Well yeah! Not “must have”, but at the same time the idea to test them wasn’t good for improving my sleep schedule - spend all the night after with reading manuals, surfing all info… Honestly liked them both, synthi and drumma, A LOT.
But totally get your statement “they have no soul” - both sounds good indeed, but kinda super cold and “tactical”, “fatal”, and “suicide” and “hands up, get on your knees!” type of thing… how troopers can be different? And the whole sound experience from both is a bit hard to call “in love”, impressive - yes, but…
Vowel Filter and 3 oscs, and other features are super nice… it’s like having your favorite softsynth in front of you with proper control… Honestly, maybe synth is even more appealing than DR2… Was a big mistake for me to try it as well : )
At the same time, Waldorf M was sitting close to them and was telling me - “fkk those evil things - take me with you! I’m a lovely german machine, and will work hard to supply u with most beautiful sounding things till the day we die”. Analog filters still make sense - more warm, pleasant, etc…
So it’s a a good food for thoughts… I also asked for another 2 hour test session next week with both machines in their “monitor” / “listening room”. Actually store owner is so supper nice, they even offered me 1 week test drive for both machines… I denied at this point since then I’m sure I won’t give them back : )
And despite the sound, yes the build and interface on their bigger machines is insanely good! Was “at home” after 5 mins…
So yeah…
But again I’m not in rush to sell my 808 or Juno to get them… don’t know… will investigate further…