Winter NAMM 2013 releases

[namnibor]

I honestly do not hear ANY difference between KINGKORG and my Radias and it seems to be a Radias with better keyboard and some new filter emulations. You can get an used Radias Rack and use any keyboard with veloc/aftertouch and pretty much for an used price of $700. max. I have only kept my currently only Korg, the Radias, because it really is an understatedly deep synth with many possibilities and in fact the Korg product page states it's built upon next stage of Radias--FYI, so may want to look into that because companies like to often re-wrap and sell same (take Triton Engine for example) by inventing a new name and this case instead of MMT it's XMT--same by any other name. Nor am I attempting to pop your GAS for something that appeals to you but having Radias already and seeing a repackaged 97% Radias, to perhaps save you some cash. Matter in fact, there's times I have got "similar" sounds as the Virus, but stress the *similar* here. What's advantagious about the Radias is it has 3 seperate modulation sequencers, 2-32 step sequencers, and many Arps as well and is a great tool and augmentation to our Virus with the difference though, as much as I have tried (maybe not hard enough yet) to make Radias sound as "dark and dirty" as our Virii can, have not been able to do so but Radias excells in other areas and also has very same PCM drums, etc as KINGKORG. something might consider as an affordable alternative IMHO.

[Timo]

Originally Posted by namnibor

I honestly do not hear ANY difference between KINGKORG and my Radias and it seems to be a Radias with better keyboard and some new filter emulations. You can get an used Radias Rack and use any keyboard with veloc/aftertouch and pretty much for an used price of $700. max. I have only kept my currently only Korg, the Radias, because it really is an understatedly deep synth with many possibilities and in fact the Korg product page states it's built upon next stage of Radias--FYI, so may want to look into that because companies like to often re-wrap and sell same (take Triton Engine for example) by inventing a new name and this case instead of MMT it's XMT--same by any other name. Nor am I attempting to pop your GAS for something that appeals to you but having Radias already and seeing a repackaged 97% Radias, to perhaps save you some cash. Matter in fact, there's times I have got "similar" sounds as the Virus, but stress the *similar* here. What's advantagious about the Radias is it has 3 seperate modulation sequencers, 2-32 step sequencers, and many Arps as well and is a great tool and augmentation to our Virus with the difference though, as much as I have tried (maybe not hard enough yet) to make Radias sound as "dark and dirty" as our Virii can, have not been able to do so but Radias excells in other areas and also has very same PCM drums, etc as KINGKORG. something might consider as an affordable alternative IMHO.

Yes, Radias cannot sound dark, it's far too bright, surgically clean and digital sounding.

Personally I'm not fully taken with the Radias sound and programming engine. The Radias has one, very good, fully featured oscillator, but the second oscillator is crippled, it can't even do PWM. Furthermore, activating a sub-osc lowers overall voice count by a third (or thereabouts). I end up having to duplicate timbres if I want to have PWM or other oscillator types for both oscillators, purely because Osc 2 is incapable of doing so. This is a bummer when you have to keep on duplicating parameters on both timbres so they match, and polyphony is halved due to twice as many timbres being used. The Oasys/Kronos AL-1 (which the Radias engine is derived from) had two fully featured oscillators, even the Z1 did back in 1995 (even including physical modelling!), so why not the Radias?

If the King has at least two oscillators that are fully featured, then that would be great. If all three oscillators are fully featured, it'd be killer.

KK has 127 types of oscillators (many are PCM or DWGS), but 64 are 'analogue' & noise waveforms, which can only be good. Sounds like the analogue waves go far beyond the standard four Saw/Pulse/Sin/Tri waveforms plus noise. I'm extremely intrigued as to what the rest of those particular waveforms are.

The main bonus with the King over the Radias is the filters. Having a complement of filter types available is a huge boon. That acid filter simulation that Richard Formidoni demo'd on the King in the video (posted above) sounded spot on, and the Moog filter sounded pretty good too.

The King has no aftertouch, though, which is unforgivable for a synth that price. The same happened with the Radias KB....

However it does have the XY joystick, although normally I'd use these for Pitch and Mod duties while using aftertouch (and ribbon) for further expression. I come from the Korg Trinity days with XY joystick, XZ ribbon, two switches, velocity AND aftertouch!

The 6-in, 6-out modulation matrix sounds the same as the Radias, which pales in comparison to something like the Virus, or even the Z1. The King's two LFOs and two EGs are measly. The Radias has two LFOs and three EGs. The Oasys/Kronos has four LFOs and four EGs. Even in 1995, harking from the Z1 days, we had four LFOs, five EGs, and routings galore!

Rich Formidoni (Korg product manager and demo guy) stated the King has no MIDI zipper artefects on the knobs (when turning them slowly), obviously some sort of smoothing interpolation, like the Virus has always had, which is fantastic. The Radias doesn't have this.

Where the Radias triumphs is the the mod-sequencing & drum elements - obviously the King lacks all that, but it's not trying to be the Radias, it's aimed at a different type of use.

Admittedly, though, the whole front panel on the King appears a bit of an elementary doofus. Osc, Filter, Amp should've been on the left, and the effects controls on the right. As it is, your left arm will be crossing over your right hand all the while when you reach for the filter and oscillator knobs.

[namnibor]

Yes, agree with all you stated. TIMO, do you have O.S. 2.0 loaded on Radias? The free Radias Editor is one of the best implimentations of an editor that alows one to get even deeper in the matrix and programming that is deeper that all those knobs do not allow. It's a free download and Korg also updated the midi and usb driver prior to Winter 2012.
Yes, Radias has its inherent limitations and really wished the modulation and step sequencer would work on external synths but that's what I recently got the first version of Elektron Monomachine SFX60+ MK1, as it will do all that having internal as well as extensive external sequencing. It's just such a different approach, will need to dedicate alot of time solely on wrapping my head around it. If the Elektron Analog 4 is given polyphony (which the engineers are planning and working on plus many more features), I may well consider it one day when it is a more mature instrument. Sonic Lab did a 25 minute intensive interview with Elektron Swedes and the A4 if you are wanting to check it out.
Robert

[MBTC]

Originally Posted by Timo

The King has no aftertouch, though, which is unforgivable for a synth that price. The same happened with the Radias KB....

I'd like to see aftertouch on any synth, but when I compare the price point with what I'd get in a Virus Snow for about the same amount, the KK still keeps my interest.

[namnibor]

Originally Posted by MBTC

I'd like to see aftertouch on any synth, but when I compare the price point with what I'd get in a Virus Snow for about the same amount, the KK still keeps my interest.

That's why is really pragmatic to even acquire a good older keyboard that has aftertouch or even rare polyphonic aftertouch that you may not use the synth per se but utilize it as a much better midi controller than what's quite unforgivable in the vast array of midi controllers on the market today. One such example that could be got via ebay often quite cheap and is actually still a rather innovative board for synth design is Kawai K1 or K2, K3, K4...when Kawai was making synths (which their quite advanced Additive Synthesis K5000S/K5000W/K5000rack was last synth then focused to this day on high quality acoustic piano and digital offerings), they were really quite innovators and their key-action was bar-none. You may even already have a synth you may not use that's delegated to closet for now or one in set-up that's not used much that you can use to get the most out of an otherwise cool synth that I too find unforgivable to place a crappy set of keys on it. The Alesis ION is such a synth! SUCH a deep synth and reason I keep it but to place almost toylike keys on such a sunth is like designing a clarinet with a crappy mouthpiece!! On the Alesis Ion, understandably, it is very GREAT an emulating other classic synths with it's huge array of filters and deep mod matrix, but the ION is one of those synths that does not have a reputation for "it's own ION sound"...but is again another stereotype because it too has external stereo input to run other's through it to take advantage of those wonderful filters and had always wished Alesis had released a rack version of ION for that inexcusable set of very synthy keys, YET in it's NRPN rather than MIDI standard, it CAN respond to aftertouch--it's an example of engineers rather than musicians designing a synth.
The excuse many synth makers have made is "aftertouch never quite caught-on..blah blah", well, aftertouch is AWESOME to send variety of mod matrix routings to as our great Virii can attest to as well as very same keyboard used on DSI MEK....love that type of Fatar keybed to death! However, Access DID use a totally different Fatar keyboard for the Indigo and Polar shorter board Virii...why, do not know!
Rant over but being a lover of aftertouch, it is salt to my wound!

[namnibor]

Originally Posted by MBTC

I'd like to see aftertouch on any synth, but when I compare the price point with what I'd get in a Virus Snow for about the same amount, the KK still keeps my interest.

It's all about what YOU like in the end~! Like I said, was not intending on trying pop your 'GAS' for KK, just thought you should know what is very similar in this still-dire economy to make your denero go furthest!

[MBTC]

Originally Posted by namnibor

It's all about what YOU like in the end~! Like I said, was not intending on trying pop your 'GAS' for KK, just thought you should know what is very similar in this still-dire economy to make your denero go furthest!

I don't mean to ignore your comments about buying used gear, they are all well-taken, but this thread is about new NAMM-announced gear so I'm trying to keep that on track.

[namnibor]

Just watched Sweetwater's YouTube from NAMM and an excellent demo of the Korg MS20 using external signals here> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUrCO...oYx4WQ&index=8
very exciting times indeed! Yes, back on track! Sweetwater also has a great demo on KingKorg as well just scroll through other videos they have posted from NAMM. I love Sweetwater because they are an hour North of where my parents live and I grew-up in next State over from where I reside. In the USA, save from NOVA Music, Sweetwater has best customer service as well while not feeling like you are being pecked for a commission as they keep the prices competetive. Their TC Helion Voice Live 2 Demo is out of this world and that woman's voice is simply dreamy!

[Ashe35]

Originally Posted by Timo

If the King has at least two oscillators that are fully featured, then that would be great. If all three oscillators are fully featured, it'd be killer.

KK has 127 types of oscillators (many are PCM or DWGS), but 64 are 'analogue' & noise waveforms, which can only be good. Sounds like the analogue waves go far beyond the standard four Saw/Pulse/Sin/Tri waveforms plus noise. I'm extremely intrigued as to what the rest of those particular waveforms are.

Seen in various videos:

double saw/square, unison saw (this is just what i have spotted)

oberheim, TB, P5, MS20 and 'Korg' (Radias?) filter types.

[namnibor]

Yes, it seems they have more fully featured osc types as Radias alone. What I love about Radias that hope they passed-onto KK is ability to use a rather advanced formant motion filter to record several 7.5 second samples of voice or ANY external recording, et al and THEN use it as an osc type and all the virtual patches. When looking at Radias features, as I mentioned to TIMO, it's important to see the massive update O.S.v2.0 brought to it and an editor with up to date drivers that's barnone than I have seen from other synths rather than from a third party...and free, of course. This NAMM, Korg definitely showed innovation AND safely would say coupled with DSI Prophet 12, kinda overshaddowed Moog's "budget sub-phatty".
I can confirm that the DSI Prophet 12 is not only 5 Osc per voice, but ONE of those is full spectrum of Wavetables and other goodies from the Evolver series and some NEW atmos-parameters for sound. He does use DCO's, totally analog osc's that are simply digitally stablized but many tools to create total chaos. My Sweetwater rep gave me quite the low-down but am only interested in preordering the Korg MS20....am SO AMPED!!!