Modal 002 versus DSI Prophet 12

The Lounge Other Gear
1

I have been drooling over the Modal 002 demos out there and it is one hell of a synth. The only thing I can find that I hate about this synth is the price. Here in the US it retails at $5200, ouch!

So I also have taken a more serious look at the DSI Prophet 12. This beast has way more features than I initially was aware and actually overlaps a lot with the 002. Both have digital oscillators with wave tables and both have crazy routing abilities and a nice but different filter.

So the Prophet 12 is $3000 which is still pretty steep but much cheaper than the 002. Aside from the web editing features of the 002, the biggest differences I see are the fact that the P12 has four full oscillators plus a sub oscillator per voice while the 002 has two oscillators and two subs per voice. However the 002 subs can be switched between a square wave or set to match the wave of the paired main oscillator. Their marketing drivel claims this is like having four full oscillators but in reality they simply wonā€™t have the full possibilities of the P12 oscillators. Both synths should have exponential FM but the P12 now also has DX style linear FM which I find intriguing. The 002 is getting constant software updates so who knows what they could add in the future or what might be hidden and not yet activated in the OS.

Any thoughts on if it is worth saving up the extra $2200 for the 002? Am I making the Prophet out to be better than it really is?

2

Itā€™s hard to say ā€¦ as so often ā€¦ it depends on the intended use.

If you are doing decent sound design than at this price tag I would recommend to check out the Solaris from John Bowen. Price should be between P12 and Modal 002 and this is a machine that is almost ā€œmodularā€ and I think, it is one of the best sounding most flexible digital synths on the market today (in this price range).

All Modal instruments are very pricy and I am not sure that this price is justified by the audio engine. I have watched a lot of presentations now and they often repeat to tell us that first class components have been used. Maybe itā€™s some kind of military quality and this is expensive.

P12 and Modal 002 have both great sound engines, but what I find exceptional is the Arp/Sequencer/Animator combination of all Modal instruments. AFAIK all three can be combined simultaneously and the Animator seems to have the capatility to switch and toggle and move any parameters at any time.

The morphing filter of the Modal 002 is special also and itā€™s fully multitimbral ā€¦ that is 12 voices that can be controlled separately by the sequencer - if needed.

3

Prophet 12 owner here, I ditched a Virus TI2 to make the switch and Iā€™m glad I did. Just providing my $0.02 based on 4 or so months of ownership:

I paid $1600 for my Prophet 12 (keyboard) off eBay, itā€™s not impossible to find them for under $2000 (though it doesnā€™t happen that often). I can safely say this synthesizer is a dream to program sounds on, once you figure out the [very] intuitive interface, there is very little menu diving as most controls are immediately available on the front panel and the modulation mapping is ridiculously easy - dare I say brilliant. The only thing which the P12 lacks which admittedly I miss is a built in reverb, but you can create that to an extent using the delays (itā€™s in the manual) but either way I plan on grabbing a Strymon BigSky since it pairs gorgeously with the P12. Where the P12 picks up the slack though is in the ā€œCharacterā€ section, you can seriously add some beautiful fuzz/crunch/air/depth to your patches and depending on how you modulate these parameters you can come up with some really interesting evolving textures and pads. Some people claim that the P12 lacks the ā€œoomphā€ for bass but I strongly disagree, it really boils down to how you program it.

Updates donā€™t occur frequently for the P12, but for what itā€™s worth Iā€™m currently beta testing an OS which hasnā€™t been announced yet so DSI is definitely at work to update it in the near future.

I canā€™t say much for the Modal 002, though personally at $5200 Iā€™d rather just buy a Prophet 6 for $2200 and save $3000 while still covering a ton of ground.

4

Not a P12 owner, but constantly eyeing ebay for one. Iā€™ll echo what em-mohv says. I see nice ones from people with a lot of positive seller feedback go for around, or under, $2k. Iā€™ve come very close to hitting Buy Now button several times. Still a lot of money for me though.

Iā€™ve been a bit intimidated by how powerful the synth seems, at least from the incredible demos Iā€™ve heard from people like F5D and Boxed Ears.

However, I downloaded the manual, almost in a attempt to talk myself out of buying one. I told myself, ā€œThis thing is a beast and will hurt your brain to program. Do yourself a favor, read the manual, and then you will give up before you start, saving a lot of money and wasted time.ā€

Oops. The opposite happened. The manual was printed in large type and only 100 pages long. And something like the last 1/3 was MIDI charts. The tone was very friendly and helpful. Everything seemed very intuitive and I didnā€™t see anything that really threw me. I will also agree with em-mohv about the modulation system. Seemed almost too good to be true. I hope it really is that easy and intuitive with the actual synth of front of me.

Itā€™s now definitely #1 on my shopping list. If you do get the P12, how about come back and give us a mini-review?

1 Like
5

No hands on experience of the Modal but i know you will not regret buying a P12
Go for the module version, its really easy to program once you have had an hour or so to play with it.
Pretty sure the modules are still selling at a discount in most places.

7

Thanks for all of the feedback. It sounds like the P12 is the most bang for the buck. How does the sequencer compare? It doesnā€™t seem like the P12 has anything comparable to Modalā€™s animator.

Regarding the P12 desktop module, it seems like this takes away a lot of the immediacy from using a P12. Am I wrong? I have an Access Virus, Blofeld, and Analog Keys so I am not shy of limited interfaces and some menu diving but it does take away from the experience. At the same time I have zero space for a full sized keyboard right now and a module for cost and space reasons is a lot more appealing.

@energyovertime
You know, I was way more excited about the Pro2 when it was announced than the Prophet 12. I almost pulled the trigger on it but for many reasons felt the Analog Keys was a better fit for me at the time. I donā€™t regret buying the AK but I do still wonder what would be possible from a sound design aspect in the Pro2. Do you think the Pro2 has a better voice engine over the P12?

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The only sequencer I came across is located 2 sub-menus in the Arpeggiator section, itā€™s very easy to program and itā€™s been getting the job done fine for me.

IMG_20151117_191314.jpg1456Ɨ1092 358 KB

Iā€™ve been using it to sequence some gnarly basslines, then hit the Hold button to keep it playing while I begin doing my modulation mappings to animate it in different ways. One thing I really want to try is seeing if I can apply independent arp settings to Layer A and Layer B, with A functioning as the low end and B giving subtle texture in the mid range. Iā€™m sure the same approached could be made for making intricate evolving melodies and leads if you wanted.

As far as the desktop vs keyboard versions, Iā€™d honestly hold out on just finding a good deal on a P12 keyboard. Itā€™s not that the desktop version is difficult to program but if you play your cards right you can get way more knobs, 2 touch strips, and a mod and pitch wheel all for just a couple hundred bucks extra over the cost of a new desktop module. For a synth that is this friendly to tinker with and is tailored towards efficient programming, itā€™s well worth the investment in my opinion.

Regarding the differences between the P12 and Pro 2, the oscillators are pretty much similar (with the Pro 2 having a couple of additional shapes), a dedicated sequencer, CV/gate, and more robust filter section. Characteristically they do share some overlap, but the Pro 2 is geared towards people who want a coked out monophonic synth with a few tricks up its sleeve. It also makes a fantastic control center for a modular setup.

1 Like
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AFAIK ā€¦ no, the Modal synths are the only ones having such a thing.

Absolutely. I like the one knob per function interfaces, because they directly lead to results and invite to move this and that or try this switch and move that fader. And it can be done as part of a live performance much better then digging in menus ā€¦ well, if you donā€™t have those macro knobs like on the virus or A4.

Should be the same engine but there could be.differences ā€¦

Itā€™s about monophonic vs. polyphonic and the sequencer. The Pro2 has a nice integrated sequencer, and an interface to the modular world. But if you think about sound design ā€¦ I think, for deep pad sounds a polyphonic instrument seems to be better suited, for basses, leads, and fx both would be fine. Both have a wealth of modulation capabilities and this should be enough playground for sound-design.

10

One thing that should be brought up for consideration - especially when youā€™re dropping thousands on gear - is the type of support the manufacturer is known for and what their RMA process is. Iā€™d hope that Modal Electronics can provide some damn good support for a $5200 synthesizer, but itā€™s hard to say since itā€™s still a fairly niche instrument. I can however attest that Dave Smithā€™s technical support is phenomenal, and despite the fact that my Prophet 12 was out of warranty, they repaired a fringing issue with my main board for $25 (which entailed a physical swap-out).

I live near San Francisco and I was literally invited to bring it in to have it worked on, even had a chance to hang with Dave and chat with him in their synth show-room. Seriously awesome company.

11

That sequencer screen looks really nice. I wish it was that easy to see what note was set on each step in an Elektron box. Iā€™m fine with it being basic. In this case it seems this is where the 002 shines since it has the sequencer, arp, and animator that can all go at once. But for thousands more than a P12 I can easily settle with my Octatrack sequencing the P12 on top of its internal sequencer. Iā€™m sure I can mimic the animator to some extent with the OT + P12 combo.

Thanks. I think you all have convinced me save up for a Prophet 12. Just simply not enough must have features in the 002 to justify the price. Now just to figure out if I want the full on keyboard or the module. The AK has really been a great controller keyboard.

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Above the OLED display are 4 soft knobs which change function depending on what menu youā€™re in. For the sequencer:

Knob 1: Controls which of the 32 steps youā€™re editing
Knob 2: Controls what the note/octave of selected step
Knob 3: Velocity of selected step
Knob 4: No function

The first button below the screen can also insert a rest if you want. Iā€™d also like to point out that there are 2 buttons and 1 knob which have yet to be assigned a function, which is promising since an OS update can make use of these unassigned controls (should DSI choose to do so).

But yeah, as nice as the Modal 002 is - I personally find the $5200 price tag a hard pill to swallow for one piece of gear when I can get a used P12, P6, and still have $1300 left over for whatever else I want (which can buy you plenty of awesome stuff). Hell you could even buy 2 Prophet 6 modules and polychain them to make a 12 voice VCO monster if you wanted and still have cash left over for a dedicated hardware sequencer, thats just my opinion though.

13

P-12 and 002 owner here. (if you sell a Synthex you can buy a few things, especially used)

They are 2 different machines with 2 different ā€˜goalsā€™.

If you want a thick analog tone and some very good filtering and filter control, the 002 is where you want to be.

If you love sound design and crazy weirdness and layers of sound, the P-12 will be your friend.

Iā€™ll mainly list the cons because everyone talks about the pros of each -

002 cons - weak modulation choices. They really donā€™t have a modulation matrix. 2 LFOs (one global one per voice) plus 4 more sources and 9 destinations. Note that due to the design, currently all destinations receive the same amount of modulation from a source. IOW - route LFO 2 to OSC1 and Resonance and they both get the same amount of LFO2. You canā€™t have LFO2 lightly modulating OSC1 while also heavily modulating Resonance.

Voices are hard-panned with no user control of position or panning. So you have to use both outputs or the separate 12 outs (on the D-Sub connection) or mono mode (one channel, but monophonic playing only).

The Animator currently (may change soon) hard transitions between steps. So if you use the Animator to modulate the filter cutoff, it changes in discrete values you program at each step, no gliding smoothly between values. They tout the Animator as a complex mod source, but the Animator, Sequencer, Arpeggiator all share a common tempo so you canā€™t have a fast Animation and a slow sequence playing those notes.

The UI while it looks great is actually klunky (for me) to navigate around. The data wheel has the ā€˜skip/jumpā€™ problem that seems to plague a lot of companies rotary encoder coding and you really do need to use the keypad a lot more than you should so your hands and eyes jump around a lot and it feels slower than it should to do detailed editing.

OS updates (and needed bug fixes) have been slow to appear.

FWIW, you might look at the rack 002r since thereā€™s a browser-based editor and they still have the screen and some controls on the front panel.

The 002 sound is gorgeous - the waves can sound big and digital and the filter can make them get all analog and gooey.

P-12 cons - the filter really isnā€™t all that. The oscillators do have a fairly digital sound to them, so donā€™t buy a P-12 if you primarily want thick analog goodness. Until recently the P-12 suffered from DSI neglect, but the recent flurry of updates has turned it into a solid monster of a synth. The UI is the best Iā€™ve ever used on a polysynth that has a screen/menus.

Thereā€™s probably more, but I foeget so ask any specific questions.

15

That actually sounds like a huge difference from a modulation standpoint. Some of your points do sound like things that can be changed in OS updates, but then the question is will they? As we have seen on these very forums it is best to buy a product for what it can do today rather than what it might do later on.

Digital versus analog sounding is not a problem for me and I think I gravitate toward liking digital sounds more so anyway. My goal is new sound design. I donā€™t want to sound like everyone else and I make everything from ambient, to techno, to hard aggro industrial music. I even am working with someone to remix a rap song which if all goes well could turn into spin off project.

The Pro 2 looks even crazier when you lay out the specs like that. I think the voice stacking in the Prophet 12 might give me better options over the Pro 2 however. Maybe both some day :slight_smile:

Regarding the Curtis filter. I always hear mixed opinions on it. The only DSI I have been able to try out was a Prophet 08 and I thought it sounded amazing. However this was when I was just getting back into making music and my synth exposure was much more limited than it is now.

16

Eventually you might want to check out the P8 again?

IMO the P12 and Pro2 are DCO instruments with very limited digital synth capabilities and they try as hard as possible to sound analog. They do the job well enough. But what is the difference compared to an analog instrument? This are a hand full of waveforms exceeding the standard analog ones.

Compare this to a Virus TI or any other digital synth that is taking full advantage of a digital sound engine and provides wavetable synthesis, granular or formant synthesis. Such an instrument would indeed open new sonic territory

ā€¦ well, the Virus is mainstream and might not fit to your requirement to be different, on the other hand I have the impresseion that most Virus patches are more classic or SuperSaw like and the other engines are overlooked by many ā€¦ I feel guilty of this myself during the first time ā€¦ :wink:

Why not have a look on the Modor NF-1. Itā€™s the kew kid on the block and has very interesting digital features. The sound is great too.