Vintage Synth Explorer

Korg • DSS-1

A wonderful early digital synthesizer. With eight notes of polyphony, two oscillators per voice, a noise source, two multi-stage envelopes, a resonant filter and auto-bend, the DSS-1 has much in common with Korg's previous flagship DW-8000. But it went much further, boasting twin digital delays, oscillator sync, an improved unison mode, a lush analog VCF switchable between 12 and 24dB, and more. Whereas the DW-8000 got its raw material from 16 stored digital waves, the DSS1's oscillators take their source from sampling, additive synthesis, or even hand-drawn waveforms!

It actually had a warm sound and was great for creating pads and textures, as well as deep basses and drones. The synthesis method is based on altering various waveform samples via 2 data sliders. It can sample and then treat the samples as its waveforms - that includes all filtering and envelopes. The DSM-1 was the expanded rackmount version. It was used by Jean Michel Jarre, Joe Zawinul, Michael Cretu of Enigma, Mark Jenkins, Hiro Kawahara, Paul Nagle, Shriekback, and Steve Winwood.

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Jim Wicked

Posted 295 days ago

Just to clarify here, there are a couple other differences between the DSS-1 and the DSM-1. The DSM-1 had more sample RAM (2 megs) and used HD disks unlike the DD disks the DSS-2 uses. Also, the DSM-1 doesn't have resonant filters.

Hillebille

Posted 320 days ago

A monster, weights a ton, kbd extremely clattering, great sounds,
a hilarious sample arrangement system, splendid VCF and VCA,
should be seen as a synth with user waves and not a sampler.
Unison mode that kicks ass!

Zax

Posted 341 days ago

I used this whale for loop sampling more than synthesis. The sound was just as heavy as the board itself (like 30 pounds or something ridiculous). Great 12 bit sound, sweet distinctive filter, and yes enough sampling time--more than the 5 seconds mentioned above, more like 12. Perfect for rap and dance.

Kai Németh

Posted 416 days ago

It´s been also used by Depeche Mode,see live Videos on YOU TUBE!!!

Andrew Beddoes

Posted 430 days ago

A well-designed, easy to operate, sampler with lots of programming options. The echo units, noise generator, and filter resonance are lacking in the rack mount version, but the keyboard version can't stack voices or do multi-timbral. No flash RAM- everything has to be loaded up on floppies.

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