Roland JUNO-D

Looking for a last-minute ticket to spend a few days across seas, my eye felt on flyer of some musicstore in Amsterdam. They sold the Roland for € 300,- as a bargan sale. Knowing I could keep the keyboard/synth for years, still enjoying the sounds of my old Roland E36, and travelling for a living most of the time, I called my brother and asked him if he would be so nice to come over. He lives in Amsterdam so I told him to go by the musicstore before heading my way.

No trip to the United States or Southern Europe, but a nice new soundmodule for me that summer.

It has nice sounding presets, also for dancemusic. It has the legendairy 808 and 909 kits, which are like all other sounds editable, by MIDI, included pc editor of right away on the toy itself (but you need to know your way to make quick edits).

For today you could say there are not enough programmable knobs on the surface, but then again, it's a instrument before t-screen.

The effects are good, but you can use just one at the time, good enough for studio, lesser for live (if you don't have on outboard fx-rack that is!).

About the beatbox... never use it. Never tried but just a few hits. I got cooler toys for that.

display is a bit small

UTILIZATION

The presets are good enough to get the sound you are looking for by just tweaking a little. You just need to learn the sounds.

But for a beginner it could feel like just not the bomb,
once familiar with MIDI and it's potentials, this Roland does the trick.

I also have a V-drum by Roland and again, it could not sound more pro then that in my ears. Remember, there sound you hear at home is a combination of all routed hardware. But the Roland part is quality sound, it a pro brand and the sound you hear a lot in the media.

SOUNDS

I like the sounds using a external reverb and for the recording touch off course some sort of eq to ballans it in the mix.



OVERALL OPINION

It is a keyboard with the MIDI capability to make it way better then a synth played by some-one that does not reaches the big budget-synth potentials.
It's way better that low budget old time synths.

As a drummodule, it rocks!
All dancetracks can be made on this babe, but you need skills, for that's how big boys use this kind of toys!

The Roland Juno D is a good board, I wasn’t sure about this one after spending 3 hours on it at the guitar center down the road. One thing that I can stand with it is the interface and sequencing just didn’t do it for me. But there where certain sounds that I really liked and the on board controls to minipulate those sounds made it really easy for me to get the sound I was really looking for .


UTILIZATION

Very easy to operate, its almost to easy. You may only need the manual just to understand a few small things. But sequencing on it was difficult for me because I am use to a more user friendly screen and menus. There really just wasn’t much to the interface of this board. Maybe it was just too easy for me and that’s why I didn’t like it because I am use to sequencing on other workstations that have a much more complex screen and menus.


SOUNDS

The sounds a pretty good, especially when you add a few small effects you will really like the sounds you can get when you play around a little bit. The brass on here is what surprised me the most, I didn’t expect to hear such a big band style of brass. Its just sounds full and rich when those horns are being played. I can honestly say the brass on here was some of my favorite presented brass out of almost any board on the market. The brass was ready to fit right in to my songs with out any equine or anything. It was almost made just for me.


OVERALL OPINION

Overall, This board is really easy. If you want something easy then this is what you need. Its not much to look at and doesn’t look all fancy. that’s because its not fancy. Its good though and has all the connections you need to get it right to you DAW. Its very realistic and ready to go right into your mixes. You will love the Roland Juno D.

The Roland Juno-D is a 61 key synthesizer that can be used in a variety of situations and applications.  It can be used as a typical synth or as an emulation system for acoustic instruments.  The synth has a huge amount of patches and effects and has 1/4 connections for inputs and output as well as MIDI connections and 1/4 inch connections for pedals.  The synth also comes with software for use within your computer and while I haven't really used this portion of the synth, it's definitely cool to have this option.

UTILIZATION

Using the Roland Juno-D isn't hard as the interface of the keyboard is pretty straight forward and easy to follow.  It is easy to scroll through the patches and to create and save your own, as well as to mess with the effects and all that.  After playing around with the synth for a short while I was able to pretty much understanding going on, and those with any experience with similar synths shouldn't have too many problems figuring out this keyboard.  I've never seen the manual for the Roland Juno-D so I can't say if it would be helpful to learn this keyboard or not.


SOUNDS

The sounds that are possible with the Roland Juno-D are quite varied as all sorts of sounds are possible.  My favorite sounds that this synth has to offer is probably the more traditional synth sounds rather than emulations.  All of the sounds that are possible are quite good, but since this is catered to being more of a real synthesizer, it give you more parameters and options to control these sounds over any other ones.  For this reason, I would probably only pick one of these up if you are looking for more of a tradtional synth rather than an emulator of acoustic instruments like piano and orchestra.


OVERALL OPINION

I've only used the Roland Juno-D a handful of times for recording sessions, but during these sessions I've definitely liked what I've heard from this synth.  It was easy to use from the start and all of the sounds are quite realistic with a number of parameters to help you get the sounds that you are after.  All in all, I would definitely recommend checking out this synth as Roland has done a great job with this synth.

Together comprehensive enough.
For details, see the manufacturer's website

USE

I find not super easy to use, but with the training even when you get there. I half days understand the "Philosophy" of edition in performance mode, and fawn split the keyboard.
For cons, the use of sound edition software is very easy, super fast .... it's simple to understand, the performance mode, for me, it is almost always with the app!
Note that this is my first synth so I can not be A reference in the field.

SONORITS

I am rather jazz (piano / bass / trumpet), variety Française (Berger ...) and electro (type Jarre), and I always find a nice sound to do what I want.
The sonorits sounds good to see very good, very varied.
on the other hand I noticed a lightweight sound degradation in performance mode (computer control multitimbral), as if the sound loses momentum, but remains very correct!
The keyboard is very "soft", a real synth what. I am a pianist at the departure, I thought it hard to adapt myself but it is easily accessible in the end.

NOTICE GLOBAL

I've had two months, I am very spot for the price. I think c'tait a good choice (the best, I know I have nothing to tell). It helps to have some fun and start with ease of handling Afternoon of a synth