What's the worst synth ever made?

Alex E · Post by **Alex E** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 3:50 am

Everyone talks about the greatest.... but what do you think is the worst synth ever made? Least reliable? Least versitile? And especially, the Hardest to program? (Without sysex)

sequence · Post by **sequence** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 3:57 am

Alex E wrote:Everyone talks about the greatest.... but what do you think is the worst synth ever made? Least reliable? Least versitile? And especially, the Hardest to program? (Without sysex)

Hmmm. When I consider all of the above only one synth comes to mind: RedSoundSystems DarkStar XPII, an "improvement" over the first model

Biggest synth fraud ever perpetuated upon humankind (sorry, DS fans.) IMO, of course. I'm sure there are others as completely SUCKY.

Jimmy he who used to own a DS XPII and ended up using it as a target for shooting practice

Yeti · Post by **Yeti** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 4:03 am

yeah, the darkstar sucks a*s. what else sucks.....i think the yamaha tq5 sucks alot too.

Analog Freak · Post by **Analog Freak** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 4:24 am

The Yamaha DX-9 gets my vote for having a crappy interface, while being nearly the same price as its hotter sister, the DX-7. Another vote for the Darkstar being a piece of c**p. It makes a good paperweight or doorstop, but not much else.

Sealed · Post by **Sealed** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 4:24 am

Yeti wrote:i think the yamaha tq5 sucks alot too.

Sorry, I like it....

Yeti · Post by **Yeti** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 4:34 am

yeah, i guess it is kinda neat. at least its easier than the TX7.

KLAXON · Post by **KLAXON** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 4:53 am

I kind of like the XP2, (note the words 'kind of') its one of those synths that is so bad that after a certain point it becomes sort of good for its excessive badness. If that makes any sense.

brian.only · Post by **brian.only** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 5:30 am

im w/ anolog freak w/ the dx line.
by the time i figured it all out i was pretty sick of it-
granted i came almost 15-20 yrs after it had come out.
ive only gone back to it for sound fx mostly.

gordwiebe · Post by **gordwiebe** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 5:42 am

Out of everything I've owned I'd have to say I disliked the poly 800 the most. I couldn't get rid of it fast enough. It would just sit there in the corner mocking me - promising to sound like c**p/itself if I were to ever turn it on again. I never really understood how it only had a square wave, and the square when "stacked" or something made a quasi saw wave - but I always understood I hated its sound. I think the filter was ok though...

Yeti · Post by **Yeti** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 5:51 am

even the synths that i said sucked.....they can be alright, and can be used in some way, so they aren't completely horrible. but i think the darkstar would be last on my list of things to get. im pretty sure.

Jabberwalky · Post by **Jabberwalky** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 6:49 am

Another vote for the Poly800. What a pile.

konvert · Post by **konvert** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 6:56 am

Jabberwalky wrote:Another vote for the Poly800. What a pile.

I'm glad I just sold mine.
But it wasn't _that_ bad was it? I mean, worst ever? Nooooo. It was nice for pads.

gryphon · Post by **gryphon** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 7:16 am

let's think about sound quality for a second. there are many many digital synths that do many things an analog could not do (at least at the price point, etc) but as far as FM it seems the DX7 doesn't provide nearly enough control/tweakability an it seems to sound kind of, well, annoying. or at least thin. if you use it for the sounds it has historically been used for (electric piano, pads, bass, whatever) it seems just plain cheesy (not that cheesy isn't appropriate sometimes, but really, a wurlitzer or at least a physical modeling synth should do ep sounds, pads on analogs or any other polysynth, bass on a bass guitar (or something else, IMHO almost anything else sounds a bit more interesting or powerful to my ears. I don't mean to piss people off, but it just sounds dated basically, and it seems like such a b***h to program (from my experience) that there's just not that much of a point (in nearly 2007). For its time, yeah, ok. but come on. Now there are better and more powerful ways to achieve those results (ableton operator, etc.) without the lame interface. thanks, sorry about the long post.

burnt toast · Post by **burnt toast** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 9:35 am

sequence wrote:
Alex E wrote:Everyone talks about the greatest.... but what do you think is the worst synth ever made? Least reliable? Least versitile? And especially, the Hardest to program? (Without sysex)
Hmmm. When I consider all of the above only one synth comes to mind: RedSoundSystems DarkStar XPII, an "improvement" over the first model

Biggest synth fraud ever perpetuated upon humankind (sorry, DS fans.) IMO, of course. I'm sure there are others as completely SUCKY. Jimmy he who used to own a DS XPII and ended up using it as a target for shooting practice

i disagree, i think the darkstar is alright but not brilliant. i quite like the bass sounds you can get out of it once you've layered the 5 parts and its pretty good for weird sounds etc. its a digital sounding synth with knobs - it has its place in my set up. dont see why people rave about toy keyboards and crappy sounding things and then bash the DS - its got the crappy digital sound + more with control. admittedly it is a pain to program as it doesnt show the parameter values in the LCD - bar the part volume which is far from the most important value to bestow the display on. i can never get the oscillators to get back in tune. and theres no intialize patch/inital patch so you have to work from darkstar presets with no values anywhere to let you know where you are - argh....

.. in short its o.k.

Dunewar · Post by **Dunewar** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 9:37 am

I also vote for the Darkstar XP2! I bought this as my first hardware synth a couple of years back from ebay, and it is horrible. I kept wondering why I didn't get a decent sound out of it, only useless squeeks and noise.
I bought it because Future Music listed this as (and I quote) "a truly underrated synth". They even put it in their list of top-10 hardware synths..... I wonder what they were smoking.

What's the worst synth ever made?

What's the worst synth ever made?

Re: What's the worst synth ever made?

Re: What's the worst synth ever made?

another vote for the darkstar XP2