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songboy
Published on 09/11/08 at 11:20
This unit is designed to be a table top unit, but it is also rackable if you get a rack plate (its actually considered a 1/2 rack unit, meaning you can find another unit and place them side by side into one rack space, I had this along side a Korg x5dr). This unit has over 1000 patches ( 1,023 I believe is the actual number) of everything from keyboards, to world instruments, to drums, to horns, to synths to crazy sound effects. It also had over 40 effects including Reverb, chorus, and delay. This was made to be used across many styles of music. I used it mainly for the sweet sound effect/pad sounds for ambience and dance. Yes, you can edit the patches/effects and store them, which is really nice, especially for the delayed patches (you can dial them in to the tempo you desire). Yes, you can edit the device with a computer and a cd rom program that comes with the unit. I never actually hooked it up to a computer though, I bought it used and didn't get the cd rom (I bet its easy to find on the web though) and its pretty easy to edit on the device. There is a very sought after expansion pack for this unit too, it is called "session" and it adds over 150 patches. I never got the expansion, but I know if you have it installed and are trying to sell it, it goes for three times the cash compared to not having the expansion ($150 without, $450 with) so that has to mean something special. As for connections you get Midi in/out/thru, a computer cable jack (pc and mac) and stereo audio out. Also a headphone jack on the front panel.
UTILIZATION
General config is pretty simple. Plug in midi controller and start playing. Navigating through patches is very simple. All the knobs on the front or adequately labeled and make it really easy to find what you are looking for. Sound editing is not as easy, but with the simple guide printed on top of the unit (very nice), you should have no problem doing so. I have had bad experiences using Roland manuals in the past (i.e. Roland VS 1880, worst manual ever!!) but this one is not to bad. Its pretty thick, but it should answer all your problems. One thing thats awesome about Roland is its customer service dept. You can call up and talk to a real person who will get whatever unit you are using in front of him and guide you through any problems. I called them a lot with the Roland VS 1880 and they were great.
SOUNDS
I loved the very unique synth/pad section. Over 300 crazy awesome sounds that you can tweek to your liking. I also liked the ethnic instrument section too, not too bad in the way of realism. Overall though, the "real" instrument samples like pianos and organs were not really good. This Unit is over 10 years old though, so you can't expect to much realistic tone. Just like my review of the Korg X5DR, the unit lacked in warmth and tone, but not nearly as much as the Korg. Its pretty much the same with the effects, lets face it, if the sound before effects is weak, internal effects aren't going to give you to much either. I have some Moog effect pedals that would always spice up the sound of this thing though, and that always made for some sweet noise/tone. The expressiveness is good, I didn't notice much difference between this unit and my Korg TR Workstation which came out a decade after the JV 1010. As with most older sound modules, I have no use for the piano/keyboard patches. They are all too weak sounding for anything I am into. What I did like very much was the synth/pad section. I spent hours going through this section just writing down patch numbers so I could remember which ones I really liked...which was a long list.
OVERALL OPINION
I had this unit for about a year and a half, but I recently sold it on Ebay to help purchase a laptop. You just can't beat the sound quality and options on todays computer based sound programs. Other than the weak keyboard/piano patches, I really enjoyed this unit. It gave me all sorts of background sounds for my recordings and made for some interesting layers when I ran it with my Korg X5DR on the same midi channel. Like I said before, I had the Korg X5DR and a Korg TR Workstation. The TR was leaps and bound better in all ways (also a hell of a lot more money) but the Roland was much better than the X5DR which was around the same price. If you are on a budget and cannot afford a computer and computer programs, this thing is pretty sweet for the price ($100-$150 on Ebay). If I could go back in time a year and a half ago, I would probably pass on this purchase.
UTILIZATION
General config is pretty simple. Plug in midi controller and start playing. Navigating through patches is very simple. All the knobs on the front or adequately labeled and make it really easy to find what you are looking for. Sound editing is not as easy, but with the simple guide printed on top of the unit (very nice), you should have no problem doing so. I have had bad experiences using Roland manuals in the past (i.e. Roland VS 1880, worst manual ever!!) but this one is not to bad. Its pretty thick, but it should answer all your problems. One thing thats awesome about Roland is its customer service dept. You can call up and talk to a real person who will get whatever unit you are using in front of him and guide you through any problems. I called them a lot with the Roland VS 1880 and they were great.
SOUNDS
I loved the very unique synth/pad section. Over 300 crazy awesome sounds that you can tweek to your liking. I also liked the ethnic instrument section too, not too bad in the way of realism. Overall though, the "real" instrument samples like pianos and organs were not really good. This Unit is over 10 years old though, so you can't expect to much realistic tone. Just like my review of the Korg X5DR, the unit lacked in warmth and tone, but not nearly as much as the Korg. Its pretty much the same with the effects, lets face it, if the sound before effects is weak, internal effects aren't going to give you to much either. I have some Moog effect pedals that would always spice up the sound of this thing though, and that always made for some sweet noise/tone. The expressiveness is good, I didn't notice much difference between this unit and my Korg TR Workstation which came out a decade after the JV 1010. As with most older sound modules, I have no use for the piano/keyboard patches. They are all too weak sounding for anything I am into. What I did like very much was the synth/pad section. I spent hours going through this section just writing down patch numbers so I could remember which ones I really liked...which was a long list.
OVERALL OPINION
I had this unit for about a year and a half, but I recently sold it on Ebay to help purchase a laptop. You just can't beat the sound quality and options on todays computer based sound programs. Other than the weak keyboard/piano patches, I really enjoyed this unit. It gave me all sorts of background sounds for my recordings and made for some interesting layers when I ran it with my Korg X5DR on the same midi channel. Like I said before, I had the Korg X5DR and a Korg TR Workstation. The TR was leaps and bound better in all ways (also a hell of a lot more money) but the Roland was much better than the X5DR which was around the same price. If you are on a budget and cannot afford a computer and computer programs, this thing is pretty sweet for the price ($100-$150 on Ebay). If I could go back in time a year and a half ago, I would probably pass on this purchase.