Roland SRX-12

[mixsynth]

http://www.roland.com/products/en/SRX-12/

Soonest I can get hold of one of these is May!! :evil:

Has anyone heard the "groundbreaking" Rhodes sounds in this board first hand? Are they all they're hyped to be?

[dwilson]

I haven't actually heard one myself, but I've heard from a few people who heard it at the NAMM show that it sounded pretty amazing.

The thing is, it's not just about how it sounds, but how it plays. Lots of plugins sound pretty good when you listen to the samples, but they just don't respond to touch in a really satisfying way.

I have high hopes for the SRX-12 - my main keyboard is a Roland RD-700 and I'm hoping that the pairing of a Roland keyboard with a Roland sound module will yield some great results. I've been really happy with Roland's stuff - the SRX-11 (Complete Piano) is fantastic.

[james]

All the hype about the SRX-12 has me thinking that investing in the XV-2020 module might be a good idea...one slot to install the board is all you'd need, and that one has two.  Plus it's relatively cheap and very small.  Between that, the Classic EPs and the Complete Piano, my live rig would be complete!!!

[mixsynth]

I've had an XV-2020 for over a year. You can get them ridiculously cheap on eBay! Be warned: you have to program the thing with your PC -- the only front panel control you have is over volume, input channel and patch changes! No in-performance adjustment of effects or anything like that.

The inbuilt patches are crap. No useable pianos or EP's of any description. The SRX-07 has a reasonable piano patch and one half-convincing Rhodes, which is what I use now when I can't shift the real Rhodes or space is tight.

I had my eye on the SRX-11 already; if the SRX-12 is good enough, I'll buy both 11 and 12 and finally be able to leave the real thing at home and just use the tiny little XV-2020!

[dwilson]

I just got a call from my sales rep at Sweetwater - apparently Roland won't be shipping these until mid June.

Oh well...I'll continue to enjoy the MrRay SeventyThree plugin in the meantime.

[mixsynth]

I've managed to find someone who can get them straight from Japan, and I've ordered 2

They're only two thirds of the UK RRP

The supplier should be putting more on eBay soon. Keep checking it.

[dwilson]

Ain't you clever!

I checked eBay - one seller says he's out of stock, another says there "may be restrictions" shipping to the US. Hrrrmmm....guess I'll just have to be patient.

Let us know when you get yours!

[james]

My lady friend from Sweetwater called about an hour ago to say that my 1/4" cables are backordered, but she didn't say anything about the SRX-12 (which was supposed to ship out next week).  I'm hoping that I'm just higher up on their preorder list, but it sounds more like Roland's problem than theirs....

[dwilson]

My understanding from the guy I talked to was that it was Roland's problem.

[james]

My lady at Sweetwater confirmed today that Roland has delayed shipping until June...I guess it's not just a backup of preorders.  BTW, I wound up finding a cheap XV-5050 on Ebay, and I definitely agree that the Rhodes sounds in the XV series are total crap.  What was most painful was finding a patch labeled "MK-80 Rhodes"...why they chose to resurrect the sound that made Harold "sick" is beyond my comprehension....

[james]

Update on the US ship date: the estimate is 2 weeks now.  Thanks Roland, but I have a tracking session on Saturday and could really use that thing right now...I guess it's time to do a direct overnite order from Japan....

[dwilson]

James, call Sweetwater back and make some noise - I got a message from my rep this morning telling me that mine went out today(!).

It's shipping FedEx ground, so I probably won't see it until early next week, but it was still a nice surprise - I didn't think I'd see the thing until June.

[mixsynth]

Mine arrived this morning. Haven't had a chance to test em properly yet, but I can see that there are Rhodes, Wurly and Clav represented.

Will get back ASAP with more info

[james]

Cool, I will give them a call...I'm going to be visiting everyone I know in CA for the next two weeks, so I guess this will give me a good reason to come home!

[mixsynth]

OK. I've tried it. I've spent most of my time on patch 001, "Pure Rhodes", since it's the sound that matches my existing setup (Rhodes amped direct without effects). These are my first impressions -- I might change my standpoint after extended use...

In my opinion and experience (I haven't heard that many competitors), it's the best reproduction of the Rhodes sound I've ever heard, from the distortion in the lower notes right down to the slight upward pitch bend when the damper kicks in after thumping a note hard. It's definitely the first "Rhodes" patch I've heard that actually sounds like I'm playing the real thing. My Studiologic controller makes it react a little over-sensitively, but that's just my fault for not knowing how to set the velocity curve up correctly.

I still can't get over the fact that the E below middle C 'clangs' more than the notes around it when you thump it -- almost like a 'deliberate defect'! I suppose this is what you get when you sample each individual note -- this patch has CHARACTER. Top marks, Roland.

I will admit that you can hear the velocity separation on some notes more than on others, but it's far from being annoying. It's going to be true of any sampled instrument, I suppose, but the SRX-12 does it well. You only notice it if you deliberately look for it, as I did. If you play normally you don't notice it.

Moving on from patch 001, I know that 2 different Rhodes were sampled, but I can't remember which models. Patch 003 is the 'pure' version of the 2nd one, which is a lot more 'muted' and less 'trebley'. Someone on here will no doubt know which models were sampled. There are Stereo Trem patches, chorus, phaser, delay, etc.

Oh, and of course there are Wurly and Clav on here! I didn't really buy the board for them, mainly because I don't use those sounds much, but assuming they're as good reproductions as the Rhodes patches (they sure sound great), I might use them a lot more from now on.

As far as I'm concerned, the 73 is no longer "required equipment" at gigs. No more back-breaking... woohoo

Here's the patch list.

If anyone wants a recording, I'll see what I can do. I'm a bit short of hardware but I'm sure there's some kind of wire or connector I've got that will allow me to record direct.

[dwilson]

This is great to hear, mixsynth - thanks for the report.

Mine is supposed to arrive tomorrow. Now I'm really excited to try it out!

[mixsynth]

I should say -- if anyone in the UK is reading this -- pm me if you want to get your hands on one before it's widely available here, and at a much lower price...

[dwilson]

Mine arrived! Here are my first impressions.

Unlike mixsynth, I was a little disappointed when I first played it - the sounds I was hearing did not seem particularly close to my 1976 Mark I. The "Pure EP1" patch had more prominent overtones, and more of a bell-like quality. "Pure EP2" was a little smoother but also seemed a little tame - you might have a hard time getting it to cut through a mix. "Pure EP1" has a nice edge to it, but the sound is very thin when played at a softer volume.

"Pure EP2" is closer in sound to my real Rhodes than "Pure EP1". Maybe "Pure EP1" was sampled from an older Fender model? I don't know the sound of the different models well enough to assess this with any degree of accuracy - perhaps James or someone else can shed some light on this. (BTW, mixsynth: are the patches on your card called "Pure Rhodes" or "Pure EP"? Mine are "Pure EP", so I'm wondering if the Japanese versions are labelled differently??)

As I played with the sounds a little more, they started to grow on me. Both pianos have a very satisfying bark that kicks in at higher velocity levels. The velocity splits in the samples are noticeable, but they're very well-programmed: the seem to kick in at just the right places in response to how you're playing. I was using the Roland RD-700 as the controller, and it seems that the card is nicely matched with a Roland keyboard.

Things got better as I started playing with the effects. The patches improved markedly with some judicious use of EQ, and some light compression seemed to help as well - I was able to get a little more juice out of EP2, and started to like that patch a little more. The RD-700 has an Autopan effect that nicely emulates the suitcase tremolo effect. I want to try running it through an amp simulator as well, just to see if that fattens things out a bit more.

My feeling at this point is that while this is not the most authentic reproduction of a Rhodes sound available (the Nord Electro and MrRay SeventyThree both do a better job in that regard), the sounds have a lot of the most important characteristics of a Rhodes, and are musically quite interesting. They're also very responsive to the keyboard, and play beautifully. I agree with mixsynth: the instruments they sampled had a *lot* of character - that comes through in the patches and makes them a lot of fun to play. With the right combination of effects, the patches can be improved greatly and I think the board would do quite well in a live situation. I plan on trying it out at my next couple of gigs to see how it goes. I don't think I'd want to record with it - others may disagree.

I didn't spend a lot of time investigating the other sounds, but I think that if you're interested in this board for the Wurly sounds, you'll probaby want to take a pass. I'm not as familiar with the Wurly sound (I only know if through recordings and having played one once in a session), but the sounds on the card seemed very flat. The clav sounds seemed very good, but I don't own a real clav to compare it to. They sampled the different pickup patterns and, like the Rhodes, they have a lot of character and play very well.

I'll post some more if my impressions change as I play with it more. If anyone else picks up one of these, please let us know what you think!

[mixsynth]

I think the reason why I'm so impressed is because my Mk1 73 is a bit road-worn and doesn't sound perfect! There are a few buzzing and dead-ish notes, and the action is very sluggish. Playing the SRX-12 patches is bizarrely more satisfying.

You're right about "Pure EP 2" (yes, it is called that, my mistake) -- it is closer to my own Mk1. My Mk1 doesn't 'bite' as much as "EP 1" does, and doesn't sound quite so bell-like. I'm pretty sure "EP 1" isn't an older model Rhodes, because they were even more 'growly'. I haven't played a Mk2 before, so I wouldn't know, but maybe EP 1 is a sample of one of those?  Why they'd choose to number the patches as they did, the 'wrong way round', I wouldn't know.

[dwilson]

Yes, I suppose the condition of your own Rhodes can make a difference. I just recently had mine serviced by a very talented vintage keyboard repair guy, so maybe I'm a little picky!  :wink:

But I agree that it's nice to have the thing always be in tune and always respond consistently across the whole keyboard. Digital does have its advantages.

In terms of the sound, here's a paragraph from the model descriptions page on the Super Site - this is what made me think that "EP 1" might be an older Mark I:

Aside from the new logos, there were two main differences between the "Fender Rhodes" and "Rhodes" Mark I pianos: the hammers and the tines. These differences were small ones, but they still had a noticeable impact on the piano's tone. The new hammers were completely plastic, reducing the weight of the piano while retaining the same shape and replaceable Neoprene tips. The tines featured a "swaged" design, tapered in a way that made them 4 times more durable than the previous generation. The combination of these improvements produced the more mellow, less bell-like sound heard on most Rhodes recordings from the late 70's.

It's clear they a sampled different instrument for "EP 1" - whether it's an older Mark I or a Mark II, I'm not sure.

I was also a little shocked to find out that my 1976 Mark I is actually a little *lighter* than its predecessor. Yikes!

[dwilson]

A personal SRX-12 update: I used it at a gig the other night, and I was not as happy with the sound as I was at my last show, when I used MrRay SeventyThree. The setup was not identical, so maybe it wasn't a fair comparison.

In any case, the search for a satisfying live rig continues...

[james]

I've only had about a half hour to mess around with the SRX-12 so far, but I have to say that some things about the Rhodes samples really impressed me.  The big one is the low end: the keys growl like they should, and if you play them lightly you hear the metallic twang of the tine that you'd expect.  Also the "Amped EP" patches seem to improve the tone in a necessary way, rounding off the (semi-obnoxious) bell-tone harmonics heard in the middle register.  In general I'm getting the impression that they sampled the piano straight from the pickup rail so that you could choose your amp tone, which makes sense.  My next step is to work with outboard EQ & f/x to see if I can get more punch out of it.

BTW, I have to say that if I had the cash I would have gone for the Nord Stage Piano, because the release samples make the Rhodes patches 10 times more real than the Electro's to me.  For gigs I think the SRX-12 will do the job, but I don't plan on recording with it....

[dwilson]

In general I'm getting the impression that they sampled the piano straight from the pickup rail so that you could choose your amp tone, which makes sense.

Hmmmm....I hadn't thought of that. I think I'll try some different amp setups and see if I can get a better sound. I agree that it's lacking in the punch department.

[james]

I think this is a general Roland issue in terms of sound...the VK-8 doesn't give me enough punch either without some EQ and/or outboard f/x.

[mixsynth]

I know it's off-topic, but I've found the VK-8 to have plenty of punch going through a couple of Roland KC amps -- at times, too much! Or maybe I don't quite know what "punch" is...

[james]

I guess that as with everything else in the keyboard world, all you need is the right amp.  I'm not surprised that a Roland amp gives the VK-8 the best sound....

[dwilson]

In general I'm getting the impression that they sampled the piano straight from the pickup rail so that you could choose your amp tone, which makes sense.

What would be the difference between sampling from the pickup rail as opposed to the "input" jack? Are the controls on the namerail part of preamp, or are they just attenuators?

[Pale]

Controls on the namerail in stage model are just attenuator ( volume pot ) and a simple high pass filter ( bass control ).

[james]

The Bass Boost circuit is actually a bass-cut, with 10 being (theoretically) the same tone coming from the pickup rail.  The problem with the Volume/Bass Boost circuit is that it lowers the output signal strength, so going direct from the RCA jack on the pickup rail will give you the maximum output.  Maybe one of the electronics guys out there can explain the technical side of this....

[Pale]

Well, the technical side is rather easy when you don't have to go into depth with this ( and I could go on about it, but I dont' want to be boring ).
It's a simple circuit with a condensator and a resitor, it's called a "high-pass filtre" ( if I recall correctly, it's the high pass filtre of first order ). By chanign the values of the resistor/cond you change the characteristics of this filtre and you move the "cut-off" frequency. I would have to open the namerail and check the condensator and resistor values to calculate which is the cutoff freq., but I don't think is really relevant. And it's a passive filtre, which means it doesn't have a power source. But since there's a resistor involved in the circuit , some of the power from the harp is dissipated on it thus making your output signal from namerail a bit lower than the one directily out of the rail.
Clear?

Btw, I'm an electrical engineer, so you may say I know a thing or two about these things

[mixsynth]

Just a couple of observations after having gigged and practiced with this board several times...

-- The playability of the Rhodes patches depends completely on the controller you use. At the moment I actually find it more pleasurable playing them through my VK-8 with its unweighted 61-note keyboard than through my 88-note, hammer action SL-880. I've still got to figure out the velocity curves, I suppose. Those with Roland stage boards (e.g. RD-700SX, Fantom X6/7/8, etc.) would probably have perfect feel without tweaking settings.

-- Patches 13 and 14, the "Stereo Trem" Rhodes patches, don't have any 'trem' on the XV-2020 unless you've connected both Left and Right outputs. This is silly behaviour, because the effect sounds just as good in mono. I haven't played around to confirm, but I think you can 'fool' the unit into allowing the trem, because sometimes it works -- I think it's when you plug the left/mono jack in AFTER turning the unit on. I'll have a play around later and see if this is the case.

-- The board is damned good, and well worth the money I paid for it I heartily recommend it to any gigging musos looking to save their backs (and friendships with other band members!) from destruction.

[Jazz+]

Fatar SL-880 and Yamahs P series keyboards output MIDI velocity curves that are less wide than the Roland  velocity curves and perhaps not ideal for dynamic control. The Yamaha P series doesn't easily send the higer velicty levels.

[mixsynth]

Someone asked for it, so here it is -- the Roland SRX-12 patch list, plus some comments on the ones I've used:

1: Pure EP1 [Basic later series Rhodes patch, direct from pickup rail. Plenty of 'tine noise' and bark.]
2: Lo-Fi EP1
3: Pure EP2 [Basic earlier series Rhodes patch, also direct from pickup rail. Only a hint of 'tine noise' and more subtle bark. Matches my Mk1 73 almost perfectly.]
4: Phaser EP1
5: Soft Wurly
6: Pure Wurly
7: Pure Clav DB
8: Pure Clav CB
9: PhaseClav CB
10: Wah Clav CB
11: Comp Clav CB
12: PureClavMtCB
13: St.Trem EP1 [Suitcase stereo pan effect Rhodes. It sounds great in stereo, but when you only connect one amp (at least on my XV-2020 module), the tremolo only functions 25% of the times you turn the module on, almost at random, so for me it's pretty useless. I'm still struggling to understand what combination of factors allows/prevents the tremolo from working in mono, but it might just be the XV-2020 as it's the cheapest SRX-compatible module available.]
14: St.Trem EP2 [See above]
15: Chorus Wurly
16: Chorus EP1 [The chorus effect on this Rhodes is fine in mono, but sounds terrific in stereo: a really lush, 3-dimensional sound. Unlike the stereo tremolo, it always works in mono. It does lower the volume a fair bit.]
17: Chorus EP2 [See above]
18: Dp-Cho EP1
19: Dp-Cho EP2
20: Soft EP1
21: Soft EP2
22: Phase Wurly
23: Hard EP1
24: Moving EP1 (or 3rd-StackEP1 on RD series and VR-760)
25: EP1 w/FM (or 3rd-StackEP2)
26: EP1 w/VOX (or HarmStackEP1)
27: EP1 w/STR (or Hybrid EP1)
28: EP1 w/PAD (or Hybrid Wurly)
29: Flanger EP1
30: Flanger EP2
31: FlangerWurly
32: Melodic EP1
33: Amped EP1
34: Amped EP2
35: Lo-Fi EP2
36: Lo-Fi Wurly
37: ModDly EP1
38: ModDly EP2
39: Dual EP1
40: Dual Wurly
41: Enhance Clav
42: Peaking Clav
43: Dual Clav DB
44: Dual Clav DA
45: Dual Clav CB
46: Dual Clav CA
47: DualClavMtDB
48: DualClavMtCB
49: PhaseClav DB
50: PhaseClvMtCB
On the Fantom-X series and Juno-G, there are 55 further patches, but they all just the basic 3 instruments with added effects for condition/bite.

[james]

Now that I've had a couple of chances to gig with my XV-5050 + SRX-11 + SRX-12 setup, I have to say that I really do like the Pure EP 1 patch when it's running through a PA with a little EQ.  Or at least I did until my new amp showed up today...I ended up dumping a chunk of cash into the Motion Sound KBR-M, which combines the Pro-3T rotary horn with a mono 12" speaker for both the low rotor sim and a pair of inputs for other keyboards.  I've got the VK-8 going through the organ channel (obviously) and the XV-5050 on the solid state channel, and now the Rhodes + Clav samples from the SRX-12 sound WICKED.  I'm still tweaking the EQ settings in the XV to balance things out a little, but this amp naturally gives me the punchy mid's that my ear needs for the Rhodes to sound right.  The one drawback is that the highs are weak, but what the hell, it's the same deal with a Suitcase amp....

[mixsynth]

Glad to hear you've found the right amp to make the SRX Rhodes shine. I thought the softer EP2 would be my bag, but instead I've well and truly fallen in love with the crisper EP1. It just sounds so good in a band context.

Can't say it enough: Roland have played a blinder with this board.

[james]

I know, that sound really did cut through the mix for me on Friday night.  It gave the latin/bossa tunes a new life...thank you Chick....

[james]

Another observation of the SRX-12 in the wild...on my way out of the Monterey Jazz Festival last night I heard what I thought was somebody playing a Rhodes in the distance, so of course I had to go check it out.  And what did I see but an 88-note board with the Roland logo on the back!!!  Evidence that the SRX-12 can sound nice through a PA too....

[Jazz+]

I'm still loving my SRX-12 EP1 now after three months of gigging with it in a XV-2020 module and using a Roland FP2 controler. How EP1 responds does depend very much on the velocity scale and range of the controller.  I use Medium Touch Setting on my FP2 , so I  like to minus 5 the Velocity in the EP1 Performance.  I also have the SRX-11 and use the Rock Piano #4 for live jazz, it's brighter quality is easier to hear than the other piano SRX-11 patches. For speakers I use a pair of 500 watt biamped (12" &  2" drivers)  EV SXa360 powered PA speakers.