extra one or two of them, or borrow one from a friend that I've made buy one too.

* 10 years playing. Yamaha RS7000, Roland MC505, Radikal Tech. Spectralis, Yamaha AN1X, Yamaha CS2X, Yamaha DX7s, Alesis Micron, Yamaha QY70, Roland tb-303, ARP Odyssey MkII.

* Love its its step sequencer and LFOs, hate that Yamaha treated it like it was their bastard child, but maybe that is part of the stigma that makes it such a sleeper unit.

Its most compareable to a rolland MC-909 and a Radikal Tech Spectralis in my opinion, and in my opinion I'd rather have two or more RS's over any other comparebale unit, or just any unit, I'd rather have an RS over anything.

* Wish it had multiple voices on single patches, more expansion capabilites to add extra sound engines. 16 more tracks. Multi sample pitch mode.

* Its a music produceing mo-fo, it is in the way, the way to makeing a lot of great music. 95% of all my music is made using the RS, and its actually dificult to get away from it to learn anything else other than it.

* I bought mine a little after they came out if it seemed like I paid too much for it to you, but I didn't, and its was the best money I've ever spent on a piece of music gear.

Ok, I'm not going to say that it's easy to use, but once you learn basic stuff, you can fly with this thing. RS7 is something that I wanted for a while, since I can't afford a MPC2000xl, I got this instead. The presets on this thing stink, like New Orleans after Katrina, but that's ok, cause I got the sampler. I basically sample everything and it's a powerful sampler, people say it's even better than MPC. Editing patches is done in the same fashion as on RM1x, which I don't have anymore. Manual is very long, but you can get all the answers from RS7000.org ...

This thing has lots of features. Effects are ok, but not as good as on my old SP808, which I don't have anymore. The keyboard on this thing is the only pain in the ass, since the keys are not pressure sensitive and they wear out fairly quick ( not yet on my RS, but the same keys broke quickly on my RM1x and I had to sell it. ). I think the memory can be expanded to 32mb and it's a necessary for $30 of ebay. Midi works the same way as on RM1x and the engine is very similar to rm1x, but much better in my opinion. Better keys on this and it would have been a 10.

Patches can be edited, but you just won't get anything useful out of them, except for some drum sounds. Each patch can be edited with endless possibilities. This is good for any type of music, since it's a sampler, but I guess it was aimed for Trance, Techno, DnB crowd, but a lot of people make hiphop with it, since it's like a MPC. Effects are good, but I rarely use them, I only migh use delay once in a while or an enhancer. You can use midi keyboard with this and then you'll have your velocity and aftertouch. Sample some 909 drums into it and it's like having a real thing.

I can depend on it, but not so much the keys. After a while you'll realize that you'll need to press harder, and harder on them. I've heard some people gig with it, some guy even had 2 to gig with. I would get an MPC for gigs. But for a home studio, this thing is perfect in all aspects.

Used them to fix my rm1x and they did their job on time. Yamaha is huge, so I can only imagine they would provide the best of the best.

If it got lost or stolen, I would propably get an MPC2000xl cause it's just an industry standard and I love those pads on it. But for right now, it serves me just fine, it's a great learning tool and a professional sampler. Thanks to this, I got rid of my akai S2000 ( which was pain in the ass to edit ). This box has tons of features, which I don't even know about, it's an adventure every time you use it. It would propably take 1 year to fully understand it, but that's a good thing.

I used to own Rm1x, Mc505, Sp808, Dr202, ER-1 and I can say that this thing replaces them all, and look how much money I saved. I also got this paired with An200 and Korg Z1 and bunch of software, like Rebirth, Reason, Acid, Cubase, SoundForge. I do all my editing on a PC, export the sample to a zip drive and then to my RS. It's cool that this reads Wav files, it saves me lots of time, which I've wasted with that simple sp808. This is a truly proffessional piece of gear on a budget, if you want a good sampler, this is it. This is great for a drum machine, just export samples from Rebirth or Fruity Loops to your Zip disk and it's like having 10 synths in just 1. Very helpful to make music. Knobs are solid, only the keyboard aches me a little, but you can get used to it. Get it if you can, I did and haven't looked back since.

OS v1.22. I Like the presets, but I mainly use the percussion, I have a host of synths I use for non-percussion. This machine is simply awesome. Since getting it I have started making music rahter than messing around with technology. Today I added the AIEB2 and I can tell you that I am simply very happy with the setup, I wouldn't trade it, if you are deliberating about it, just get it. IMHO anyone who doesn't like this unit hasn't spent the time to get to know it. The AIEB2 is a must have to really make this unit useful, combined with a good mixer and you will be making great track in no time.

The effect are excellent, they take a little getting used to in terms of where they cut in and out, but that only comes with practice. One comment is that rather than gradually bringing in effects with the twist of a knob, some of them seem to be cliffs, where they are barely noticeable and with a small twist they are completely in your face. Effects are in two part, effects per voice applied to the internal synth, and then Master effects that can be used for internal sources and external ones too. The AIEB2 is the best option ever, my advice is expand and create. Sequencing is accurate and MIDI capabilities are good.

Effects rock

Can depend on it, and real fun too

Never used support, but have upgraded the box myself with no problems

Get it you won't regret it.

First off i struggled with this unit. When i was looking at getting a hardcore sampler + synth i was looking at this and the Korg ESX-1. I had previously used/owned a few pieces of hardware (Korg em1, Korg Es-1 ( which i loved ), Roland Mc-09, Korg 05/rw) but mostly had written my music using a laptop.

After buying my Rs7000 i was kicking myself for weeks :( i hated the massive interface and the sounds were strangely muffled. I didnt like the way the sequencer worked and when i would take it to jams it did all kinds of strange things from erasing my memory cards to freaking out with delay and i was having all kinds of troubles trying to get samples into the unit without having to sample them all again :( . I was very unhappy, and was seriously thinking of selling it. Then i upgraded to the new os and things started to get better. The sounds were clearer for one thing, and as i played with the unit more i discovered a very deep and interesting piece of equipment.

Its menus and knobs are incredibly daunting :S with a total of around 52 menus in its system, and while this is innitally offputting, when you get the hang of the unit you can breeze your way through straight to what you want.

Basically unless your a hardware nut there will be a pretty serious learning curve to this unit.. Im giving it a 7 because once to figure it out it all makes sense :)

Features abound in this unit and was one of the main reasons i bought it. Firstly its upgradable to 64 meg ram which makes the unit much more stable.. and this can be picked up on ebay for cheap as.

There are some hardcore sampled editing features, right down to being able to see the waveform on the screen and change it to a certain extent. You can slice samples, and even better is the ability to remix the slices.. brilliant for drum loops.

You can pitch, effect, change gate/phrase time/velocity, decay, attack, LFO depth and speed, filters and more right from the knobs on the front of the unit.. want a sound that filters via LFO? or maybe even pitches from the lfo? its easy :)

I have yet to hook anything up via midi so i cannot comment on it too much, but the sequencer is awsome. It really does take a fair bit to get used to as each part is containted in a phrase. This makes it very flexible for playing live as you can have one phrase going in a song.. then decide to swtich it to something else without loosing time :) the sequencer also allows you to edit phrases via step, realtime or grid.. i never got the hang of the grid and just do my drums via step and synth via realtime.

The live capabilities on this are awsome.. the way you can tweak most things is awsome, as is the way you can flick between the stored setups of your track. I did an improv set for a party the other night in which i just cut some samples and looped before hand.. then on the night made up songs using realtime tweeked presets.. want to change that hiphop snare into something DB? use the midi time knob to speed up the phrase and pitch + change the attack of the sample.. its really sweet :) :) :)

I was looking at the multi out card the other day but it was basically half of what i paid for the unit :S i might save up and get one thou.. it would be nice to effect seperate channels..

There are tons of preset sounds and thousands of preset phrases.. not to mention the ones available on the new units that come with a smartcard full of tracks/phrases... Being on OSX i could not use the bundled software but just cut up my samples in spark and save them to a smartcard ( this took me a while to figure out but its easy now )

The preset sounds are pretty damn good, and while not editable they are certainly tweekable enough to change them completely And while you cannot save your tweaks, when you create a phrase ( loop ) with your editited sounds its saved as a user preset. easy!

You could really do any kind of electronic music on this thing.. i use it for IDM beats but the other night was pulling out RNB and House on this thing just for laughs :)

There are a ton of effects built in like distortions, delays, reverbs, phases, overdrive.. blah blah blah.. they are all digital but most sound pretty good. There is also a master effect that you can play with although appart from the cool tricks you can do with the delay ( fatboy slim anyone? ) i couldnt find them that usefull.. I really did wish i could have more than one effect too :( that was a big dissapointment. For example you can have say a compression on one knob, delay on the middle and reverb on the end. it would be nice to have compression on one, overdrive on another and delay on the end.. you can get variations of effects like delay + Compression + overdrive but its just not the same as having them seperate.. fix this please yamaha :(

there are two velocity pads on the side of the unit, their pretty useless really and if i really wanted to id get a midi controller or a cheap velocity synth and midi it up.. but i guess its nice to know that they are there.

This thing is BIG! and heavy... it almost put me off buying it when i compared it to the small sleek ESX-1..

But i use it for gigging all the time, i had to convert a suitcase that i fitted out with acoustic foam for protection as to get a case made would have cost me big $$$

I feel i can depend on it although i do get a little nervous gigging on it without a backup :S

Yamaha have been fairly helpfull with queries i have had.. although they say there was no carry bag made for it when there is clearly one on the Yamaha Europe site!! go figure..

other than that i have not had any reason to contact them.. :)

I would cry if this thing was stolen :( its such an amazing piece of gear once you nut it out that im starting to wonder how i lived without it!! Nothing i have owned even comes close to the abilites this thing has ( even my MAC Ti laptop )!!

Im really trying to make my music as live as possible, and the rs7k really lets you do that with ease.

There are some quirks ( not being able to set volume to 0 on the start of a phrase, you have to do it via velocity ) but most of these seem to be work-around-able.

I wish it had selectable effects for every track, editable synth features and a smaller body :) but we cant always get what we wish for.. At the price i got mine for ( 995$ AUD, the ESX-1 retails for $1395 over here.. almost as much as my car or an apple laptop ) i feel like i walk away with the deal of a lifetime.. maybe yamaha are the devil?? ;)

www.hazyinseptember.com

version 1.21. Presets sounds are very usable, especially percussion sounds which I really like. Many of the other sounds are very usbale too, one just needs to be creative with what's available. Editing patches is very easy, one thing I have discivered is that there is a cliff on some effects when using the knobs, ie turn a little bit and it's really obvious, and a bit the other way and you can hardly hear it. This is as opposed to more gradual implementation. The manual is good, in fact there is little chance of understanding this unit without at least a brief read. Now that I have read a fair bit of it, this machine really does make it easy to get ideas into music very fast.

Well Polyphony is 64 I beleive, but I haven't run out yet, the keyboard action is dismal, but hey, it's not a real keyboard, I use my real keyboard for playing. You can add RAM to make sampling time longer and also a card to increase the number of in-outs and also digital in-out capability, it all depend on what you want to do with the unit. This unit is (IMHO) best suited a master sequencer. The midi capabilities are good and two outs mean you can hook up other other midules with ease. The on board srquencer is very good and simply a joy to use.

Like I said earlier, the percussion sounds are what I use, I like some of other sounds too including some bass. Well I know lots of people dump on the internal sounds but there areally are a lot of usable sounds. Currently I am making Trace music, and for that this machine is excellent. Having on-board sounds makes it easy to make things happen. The master effects are very nice and usable.

So far so good, I bought this unit so that I can ditch my cumbersome PC and go out and jam with it, so I do depend on it. I would use it for a gig and wouldn't bother with a backup. If worst cam to worst I could survive without it for a performance, but life is so much better with it.

Haven't need service.

Well for the price I paid I am very impressed. A this price I would buy it again if it was stolen. I also use some VA synths, Novation and Virus and also a PC. What I really like about any hardware gear is that it generally works and does what it's designed to do and does it well. What I don't like about it is the plastic build and the large size, the size alone almost stopped me from buying. When I bought it I also considered the Akai MPC 1000. I choose the RS7000 for price and features. It would be good if it had an internal hard drive and also accepted other media then Smart Media. This machine all in all make it easy to make music. If you can get the same sort of low price I would suggest buying it.

Not easy

Good efx..thats it
64 paltry Megabytes of RAM?

some cheesy, a few quality presets..can't save em though once tweaked..

forget it...you will be tempted to smash it unless they fixed to OP sys.

They tried, but denied

I bought it when it first came out and returned it a week later. What a love-hate relationship I had with this machine. It would not perform it's sample 'Recycle' type function properly so I could never get the sample laid onto the pads and syncronized to the composition's BPM. Internal sounds were weak, save for a few stellar ones. The effects were awesome and worthy of an outboard piece of gear rating...shame The 16 track midi sequencing setup was goofy, and based around Yamaha's other goofy loop sampler, the SU 700 something or other. It was a quasi-based loop-pattern based sequencing and configured the sequence on channel 1 of 16 possible by creating an initial midiloop type of track on the channel 1(usually the rythym track) in which you continued to build around the initial 4 or 8 bar midiloop track that you laid down....stupid, but workable if you like stagnant sequences that rely on one loop that you have to cut and paste continually to keep pace with the length of the rest of the sequence, which could be longer than the original and first track you laid down, weird... I grew up on Roland MC-series style of pattern based sequencing in which my pattern was as long as I wanted, from the get go, so this was a damned hindrance to me. Good news was the subsequent patterns one wrote could extend longer than the original pattern on track one, which I had to keep copying onto itself (this is why it was my rhythm track) then overdub fills etc..strange...I think It was designed to be implemented around the chopped sample that you laid out onto the spongy little pads, accept that the damn thing would never chop the sample correctly, lock up and eventually freeze until you turned it off. No panic button here on this one..shit...hope you weren't two hours into your track, cause you lost it. Even more frustrating, when you went to save to SCSI hard drive, it couldn't find the drive (even after formatted to Yamaha's stupid file format system) and yes, again, would some times lock up, meaning again, you lost all your work. I tried Syquest Syjet, ZIP SCSI and Seagate SCSI drives, all of which I used with my MPC2000xl, and all worked fine on the MPC, so it wasn't the drives.

In all, I was so pissed with this machine and Yamaha but loved its concept and wish Yamaha did a little more R&D on it prior to releasing it at is 1400 dollar price tag to a hardware craving audience who, at the time were inundated with good software options but very little hardware to control it. This is where Yamaha promised to deliver, but just couldn't cut the mustard. Too bad, because it was a great concept at the time, and still is when you think about it. I Love the concept of integrating syncronized samples into a midi sequncer that drove both its own internal sounds and could midi out to other gear. The best of hardware and software that was portable, too, so one could scratch out track foundations on the road then reintegrate the sequencer back home into their pre-existing midi setup...still, it wasn't to be from Yamaha and the idea was further developed by Roland's team and eventually produced the MC-909, which I now own, and is a joy to use with a simple 25 dollar midi controller. Still, the MC 909 is not as portable as a laptop when you throw the midi controller in on the package and try to lug around your flight case, but the sounds and programming along with the added expansion board option (too bad only one expansion board, though)make it a great way to sample, sequence, lay down beats, sync it all, then go home and integrate it into your choice of software sequencer and hard disk recording setup, if that is your thing, or just write an entire track on the 909, because I have done that as well, and it is commercial release quality, I assure you (minus the mastering house glitz and sheen. If you don't want or care to sample and integrate your samples into the sequence and are happy saving your tracks as midi info onto the the RS

Well, for the basix I use it for, it's quite simple. There are several seq. related thingz i'd like to manage, but impossible... Editing patches is quite simple, because there's no patch editor. i rate this 10, because it's very easy to use (on one hand)... (see later)

well this is a real work horse... tons of features, loads os FX, huge bunch of patches, nice polyphony, great expansion possibilities (SIMM RAM, Smart Media Card, SCSI), 16 track pattern sequencer, pattern chain, song, master FX, it even makes coffee for you... but hey, I don't drink coffee!D So what is it all for? You wanna produce music dont ya? (see later) I rate this 1, because:

1. all those features are for nothing... if a music instrument doesn't sound good, and has nothing to offer (like a 12 string noname guitar with no resonant body and no pickups at all, havin 12 strings but what for?), than it deserves 0, but here 1 is the least.

the sounds!!! yes! my favourite. I always wondered on the purpose for Yamaha to build electric instruments. well... yes, this device has a huge amount of patches on-board. Most of them sound like from below the pillow. no presence at all. If I had a kid, I would rather teach him to use Reason instead. This is not the first time I ever met a hardware synth (or so), but the sounds are among the worst crap around. Now I should mix the album of a band, which produced all their accompaniment with RS7000, and I'm afraid, that no matter how hard I'm trying, it will never ever sound better than an E seires Roland (the lowest budget of all low budgets). Of course I may not change the soundz, because... you know... it was the creators creativity. yep. how creative. loading bad sounding patches. really creative. The Sampler section is told to be nice, but hey... I have the device to sample from, I have the capabilities to program the sound I'd like on it, I have MIDI sequencer... so why should I bother with sampling with RS7000??? just to suck out all the life of the patch I programmed with sampling? nonsense.

anyway. the sounds may fit for live acting... (or playing around)... but if ever want to step forward (going into studio to make it sound good (or at least better)) you will immidiately feel the lack of proper sounds. really like from under the pillow. and as far as I experienced, if there's an unnecessary freq in the sound you can easily hunt it out, but if no needed frequecies contained it's impossible to get them...

I rate this 2, b-cuz I've already heard worse ...

well... really stable... a stable coffee machine...:))) (no offense) (except for MIDI, but this one is also ... "see later")

never had a deal with em.

if it was mine, and was stolen, I would laugh on the stealer...

In the last decade (even more: 13 years) I've been programming and playing really a lot of different kinda analog, virtual analog, and digital synths, and software synths. from Korg Poly800, to Kawai K4, from Roland D10, Alpha Juno2, from Novation KS, to virtual MiniMoog, and MS20, and ofcoz the almighty Reason (which is also children's toy, but a serious one). I used Cubase 3.0 on Atari, and now SX on PC, and Nuendo 2.0. and my overall rating goes like:

I have to tell you, that I'm not an everyday user. Now I have to use it (everyday) for a while, and my task is to record, and mix the songs a band composed in RS7000. I'm really not familiar with the pattern seq., and editor and functions for it, bla, bla, ... but...

RS7000 might be a nice hardware to buy, but it has major deficiencies like:

- in MIDI it's a DUMB. Synchronizing is something it really cannot handle. when recording track by track I had to face the problem that several cases it simply misses the right beat. And it's quite disturbing to slice and quant. a song when recording from a machine!!! I also missed the START/STOP/0 POS. messages, that were also known by my f***ing old Yamaha RY-10 drum computer. (for those who are not so familiar: normally when I press START on the "master" sequencer, the "slave" device (ie. RS7000) should also START)

- there's no patch editor, which is really bad as the 99% of the presets are ... crap. (no presence, and they are lack of frequencies, they are really like pre-mixed)

- there's a multimode resonant filter LP24,18,12,HP, BP, Notch, but... if only there wasn't. Really nice to increase to filter cutoff of a bass-sound in the hope of getting some high-mid, and high freqs, and guess... not much happening.

- you can access the mixer only in pattern mode, and solo and mute is only available in pattern mode...

- it's quite nasty to get along in the mixer with the stupid knobs... I never used MC909, but it has sliders!!! yeah. my forearm wants MC909!D panning, and vol is a hell to set up!

- it has a master compressor... hehe. really funny. I used multiband compressors when working in studio, but hey, I didn't find out what those parameters for. "Offset"??? between -64 and +64??? and there's a huge difference between 0 and +3, and almost nothing between +3 and +64! that's the way!

- it's possible to go CLIP when using master compressor (with 0 threshold) and using D output! Gorgeous!

- the reverb is nice as an effect, but has nothing to do with reverbration...

- the sample is said to be nice, but as I opened the manual and read through the proper chapter I've found, that I really don't wanna make samples... and really, I don't feel like I'm "weak" for it, but it's a bit 2 complicated (programming the Korg M1, or the Kawai K4 is NOT!).

anyway...

if you have this amount of money, and you're interested in what to use it for... send it to me! it's a much more worthy business than buying an RS7000... in my opinion.

and there's so much lackage i discovered in a pretty short period of time, that I guess that there are much more hidden (from my eyes), but the most important, that (in my opinion) it sounds like a real toy... ridiculous (for that bunch of money)

noah said it best for all u haters... READ THE F*KKIN MANUAL!!!

this machine has waaaay more than its rivals (mpc, 909, es1) and is only $800 right now. the knobs can twist up the sample so u cant be sued. u can resample ur own sh*t, and its VERY clean, no white noise or air. READ THE MANUAL, DAMMIT!

ive heard coughing used in music... babies cryin in the background(R.I.P. Aaliyah),etc,etc... any sound can be used for anything!!! it has built in fx and other filters which free up ur other equipment. the built in keyboard helps all of us 1 and 2 finger keyboard guys get our freak on. this is not for the Alicia Keys, and Elton Johns of the world. READ THE DAAMN MANUAL!!!

always worked, never crashed... make sure u get OS 1.2 free download and READ THE FRIGGIN MANUAL!!!

get tha upgrade from yamaha.com... THE MANUAL, READ IT!

this machine is for HIP HOP. PERIOD! this is yamaha's answer to the mpc. This is one of the most slept on machines EVER! im glad it is, i got mine. those of u that hate the keyboard buttons, u wasnt supposed to buy this in the 1st place u dicks. u were supposed to buy a MOTIF. by the way, the RS paired with a MOTIF is a RIIIDICULOUS combination! any good synth for that matter. ive downloaded lots of drum sounds from all the vintage drum machines, and set up new kick, snare, and hi hat and cymbal banks onto a 128 meg card so now i have everything mpc users have, plus more! (dont bite guys, ok? lol) 1 or 2 expansion slots and a usb port and I wouldve given it a ten, but im happy nonetheless. for u strugglin fake musicians...RTFM!!!

da relic

after reading the manual (YOU MUST READ THE MANUAL! DON'T BITCH ABOUT ANY FUNCTIONS UNTILL YOU KNOW HOW TO USE THE THING) and playing with it a couple weeks i was sold. its like second nature to me.. SERIOUSLY.. so easy to get your ideas out with little menu scrambling and all that nonsense (ala motif) simply a great product. yamaha you get an A+ from me!

are you kidding me!?!?!?! FEATURES!!!! this baby is nothing BUT features! MPC what!!?? ASR who!?!? LOL!!! i swear, if every mpc user was aware of the capabilities of this maching the mpc would be obsolete... and i am dead serious. if you produce dance/rap oriented music this is the thing for you. TRUST ME.

revereb: wonderful!
filters: sick!
multi-effects: very usable (wha wha is tweakable and very usable)

front panel knobs to access almost everything... MPC WHAT!!! hahahahahahahhaa yeah right!


ok, now the sequencer is wonderful, just wonderful... i love it. and the sampler... YAMAHA, HORAY! HORAY! it is sooooo easy to multi-sample a bunch of different waves and set start points on the fly! i mean... there is NOTHING i would change about it!

ummm.. well lets see here, the sounds are OK! nothing absolutely stunning... but lets face it... this baby is well worth the price even without the god damn sounds! so anyone bitching about the sound, SHUT UP! where the fuck are mpc's sounds!? where are asr's sounds!?!? lol! i mean, theres like 1000+ sounds on this bitch!

as far as filters go... they are so wonderful... if you do hip-hop you can get the filters to make your samples sound beautiful with that vintage lowpass effect

got it used and ive never EVER had a problem with it

WHAT A GREAT PIECE OF GEAR... simply stunning! and for the price!?!? what can compare?? i mean, i havent used the mc-909 but im sure its very similar.. but the damn thing costs like $400 more (although it does have expansion) ok... yamaha i thought of one thing: maybe an expansion slot???

ive used an mpc, asr, and various keyboard sampler/synths (including motif) this thing is the greatest piece of gear i have ever owned!!!!!!!!!! HANDS DOWN!!!!

if you produce dance/rap/hiphop/rnb: this is for you! you must buy this gear... if you dont believe me then drop me an email...
simply fantastic!

Software version 1.2. There are no real sound preesets. If we are talking about the preset styles the hip-hop set is better then the techno set which sounds to hard. The good news is that sound editing is easy, but the bad news is it is also easy to lose your edits. Manual is bad it for instance does not mention one usefull feature that if from the grid groove screen you press key-transpose this would lock the button

It has lots of features and good midi capabilities, but no expasion cards, probably they thought that with the sampler you should get all the sounds you need. Theoreticaly this is so but browsing sounds only with the RS is slow it's a lot faster on a a computer, you can transfer samples to the RS via SCSI but it is slow or through cards which is faster but it often fails erasing the whole contetnt of the card

Realistic sounds are pianos and synths. Also there are a lot of electro sounds making it more sutable for that kind of music than Korgs Electribes to my ears. While playing it often requires you to stop and save your work or do somethnig that you cannot do while playing so the workflow is not very smooth.

It is more reliable than a computer

The upgrade was avalible for free download

I am trying to sell it for over a year but nobody wants it. I prefer to play on keyboard without a sequencer. I like the number of features it has but I hate that it is not more like fruityloops of Madtracker

Great, took me about a week to figure out. This thing has tons of features! I thought software programming would be superior...No, no, no! This thing, once your used to it, is fast.

holly sh@t!, I produce hip-hop/r&b/reggae/drum-n-bass and this thing is a MONSTER! Effects are great (very tweakable to your liking) especially the reverbs. I can get pretty much whatever sound I want with this baby. SCSI is a great addition, I have a 10gb scsi drive so i never have to worry about disks or anything.(usb would be nice)

I'm giving it a 9, only because, yes, I agree the onboard sounds are a bit low budget, drums are pretty good. But I sample, so I rarely use them. This is a GREAT machine for hip-hop in my opinion, you can get real grimmy sounds, to clean and crisp. There really is no limit...(exept for the 64mb of sample memory ARGGG!)

yes! She is my baby, and if anyone touches her, I will kill them.

na

Yamaha, great job. Really, this thing is my savior.

only drawback...64mb internal memory. I load all my drums in at once, so this leaves me w/ little room to do much of anything else. But this is a small problem, I'm just lazy...

After using Cubase v5 and an RM1x/SU700 combination for two years I decided that I needed a portable solution which provided me with all the capabilities of the software and synth/sampler, but in one package.
When the RS7000 was released, it seemed like the perfect solution to my needs. I finally bought one in 2001 and have been using it exclusively since then. I've upgraded to software version 1.2 and bought the maximum 64MB of memory for it. The operations on the RS7000 are very similar to the other Yamaha instruments I've used, so the learning curve wasn't as steep as I thought it would be. The sampler is fairly easy to use and is packed with some great features, especially the 'Slice' feature which enables you to break a loop into segments in the same way as Steinberg's 'Recycle' or Sonic Foundry's 'Acid' software does. Though there is a problem I've encountered with the 'Slice' feature, which sometimes freezes if you ask it to process a long sample or a loop with an unusual time signature. This happens rarely though, and if you choose your loops carefully, the RS should cope with it. The manual is easy to follow and logically organised, as with most Yamaha manuals.

The RS7000 allows for 128 note polyphony for the synth section and 64 note polyphony for the sampler. These work independently of one another, so you don't have to offset polyphony in one section to compensate for the other section as with several other machines. These figures are perhaps a little misleading however, as some of the presets use voice layers and multisamples, so a pad preset for instance, may actually be using 4 voices and therefore, 4 notes of polyphony. This isn't particularly restricting unless you are producing very dense instrumentals and you can always sample some of the sounds internally and play them through the sampler instead. The 16 track sequencer has real-time, step and grid recording modes and a large note capacity (100,000 events - though that includes control and sys ex data also). The sequencer has a nice range of midi and timing effects, such as 'Groove', 'Harmonize', 'Swing' and 'Midi Delay'. Sequencing is virtually the same as with the RM1x; and though there are times when I would like better VISUAL control over my compositions (as with a computer based sequencer), I find that the sequencer is more than satisfactory. In fact, once you get to know it better, it seems like a very natural way of working. In addition to this, there is a basic arpeggiator, the output of which can be recorded. The RS comes with a whole heap of multi-fx to alter voices and samples. These are generally of an excellent quality, especially the reverbs, delays, distortion/overdrive, Amplitude modulation, Lo-fi fx, and the internal Aphex 'Aural Exciter'. These effects can be applied to as many individual tracks as you wish. However, there are also a further 8 multi-fx which can be applied to the entire mix ('Master Effects') and these are of a high quality and very usable (particularly for live performance and Dj-ing). All effects setting can be altered and saved within a pattern or song, or can be altered in real-time using the knobs on the front panel. This is a very well laid-out and practical machine, with knobs and buttons for every function (and not much holding down of 'Shift' keys thankfully). The internal sample RAM of the RS7000 is 4Meg as standard, but can be expanded to 64MB (not a massive amount, but enough) using relatively cheap 72-pin SIMM memory. There is a SmartMedia card reader/writer for pattern/song/sample storage (the machine comes with a standard 8Meg card full of samples and demos to start you off). As all memory is lost on power-off, you MUST save everything (as an 'All' file) to SmartMedia card after each session. Expansion-wise, Yamaha have made the RS software OS upgradable, and upgrades can be downloaded free from the Yamaha website. Installation takes place using the SM card, though this requires an inexpensive card-reader/writer for your computer. There are also options to install a digital audio I/O board and separate audio outputs, though these boards are expensive additions. SCSI is fitted as standard to the RS, so you can attach a ZIP drive or hard disk to store songs/samples.

The synth presets are all servicable; there are a large range of sounds available, from basic synth tones (saw, sine, square, pulse waves plus noise and digital FM-like tones) through warm pads and crystal digital pads to orchestral instruments (not the strongest sounds but usable in moderation...the strings are good though). There are a wide variety of sound effects, from wacky, cartooney clunks and shrieks to vinyl scratches and vocal effects (the latter are rather cheesy). All these sounds are editable though and this is a very straightforward process. You have control over the ADSR of amplitude, filter and pitch; and you can change the filter type for each sound, transforming it beyond recognition (there are lots of filter types to choose from, especially after upgrading to v1.2 which provides another eight filters) and a comprehensive LFO (with bpm sync) takes this further. There are 41 drum kits to choose from, and generally these are excellent: the (now) standard 808/909 kits and acoustic kits are augmented by kits catergorised by genre, such as 'HipHop', 'drum&bass', etc. The multi-fx can be applied to each kit, as with any other sound, enabling some good scratchy or grungey beats. One thing I can't understand though is why Yamaha have restricted the filter-type for the drum kits. The drums can only be fed through a standard low-pass filter (albeit the LPF24 version) and none of the others. Why? Everything else (instruments and samples) can be fed through any filter you choose (and there are 19 of these in total - after upgrading to v1.2), thus enhancing their potential no end. The RS is basically a dance machine and the sounds reflect this well. The built-in keyboard is OK for playing drums and sample loops, but is of the mini-'button' kind, similar to the ones found on all grooveboxes; so if you are a 'player', you'll need an external keyboard. There are also two assignable velocity sensitive rubber pads on the right of the keyboard which can be used to program drum loops. One thing that strikes me is that though this is advertised as a dance/DJ instrument; it is actually a fairly successful all-rounder. It is suited to studio and live use, it provides a lot of varied sounds which can be played from an external keyboard by a musician; and samples which can be looped, sliced and effected for the DJ. There are knobs gallore, and you can control virtually any parameter in real-time from these. Despite the crappy keyboard, this is actually quite an expressive instrument.

Ever since upgrading the OS, and being a little more careful about which samples I use to Slice n' Dice; the RS7000 has been solid and totally reliable. Think of it as a combination of a PC (running Cubase and Acid with a softsynth and sampler) which NEVER crashes! I have used it for two years in my studio and in live performance and it has always been dependable. All you need to do to take precautions is back everything up on SmartMedia card (and transfer it to your computer) in case the cards get lost or damaged. I love it!

OS Upgrades are easy to get....go to www.Yamahasynth.com or the excellent www.RS7000.org and download it (it's about 4Meg in size). Yamaha UK have always been very helpful if I've contacted them by phone or email. They reply to your emails with the relevant information and if I've ever had any problems (as with my SU700 a couple of years ago) they've solved it.

If the RS was stolen, I'd buy another one as soon as the insurance cheque came! I love its portability, its ability to make great sounds AND sample AND sequence. I like the fact that it does not crash and it isn't dictated to by Microsoft. I love the controllability and the fact that it can be used to great effect live or in the studio. I make all my music on it now.....that includes animation soundtracks and my own dance tracks. It kicks the ass of anything else, especially the Roland MCs. It might not have the kudos of an Akai MPC (so overrated), but it is a superb machine. The only rivals sound-wise are the E-mu grooveboxes, but they are all preset based and don't have sampling. Check out the sounds at www.Besonic.com and search "dementio13"; all the tracks have been produced solely on the RS7000.

I'm an RM1x veteran. As far as the ease of using this machine, I barely had to crack the manual since I was allready familiar with it's little brother. Once you learn the architecture of this box, laying out a track is second nature.

Grabbed this unit on eBay with max RAM and a road ready case - so glad I got it. Haven't hit a ceiling on it's sequencing and playback capabilities. The sequencer rocks - high resolution and deep realtime tweakability. I have max RAM, as well as the I/O expansion board with Digital Optical, SPDIF, and 6 more analog IO's.

I keep finding new and interesting sounds, anyone who can't get what they need should just use a prefab sample CD. I write progressive dance music. I find the digital sound quality mixed with the grungy distortion and filter capabilitites of this box to be an excellent combo. Effects are good, I can get everything I need out of it. This unit has a groovebox step/single velocity keyboard - works fine for me.

Very dependable, never had this unit, nor it's llittle bro - the RM1x - crash on me. I've used it to gig out quite a few times. A ROCK SOLID SEQUENCER - Feature for feature, probably the best ultra portable hardware/sampler/synth on the market.

Never needed customer support.

I've used and shopped around for boxes to gig with - Blows any standalone groovebox Roland makes out of the water. This unit powers up and offers everything I need to sit down and write a techno track. For songwriting, I'd rather have this unit than my G4 Mac.

None

Some fancy bells and whistles but delving into the machine deeply you will find (unless by some miracle Yamaha completely revamped the operating system, which I doubt)that it is limited in its sampling capabilities. From other reviews here, it looks like the New OS fixed its 'recycle' features, big deal...I have been using Recycle aloe with my rack samplers for years, BUT, the important issue here is what Yamaha implied in their advertising and what did not happen when I used the unit and what I have not heard from other users since I wrote my first review of this unit and that is this:
What about playing multiple samples in different keys (after being tempo synced via time compression expansion etc) while maintaining the BPM integrity of the sample...this must be done if you want to play multiple samples from different sources in sync together and in a Key (ie A# B etc) that is musically usable...I could never get the unit to do this....If anyone out there has a way to do this on this unit, show me and I will eat my words and buy the unit.

Decent sounds for sure....a nice music box but not a great sampler...

crashed while saving to SCSI...see other reviews

Took a week for them to get back with me

The unit at the time I purchased it was a total Piece of Crap----Rick, ironically, states that my review was a laod of crap....Rick uses Cakewalk...that explains it all. Rick leaves no contact email address....Rick must work for Yamaha.
Want a Hardware sampler all in one groovebox cheesewiz machine? Buy the Roland MC 909...better unit at this particular juncture of the battle for the groovbox market.....looks like it uses variphrase technology as found in the VP-9000 (overpriced unit for sure but at least does what it says it will..unlike the RS 7000 when I bought it new). Shame a company can't work out its R&D bugs before they pawn their gizmos off to the unsuspecting public...and even a further shame that they advertise ambigously to give one an impression of the power of their unit only to sell you something that 'knda, sorta' does what they 'implied' in their advertising, but neither either or...whatever...I am turned off to Yamaha completely...you couldn't give me a piece of their gear for free...I have considered the AW 4416, 2816 and now the AW16G...Nope, aint gonna happen...I link two ZOOM HD recorders are spend the real cash on an Akai DPS24...I just don't trust Yamaha or their lying asses marketing strategies...
Rick, kiss my ass.....
Still, nothing beats an EMU and some good software like Kontakt, if you want to really mangle samples

I'm using operating system 1.14. The Preset sounds are suprisingly
unimpressive for a machine in this price range.
The sounds work well enough for a sketchpad sequencer. (Which is what
I purchased this for.) I can't imagine using many of these sounds for
a final mix however.
There is no true editing of sounds. You can tweak the ADSR in real time
which can be a blast.
The manual is not bad at all. The tutorial is a great help.

The effects are decent but they won't make you put your lexicon gear up
for sale. It has several expansion options that, for the price, shoule
be standard equipment. To center a production around this you would need
at least 4 individual outs.
The MIDI implementation is where this little, plastic box shines. Very cool!
The sequencer is nice. I wish there was a software version of this sequencer.

The instruments are far from realistic. I don't think realism was what
Yamaha had in mind. The drum sounds are cute but grainy. Not something
I want to use on a client's session. I really wish that all the keys
were velocity sensing. For the money, Yamaha could have done this much.

It has wigged out a couple of times. However, I use this in situations
where I don't want to take my Powerbook and a recording rack so the
environment is not always ideal. The smart media cards and Yamaha's
typically bad SCSI implementation don't give me too much confidence.
Work a little and backup and repeat.

Yamaha has always been a good company for support and I've been in the
biz for quite a while.

I would probably not buy this again. I have since gotten a Motif for my
scratchpad and the sequencer on it works well enough for getting ideas
down. And the sounds can make it all the way to the final mix.

I think that this is one of those generational differences. I came up at
a time when recording technology focused on audiophile standards. If I was
delivering my final product as MP3s, the low res sound of the RS7000 would
probably not bother me so much. It still works fine as a sketchpad. $1,000
just seems a little steep for a sketchpad.

Mine runs on OS v1.14, no known bugs on this one. The preset sounds are mixed, some are average ok, some are excellent. Especially some synth-pads, synth-leads and the 63 drumsets are fantastic. Editing the sound is easy as a fart. The manual is one of Yamaha's better ones. And if it doesn't help you, there is a large community out there to help answering your questions.

FAQ: http://www.rs7k.org
Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RS7000

The built-in FX are easy to use, the quality goes from good mid-range outboard-FX to better studio fX ones. Excellent is the EQ for each track separately and the master EQ. Also REALLY excellent are the very analogue sounding filter. The RS can be expanded with usual EDO/PS2 SIMMS up to 64MB Sample-RAM, with the AIEB-2, which gives you 6 extra Audio-outputs, and two digital I/O's, the built-in SCSI-2 interface accepts HD`s, ZIP, JAZ, CDROM. Also the RS has a built-in SmartMedia Card Reader, which can be used with Cards up to 128MB.
You get besides the known small plastic keys, two pressure sensitive free-assignable rubber-pads, a fantastic onboard sequencer, that integrates Sampling and MIDI-sequencing easily, the sampler is not a full sampler, some features are missing, like multi-layer samples, but for a start it's great and the built-in "ReCycle" function works great. The sequencer also offers a realtime Loop Remix, that lets you remix MIDI-sequences in realtime.
Then there are a couple of other features the RS offers, like a MIDI-resolution of 1/480 ppqn and stable and tight timing and and and...

All in all once you understand the pattern-phrase concept, the RS is easy to use. The sequencer is quite intuitive to use and supports your process of composing, instead of being in the way, like most software sequencer with their zillions of functions. The RS sequencer is not as simple as like on the MPC, but also not as complicated as a software one. Yamaha found the right balance with it, to make a highly usable music instrument, especially for live usage and composing.

The internal sounds are highly tweakable and the soundquality is fantastic, The output is 20bit, internally the RS works with 24Bit.

The factory sounds are definately orientated towards electronic music, but with some of your own samples or with an external Tone Generator, like a Proteus, you can use it for every genre of music.
Very versatile usage.

It's very reliable, during a long jam session with a friend, it never failed. I indeed would use it on a gig without a backup. The plastic case on top needed though to be handled with care, the RM1x is with it's metal case more reliable, but the knobs and buttons on the RS are of a higher quality.

I didn't had a CD with the ACID-Xpress software, i wrote an email to the support in Germany and got a few days later with the missing CD, for free. Good friendly helpfull service.

Now the RS goes for less then what i paid, but it's worth every cent. I definately would buy it again plus i would add a QY700. I am using it since it came out here in Germany June 2001. I love about the RS, that it supports my creativity, my composing. It almost never gets in my way during the composing process. I don't like about it, that i have to stop sometimes the sequencer to jump to certain menus, that makes the working process less fluent, but still it's much better than fiddling with a mouse in a zillion Windows and Menu-bars.
I compared it with the RM1x, which i would have gotten, until i heard about the RS, and i compared it with the EMU Commandstations (which i don't like because of their plastic-chart sounds and their tiny small display) and with the MPC. The MPC is a nice drumsampler with a very basic sequencer. Good for what it is built, but far not as versatile as the RS. And overpriced also.

The RS is a bummer. It's now the center of my studio. I never missed Cubase or Logic since i am using it.
I also own a Yamaha TG33, DX200, AN1x, DB50XG, Clavia Nord Micro Modular.

I am using Cakewalk Sonar, Fruity in conjunction with RS, yes the rs is an all in one machine, I give the sounds for R&B production an 8 out of 10, rap 9 out of 10 and electronic 10 out of 10, but for the smart studio this is a must have if you have other keyboards with good sounds for R&B, the basses are fat though, at first I was going to give up my sp808 but I found that I can record straight any of the tracks on the 7000 and trigger samples in addition to its sampling capabilities, so I have everything hooked up via midi, that way any external board sounds can also be recorded and edited directly to any of the rs's 16 tracks, the drum sounds are great but the main thing is none of this really matters because you can load your own sounds and samples into this machine, I can't think of anything else that can be done except for a mouse and a monitor, because this can do anything that a computer and software based system can do and more, you can load external midi either via scsi or directly to a track from the midi cable and sync.....I'v done some things on an MPC a few times but that is basically childs play in comparison to what's under the hood in this machine.

the bomb

anyone without a clue can drop a track on this thing

I have seen it freeze once, but this could have been because of my midi setup

never had to yey

I give the RS a 9 standing on its own, and I give it a 10 plus used in conjunction with other studio equipment and sounds.

My goodness. This shouldn't be legal... the Yamaha RS7000!!!

Lets say you have 5 drum loops that comprise your song. If you wanted to change the speed of the loops you can pitch them, recycle them, acidize them, whatever.

Normally the best way to do it is recycle/wavesurgeon/hand cutting your breaks up.

Well I do this with Wavesurgeon and it works very well.

In using my RS7000 I finally got around to using its built in 'Recycle' feature and HOLY CRAP its stinkin fast and amazing.

You simply select the loop you want to chop, dial in a few settings to see how you like it and it chops it for you, generates midi, *and* assigns it to a track for you so you can instantly start using the loop in your tune.

Fast fast fast!

Apparently the Yamaha not only breaks it up into the individual hits, but records up to 50% of the wave after or reverses it or something so was able to take a 130 loop from 90 to 190 or more without any gapping or weirdness.

I knew it had this feature but when you can do it that quickly and in such a usable fashion... wow!

Ok next up the midi capabilities of the RS7000...

After using Cakewalk from version 3.0 up to Sonar, I am very familiar with midi applications and using them.

I *never* thought I would be saying this but the hardware sequencer on the RS7000 is more capable and faster to use (in most respects) to sonar or Cubase or any midi sequencer. What?s more each midi part gets stored off into little 'phrases' that you can use with any sound set.

Amazing.

The groove feature is also nice. You can just (for instance) record in your 16th note high hats straight quantized at a velocity of 100.

Then by pushing a few keys (ala Roland 909 programming) you tell each time part (beat 1, beat 2, 16ths etc) if you want it to happen early or late or if you want different velocities on different parts or to pitch down on the second beat for some snare variation etc.

It really shines in how quickly you can get it done with the 909 style sequencing.

You can also use midi delay, time compress/expand (of midi), velocity, swing, time offset and more non destructively and with real knobs to twist to get it done!

Whew...

So what about the user interface?

This is one of those things you don't think about until you want to try live stuff out. I sure didn't but the Yamaha folks did.

First off, the only real stuff out there that you can play live with is hardware sequencers. I suppose you could do it soft but either way most folks end up using a Roland groove product or an Akai mpc triggering their synths.

Well Yamaha took the best from both of those units.

The unit is divided up into 16 tracks and each track can trigger the internal sampler, an external midi kit, or the internal tone generator. Lets just ignore the internal tone generator because it?s pretty much a 'groove toy'. I would say if you are happy with the sound of the cs1x, then go ahead and use it. The major, major exception is the drums (more on that later).

So if look at the layout, you can mute and unmute each of the 16 tracks by a simple button press. If you need to mute or unmute more than you have fingers or care to try live, there are 5 mute memories so you can push one button to the same effect.

The sequencer works on the idea of songs being made up of sections... intro, chorus, verse, chorus so you get 16 sections, 9 of which are right on the panel with dedicated buttons.

So at this point, while live you have the opportunity to mute/unmute tracks and jump to various sections.

Each section can hold different things... for instance track 9 might be one sample-based track in one section but a variation in another. There are no rules, you get to load the 16 tracks with whatever samples and midi you like.

So lets look at a track... what can you do with a track? Unlike the Roland, which has tons of knobs but only for the internal engine, the Yamaha has tons of knobs which work on the sampler as well (which in my mi