Roland JD-XA

CCMP · 2021-03-18T21:53:42.064Z

I picked up a Roland JD-XA for a price I couldn’t pass on last week, so home it came.
It’s a bit bigger physically than I wanted, and I wasn’t totally into the colour scheme with all the red, but thought it would cover a lot of ground.

I didn’t realise until this weekend that it has had the matte overlays fitted already, instead of the glossy reflective surface that everyone was up in arms about.

The first few times I messed about with it I was thinking I was probably going to sell it on quite quick… all the presets seemed very OTT, and not really my thing. I got some Axial downloads, same thing, I just wasn’t feeling it.

Then I took a different approach to the same presets and started messing just with the parts, and it suddenly came to light to me how good the JD-XA actually is, and how usable.

I now look at it like an Analog Four and 4 separate VA poly synths in one unit, it’s pretty incredible.
It works/blends/mixes really well with my A4 and Peak to.

A desktop/module version of this synth would have been amazing.

Curious how many other people are digging the JD-XA?

the_PMO · 2021-03-19T00:13:24.260Z

I came close to getting one once awhile back. There was one on sale for a good price at a shop the next city over. I really quite like the sound by all accounts. I’ll admit the glossy finish is a bit of a putoff.

Ultimately I did not end up buying it because of the menu diving warning from various reviews. There were some features, I don’t recall which offhand, that I figured I’d never use because of the menu nature of it and the two line screen. A small tactile choice that was enough to change my mind.

CCMP · 2021-03-19T09:00:34.477Z

I thought the menu diving was going to be a ball ache, but the more I’ve used it the more intuitive it becomes… there’s still a lot of knob-per-function tweaking to it, you just need to remember to select the voice(s) you’re working on.
A data jog wheel or slider would’ve been nice, +/- buttons are tedious, but you can use them +shift to navigate quickly.

I would advise anyone who likes Roland analogs to jump on the JD-XA if you get a chance.

I’ve picked mine up for less than the price of a Behr Deepmind…

smokyfrog · 2021-03-19T09:08:46.015Z

Mine continues to delight. It’s a very tweakable multitimbral powerhouse.

ddiamond84 · 2021-07-27T22:56:51.469Z

Just picked one up for a good price, I was so curious to try this after such polarizing opinions. I gotta say, it’s great! I don’t get what people want. I’m assuming most people here were turned on to electronic music because of stuff made in the past on gear that was a lot more primitive. There’s so much flexibility to it! I don’t understand some of the harsh opinions I read. I’m not talking about this forum, but some other places and on YouTube…

horisonten · 2021-07-28T05:44:04.083Z

I enjoyed mine. But the things that made me ditch it was:

Sequencer is only 4 bars = no long evolving sounds (why do companies insist on this limit… Sigh)
The anoying white noise on the analog voices = some sounds basically not possible to create/use under certain conditions. You’re talking the past, but this is a modern synth. Why couldn’t they get rid of the noise before releasing it with modern manufacturing?
The menu diving. Again, a modern synth crippled by a small/unintuitive screen.
Roland ditched it far too soon. They released perhaps two firmware upgrades, then nothing. That is not my type of company. This alone made me not really wanting to own anything from them.

Edit: Oh yeah, not to forget the dreadful “crackling noise issue” that plagued some of the units. It was not pretty and rendered it basically useless for professional use for those affected. When I owned mine, Roland still repaired them on goodwill. Not sure if that is still the case.

ddiamond84 · 2021-07-28T06:05:20.146Z

All good points! None of those bug me, but I’m not a professional musician and just like playing at home for fun. I’ll try and pay attention to any cracklings noise, I haven’t noticed it yet.

smokyfrog · 2021-07-28T08:33:39.751Z

Me neither, it’s a great synth with lots of flexibility when used with a sequencer (in my case a Sequentix P3). I don’t enter the menus in ordinary use either so can definitely live with those.

jespers · 2021-07-28T11:05:15.193Z

Had one. Interesting synth, but too quirky for me. Mine had the audio crackling problem so I had to have it in for repair. It was still very noisy.

I liked the digital/analog concept, but it felt like the digital side was not well designed and integrated. Annoying with the waveform selection etc.

The midi implementation with channel per part was quite weird. I know you can work around it but I lost the patience.

I had it together with the System 8 and I ended up keeping that as it was much more intuitive and useful for me.

Many people complain about the build/looks, but if you have the version with the overlay I actually think it is pretty cool and much better than the System 8.

CCMP · 2021-07-31T09:40:10.858Z

ddiamond84:

I don’t get what people want. I’m assuming most people here were turned on to electronic music because of stuff made in the past on gear that was a lot more primitive. There’s so much flexibility to it! I don’t understand some of the harsh opinions I read. I’m not talking about this forum, but some other places and on YouTube…

I think the JD-XA got some bad hype early on and it’s just been perpetuated/repeated over time.

The more time I’ve spent with mine, the more I’ve got connected with it… I think it’s fantastic, it’s such a powerful synth, well synths… it’s not orthodox in it’s approach, but the more time you put into it the more natural the workflow starts to become.

People complain about the small screen and menu diving… which I get… but, since I’ve got more familiar with it I’ve realised that most menu parameters are closer than you think. There’s usually a button/fader/control on its panel that is located a step away from the ‘menu only’ parameters.

For example, finding the ‘Legato On/Off’ drove me mad for a while, going at it from the main menu button was a PITA… then it dawned on me, hit the ‘UNISON’ button on the panel so it brings it up on the screen, one step left is ‘Legato’, done… it speeds things up no end when you learn these shortcuts.

Like you, I got mine for a steal… if you look at the JD-XA as 8 individual synths, it was under £75/synth, that’s less than most softsynths these days. It’s a no-brainer.

ddiamond84 · 2021-07-31T19:14:24.815Z

Well said, totally agree! I was nervous about the menu diving but there’s barely any for what I want to do. So much is accessible right there or only a button press or two away.

sabana · 2022-05-28T12:17:42.302Z

Well i finally got one. Gattobus’s video persuaded me as most of those songs he did with it are my favourites and there very very close. Getting the matte overlay. It took a few years to come round to just how damn powerful this synth is and modern Roland offerings are no longer analogue. The user interface and menus wont phase me. But wow this synth does sound huge.

Bunker · 2023-01-22T12:05:00.695Z

So it’s been a couple of weeks since I got my JD-XA and I’m still a bit on the fence. First thing first I think It sounds brilliant on the whole but some of the design choices are annoying. It needs an encoder or jog wheel and I’m not impressed with the architecture of the FX with effectively 4 master FX and only one part FX which doesn’t really lend itself to multitimbral playing via the sequencer. I’m not too bothered my the lack of polyrhythmic options as I’ve got that covered elsewhere but there are some issues with the sequencer that severely limit it in a real world scenario.

No pattern chain or song mode is one of them and when you realise that you can’t just jump between patterns on the fly it makes matters worse. Likewise when I’m clocking it from another source it doesn’t start playback on the beat unless you’ve pressed the play button on the pattern sequencer…and I can’t see a way of saving a patch with play enabled as or won’t let you save while in play mode. So while you can manually switch patterns the sequencer stops playing when you do.

I quite like the analogue element, to my ears it’s got a very Rolandy sound which is a good thing as is the dedicated analogue output. The Supernatural stuff sounds ace as you’d expect especially with some FX applied.

I do think it’s got something of a split personality in that with all those global FX it’s a layering monster but the integration with the sequencer and the whole multitimbral element just doesn’t seem to have been thought through or implemented very well.

jm2c · 2025-04-27T07:12:12.561Z

JD-XA completely flew below my radar when it originally came out. I blame the JD-Xi for that. But now, seeing it reach EOL and getting sold out on most shops, it piqued my interest somehow… Started researching about it, and eventually managed to buy one of the last remaining units in my country. Put on the overlays and the thing stopped looking all tacky, and became like a respectable looking instrument. It has a Star Wars -esque aesthetic to it with the overlays and the red LEDs going on.

I am totally in love with this thing! Its a bit of a pain to program in depth no doubt, but its basically a Roland’s quirky take on the Analog Four. Many of the same things apply to it than to the A4 - for some people, it sounds funny and doesnt feel intuitive/immediate enough, to those willing to roll up their sleeves and start exploring, there’s an universe of sounds in there to be discovered… A very misunderstood bit of kit.

I am starting a new music project, which uses only the JD-XA for everything. Only the internal sequencer and arps. I already learned how to flick between patterns in a fluent enough fashion (basic DJ stuff really), so I’ll keep it one pattern per “song”. The sequencer remembers BPM for each preset, so I can even vary tempos between tracks.

I originally started making music with a crappier setup than what a single JD-XA can do. I like the idea of coing “back to basics” with it. I could add some knobby controller to it for faster part mixing and that’s all I’ll need

jemmons · 2025-07-26T02:57:48.664Z

I was excited to pick up one of these used. But now that it’s here, I can’t hear any of the analog voices over L, R, or the headphone jack. Only the digital oscillators are audible. I’ve done a factory reset to no avail. Anyone know if there is there a switch or menu setting I might be overlooking?

wald · 2025-07-26T03:04:13.285Z

Can you at least hear the analog voices via the analog output jack?

Megamind · 2025-07-26T08:25:59.844Z

I bought one and the analog voices only kicked in after 5 mins or so, it was away for nearly a year getting fixed. Some kind of power supply issue IIRC.

jemmons · 2025-07-28T13:32:12.731Z

The seller saying there’s a setting that routes the analog voices away from L&R/Phones, that it’s set that way by default after a factory reset, and that I need to find it and route analog back to the main outs before I can hear it. But I’ve been all up and down the menu with no luck.

But there are hundreds of menu options, so it’s not impossible to think I’ve missed it. To those who own one, does this sound like a real thing? Or a seller making excuses for broken kit?

Megamind · 2025-07-28T13:37:23.740Z

Never heard of that, sounds like BS.

Factory default state would want all voices playing, of course.

CCMP · 2025-07-28T14:07:21.818Z

I’m away at the moment, so can’t access mine to check; but I think there’s a setting to remove the analog voices from the main L/R if you’re using the analog outputs (so you can still use the analog and digi voices together, etc); but, I’m 100% certain the analog voices aren’t bypassed from the Main L/R as default.