HUBA wrote:Pro5 wrote:The 'deal' with the D-50 is that it's a very warm, thick sounding digital synth
Do you have a D50 card on your V-synth, or have you tried one before? If so, would you describe it with the same words, or is it worth having an original D50 for that? I have a V-synth and would like to try a D50, but would prefer to avoid another keyboard in my room.
Although pflosi already gave you his opinion, and there's a few around here (inc myself for a while) who felt it was an exact emulation (using the D-50 output mode), I have to say for me, no. It did not feel the same as D-50. Whether that came down to even MORE noise on a real D-50 (as earlier ones had more noise than later ones, so which did Roland Model for the card?
) and maybe because the keybed of the D-50 is so nice (softer than the V-synth's which in my testing has been known to bias opinion towards/against a synth's sound, based on feel of the keys)...
but well, I say yes you can get every sound the D-50 does, easily - and it's a joy to program it from the V-Synth (esp the keyboard) as all the multitude of knobs and touchscreen are all laid out for live edits (even the filter updates in realtime without needing a key press retrigger to hear your new setting; on a real D-50 it doesn't).
But I have to say imo the VC-1 card sounded quite a bit 'flatter' and less dimensional. In a mix it probably wouldn't matter one bit and it'll give you the D-50 sounds you need, but I didn't connect with emotionally like I always have with the real D-50 keyboards (I now have two here btw - I sold my VC card after 2 months or so as I just preferred to use the V-synth as a V-Synth anyway, cos it's such an amazing machine - my favourite synth!) - also I had samples in my V from my D-50 that I had previously made and many of these sounded more epic/warm than the VC-1 card - again to my ears, and I can only speak for my ears
You can get them both together and A/B them, maybe even try a null test
but my gut feeling is I was drawn to play the D-50 and react to it's 'alive' sound as I play, often losing myself for ten minutes just noodling, I never got that with the VC-1 card at all. In fact I had MORE of that from FM8 vsti which I programmed to emulate some of my 'warm' custom D-50 patches (when I sold my 2nd D-50 and didn't have a V-synth to get the card for). I don't know... while the D-50 is indeed just software through some old op-amps, the card is software emulating those quirks and faults and I didn't feel it at all.
sorry for the essay and I will prob be in the minority so try it for yourself, but my advice is if you don't 'feel' the VC-1 card then don't write off a real D-50 as it's a different experience, not just because imo the sound is a bit thicker and more alive, but the fact the keybed is nice, the design is beautiful, it feels like the classic it is.
I also had the VC-2 card that many rave about, maybe was overkill for my needs (as I rarely use vocoders etc) and I again felt the V-synths best function was as a pure V-synth, because when you dig into a V you really find gold. It has kick started so many new songs for me now, from completely unheard of textures and tricks with it's spacey sounding overtones combined with it's tempo synced LFOs....... sorry, I should save that for the V-Synth thread.
And sorry for muddying the waters re D-50 v VC-1, can only say what I felt as a big D-50 fan and owner of multiple units of varying ages of them, 6 and counting... I wasn't fully convinced by the VC-1 card (in either output mode).
Having said that if I found another card cheap and didn't have a real one around I'd certainly snap it up again for another try... (did that with the AN1x, sold my first as was 'unconvinced', rebought one and it's now my 2nd fave synth - love it) D-50 would probably be my 3rd favourite (after V-synth and AN1x) but the need for a D-50 is more specific than with a V or AN1x which are universes to explore, amazing workhorse tools while D-50 etc are for the character.
) That, and the little phatty just aren't impressive to me. I was more impressed with the sub phatty, probably due to a better UI. Seen several XoX boxes, but I've never walked away thinking "that sounds exactly like my 303!" And finally, I have yet to be wowed by an electron box. They sound a bit bland, but they're so damn expensive, and again I don't jive with the UI. It feels small and congested to me. I would love to try an octotrack for an extended period of time, but again too expensive to go out on a limb for when so many other devices offer great sampling capabilities for so much cheaper.
Thanks a bunch! I totally see what you're saying. Found a thread on gearslutz where this was discussed. The general opinion seemed to be that they were not identical sounding. 
