DSI Pro 2

The Pro 2 looks really nice!
I thinks it´s more a keyboarders´s synth (like me), that wants to be played, jammed and programmed on the fly.
The AK seems more for producing and to perform things already well prepared. Jamming on stage doesn´t seem to be it´s strength. If it had more knobs, it would be perfect, but like this it´s too much menu diving on stage.

For me, with Jazzpiano background and always wanting to jam on stage, the Pro 2 seems more suitable. And the Sub 37 of course. Might sell my Prophet 08 for one of the 2.

Andajazz

I don’t do preorders either.

that’s a very tricky balancing act. Of course you have 4 voices of true poly in the AK instead of Paraphony, and the Elektron sequencer is more advanced.
On the other hand, the Pro2 does excel in a number of areas besides the knobtastic interface and CV inputs - 4 oscillators rather than 2, FM (which is a big deal), 4 LFOs (always wishing more of those), individual envelopes for each oscillator, 16 slot modulation Matrix (the weakest point of Elektron gear IMHO), and some nice things in the sequencer like step entry and modulation of sequencer parameters from the Matrix.
It’s pricey, but it does really look like a fantastic synth, and I say that despite feeling burned about the lack of follow-through on the Tempest. I’m still on track to sell that and pick up an Analog Rytm, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have serious gear lust for the Pro 2. No way to afford it for the time being unless I sold my Nord Modular, which is not going to happen. but I look forward to trying it out at a music store soon and it will definitely be on my shopping list.
Assuming the build quality is there,there’s a slim possibility that I would use this rather than an A4 - the knobby user interface is a very big deal for me and it’s also a real programmer’s synth. I love the minimal abtracted Elektron interface on the Octatrack and the design of the AR also seems completely natural to me, but I’ve sometimes found it a hassle on the A4 - when I’m designing sounds I really want to be able to just reach out and grab parameters directly, so I can tweak an LFO at the same time as an FM or delay parameter without thinking about which parameter is on which page, or creating performance knob assignments ahead of time. It doesn’t bother me when dealing with samples on the OT, and it doesn’t bother me for drum/bass programming on the AR, but I often find myself missing the knobby UI of the Virus or Nord Lead when programming the A4. I had previously considered trading it for a Prophet 08 module but I think the a4 is a better syntha than the p08.
The Pro 2…hmm. Hmm.

Oh yes please.

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:heart: I like you.

The price is beyond for me - I don’t like dsi synths anyway but I don’t like their filters which have changed on this but I’ll never give that guy a dollar of my money after the mek and the encoders. A joke. This makes the analog keys look like a dream and cheap as chips to boot…

But to reply pretty much any synth if you whack a midipal on it. If you ever go “I’d get that synth if it had…” Just put a midipal in the sentence and it becomes a super powerful synth

You’re welcome. :+1:

But, as to my original post, no one cares that Dave Smith made a Eurorack Module and dropped a hint to it in the Pro 2 video? He had mentioned in some recent interview somewhere else that he will be exploring doing a Modular system. Wrong forum for that I guess; I’ll have to head over to Muff Wiggler to get a reaction for a possible DSM. (Dave Smith Modular)

re: ^

I’m doing everything in my power not to go modular…it’s a slippery slope to going broke. :slight_smile:

I’ve already looked at what modules I would like to get and the price tag continues to rise when I add those up. As much as I want some modular, I shouldn’t go down that road.

I think people are a bit indifferent to the Eurorack piece because some other manufacturers already have Curtis filters, and filter connoisseurs are not in love with it to start with . It’s neat that DSI is going into that market but unless it’s very competitively priced I suspect most people might view it as more of a branding exercise.

This is what I’m wondering about too, concerning the Analog Keys vs. the Pro 2 - the sequencing functions in particular.
The Octatrack has a great sequencer, but it does require some things to be set up beforehand, for a smooth live performance. Slicing and the triggering of slices are particularly difficult to execute smoothly in improvised live performance.
I think this is why some peeps prefer analog style sequencers for improvised live performance, over the composition-oriented sequencer paradigm embodied in the workstation keyboards by Yamaha, Roland, Korg, etc.

in a world where money don’t count much we won’t need to do such a thing and i agree with you that things should work differently , more consumers oriented
sometimes i still prefer buying machines for which i won’t need to worry much about upgrades and such, knowing that a lot of time has been spent in designing, building and testing it because once sold, they won’t come to you and say: ooops, sorry…actually, the filter circuit is wrong, can you send your machine back so we can try and get things sorted? :zonked: :astonished:
… having said that, i’m looking forward to the next Rytm OS update :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

[quote="“Mannity Joseph”"]

Yes I completely understand that and I use an Octatrack and Mpc5000 to sequence so to me a sequencer that is only 32 steps per program is useless to me since I would just use the others to sequence it and create tracks. To me that is very limited and Dave Smiths claim that it is the most advance sequencer ever in a synth is an over statement.[/quote]
i like elektron and tons of other stuff so this isn’t an either or, but the way that the mod matrix and lfos and modulations work, 16 or 32 or 8 or even 4 steps isn’t much an issue in terms of making an evolving, deep, patterns, if you like working that way.

the lfos are tempo and clock synced and can be set to speeds like 1 step, beat, bar.(i’m not sure if the speed is modulatable when locked with their new stuff, if was not with the evolver) but you can use hz values if you want to modulate their speed.

so you could have an lfo that changes the pitch every 3 steps or something, but then you use a sequencer track to change the depth that the lfo changes the pitch. :dizzy_face: then you can change the sequence length in real time or adjust the values on that.

then you could use that same sequencer values, but send it to the mod matrix and control the pitch of another osc negatively, or adjust the speed of the lfo that is controlling the pitch.

you can stack multiple sequencers and lfos of different lengths and times to target the same thing like filter in different amounts while you have another sequencer line make the basic rhythm, but because the filter line is complex a simple rhythm won’t sound that way. it lets you change the rhythm up real time without changing the filter stuff.

then you have the multistage looping envelopes that can be modulated too. :slight_smile:

if you get on with working with intermodulations to sequence, it will be one of the most in-depth implementations of that in a synth, i think. could build stuff like that in nord g2 tho. :slight_smile: but then that didn’t do cv so you could count that as part of the advancitude :dizzy_face: of the sequencer.

the evolver saved sequencer lines with the program and i expect that to continue because that style of sequencing doesn’t lend itself so much to pattens in isolation. with the evolver you could use the sysex editor to grab individual sequences, but i was never really compelled to do so.

the tempest started the play list feature that the p12 has and i’m guessing p2 will have where you can order your patches (which would contain your sequencer and everything) and then switch through it instantly. i’m not sure if they’ll make let you make the patch changes quantized. i think it can be 40 patches. and i think you get some 700 odd patches total?

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yeah, i’m into this because polyevolver. i’m also waiting until it’s released and making sure it’s feature complete and works in a way i like because polyevolver. :dizzy_face:

World Cup Of Synth…

Who will win?

Dave Smith Instruments - USA vs Elektron - Sweden

I think a Brazilian synth will eventually win!

… except for its headphones output.

My issue with Dave Smith claiming that it has the most advanced step sequencer ever in a synth isn’t to do with using a modulation matrix like almost every other synth but it’s with a patch containing 1 32 step pattern or as it was pointed out it may have 4 saved with the patch. Off course 16 sequencer lines of modulations isn’t limited in terms of how creative you can be with it but at the end of the day if you want to build a complete song made of many different sequences then the A4 is a lot more powerful (and lightning quick sound changes). The claim can’t be made that it has the most advanced step sequencer ever in a synth and at the same time ignore that it doesn’t have pattern chaining or song sequencing compared to other synths. If you want to sequence a chain or song in the Pro 2 it looks like you have create different patterns on the limited program space and then use midi program change to sequence it…with another sequencer?

Yeah, but you almost certainly would never use a monosynth for an entire song without any other instruments. It’s not a workstation-type, multi-track sequencer, but one designed for sequencing within a single patch. Seems like a perfectly reasonable description to me - when I hear ‘step sequencer’ I think of something like a souped-up arpeggiator rather than a multi-track X0X sequencer like on the elektron gear.

[quote="“Mannity Joseph”"]

With the A4 you have P locks and automation on each synth track but the ability to save many patterns and sounds where if I’m mistaken as I’m not familiar with Dave Smith Synths is they have 256 programs , So a patch contains a pattern that is 32 x 16 and if I had a song made up of say 8 patterns then that would be 8 programs out of 256 total. I would run out of those in a week and with the A4 I can save projects, Sounds , Kits and patterns. That’s where my concerns are but as I said I’m not familiar with Dave Smith synths and wondering if I can save multiple patterns within one patch.[/quote]
At least on the Mopho, the patch has a 4x16 sequencer and that’s it. It’s not really comparable to the A4 in most areas except, as I say, the option of having four (or sixteen!) sequences running simultaneously. That’s different from plocking because each of the Pro-2’s sequencer tracks will have a reset option and behave like a traditional step sequencer. So you can have a 16-step melody track, a 14-step track that alters the noise mix to create polyrhythmic percusson, a 12-step cutoff track, a 10-step effect send track and so on. The Mopho is capable of very complex sequences with four tracks and one two-osc voice, so I expect some demented patches from the Pro-2 - but I can’t imagine the sequencer being used to build entire songs, other than modular-style generative tracks.
Of course you could have several slower sequencer tracks working on transposition and mixing, so I expect someone will prove me wrong once it’s out. But I don’t think the Pro-2 is likely to challenge the A4 as a pattern-based analogue. Although with four CV inputs, it would of course make a very nice partner for an A4…