fair. you do have to dig in a little bit to learn the differences. I’ll try to give a basic overview, as I see it. I’ve owned most of these.
OB6 and Prophet 6: P6 came first and was considered a revival of the Prophet 5, with an extra voice, extra modulation, and effects. but slightly different voice circuitry. the OB6 took that same idea, but used the voice circuitry from the Oberheim SEM’s oscillators and filters.
Prophet 5/10: revival of the original vintage synths, as close as possible. no effects. mono output only. more limited in the modulation department than the P6/Rev2. but a more “pure” and “characterful” vintage sound, because of the circuitry used.
Take 5: I’m no expert on this one. essentially a budget prophet 6 in a way (but 5 voice). but it does offer some things the P6 doesn’t, like full oscillator wave shaping. simple and fun. and well-loved.
Rev2: more modulation options than any of the others. more voices (8 or 16). has effects. can be multitimbral, stacked or split. the base sound has less character and vintage vibe than the P6 and P5/10, but with all the modulation, can sound similar, and go much further.
which one is right for you depends upon what sound you’re after, your budget, and how you like to work. I’ll try to keep it simple: small budget: Take 5 (or the Oberheim-ish equivalent that’s coming soon). big budget: any. if you need effects built in, go for P6 or OB6, depending upon which sound you like better. go Rev2 if you want lots of sound sculpting and design options. and Prophet 5/10 if you really want THAT sound, and additional effects to add to it.
It is its own thing: P6 adjacent. But really fantastic modulation capabilities. It can get weird. Really weird. But also can just sound good like an analog poly. I imagine the TEO 5 will be similar but with a few different sounds / tricks.
I think it’s cheaper because it’s built around SSI chips for VCO and VCF but digital for VCA and modulation. It’s super high sample rate digital though, so audio rate modulations sounds great.
sure, compared to the OB6 / P6 I’d describe the sound as a bit more ballsy and slightly saturated (although doesn’t need to be like this if you turn down the levels into the filter). The feedback / drive knob is awesome and adds a little more spice. There’s a couple of extra aftertouch destinations (fx mix).
The other main difference is that there are 3 oscillators and you can layer up the oscillator waves (like on the P5/10) so things get pretty fat and rich.
Aside from these differences it’s a very similar workflow to the P6 / OB6.
The Rev2 is the opposite end of that scale. Absurdly flexible, with so many options that it can become a bit of a maze. Sounds incredible; takes effort to get there.
well… if I understand correctly, it doesn’t have “another filter” it has “a different filter.” P6 is based on the Prophet 5’s original filter design, Take 5 is said to use “the same filter as the Prophet 5 rev 4” which actually confuses me… the Rev 4 has two filters: the Rev 1/2 filter and the Rev3 filter, and you can choose between them. doesn’t seem you can do that in the Take 5. so guessing it has the Rev 3 filter…?
also the “another filter” thing confused me even more because the Prophet 6 does have “another filter” haha. it has a high pass one in addition to the low pass.
also also… I should’ve mentioned in my overview above that the Take 5 is 3.5 octaves. the P6 and OB6 are 4 octaves and the Rev2 and Prophet 5/10 are 5 octaves. of course, there are desktop versions for all of these (other than T5) too.
I totally forogt that the Take 5 is 3.5 octaves. the principle really is for it to be a portable and first polyphonic synth (going by the marketing). but it does seem to be its own thing too. now I’m kinda talking myself into trying one out!
I’ve even more confused. Prophet 5 Rev 1 and 2 used the same filter (and this is what Prophet 6 uses). Rev 3 used a different one. and Rev 4 lets you choose between those. there’s literally a button on the Rev 4 which toggles between “1/2” and “3.” and the literature for Take 5 says it uses “same filter as Prophet Rev 4” but it has no such toggle.
Here’s how I understand it. The P6 is discrete design, inspired by Prophet 5, but it is its own design. Sometime after the P6 was released, Dave Rossum started reissuing, or making the updated versions of the classic filter chips, two of which end up in the P5R4 as the 1/2 and 3 filter. The same 1/2 chip is in the Take 5, although, the one in the Take 5 has a bass compensation circuit.
I think it’s funny when devices get analog firmware updates, like SSL did with the optional compressor in the Fusion. It’s like “Guess what, your machine could always do this, but we didn’t want you to have it for a couple years”.
the P6 has effects where the P5/P10 do not. Also P6 is stereo I think whereas P5/P10 are mono if I my understanding is correct. Question is which sounds better overall and has better filters?
Are you sure that P6 is not using the Curtis filter?