It's not great, but it ain't bad! A very stripped down monosynth from Roland's classic SH-series. Its single oscillator only has PWM, ramp, square and noise waveforms. It has a similar architecture to the SH-101, the VCA can switch between gate or envelope, the VCF is pretty standard, and there is a sample-hold function which is great for voltage controlled filtering into acid and back! Another cool feature is its external input which will allow you to filter external audio through its VCF. Because they are pretty old now they will most likely have some functional problems like sticky keys, and noisy knobs and signal. It is used by Orbital, Vince Clarke, BT, Conemelt, Josh Wink, Banco De Gaia, Mr. Oizo, Ladytron, Jimmy Edgar, Dave Holmes, Freddy Fresh, OMD, and 808 State.

Rey

October 17, 2009 @ 5:46 pm

very stripped down synth, probably why it sounds so much fatter than anything else i've ever played with.

at the same time, its lack of features made me sell it.

Claude 9

September 30, 2009 @ 9:18 pm

Yes , the deep bass is actually phatter than the 101 and that is sayin' something!Three differences between these two that I have not seen anyone mention are 1) there is a switch that inverts the filter envelope , 2) There is a fader that delays the modulation onset( great for playing with one hand) and 3) there is a hold switch on the vca for keeping a note going without keeping a finger on the keys, useful for modulating drones and for using the external filter. The price these days is not nearly as overpriced as the 101s( less than half as much). So I saw these as a great companion or alternative. Of course if you have both you can hook them up together through cv/gate and have a super massive bass or acid sound.

JOE

September 20, 2009 @ 10:28 pm

what a cracker.make sure you spend a bit more and get one in reasonable condition to have a fighting chance of it lasting with you - lots of things can be or go wrong with them. much fuller and more organic sounding than yamaha cs 01 and darker than the moog rogue.no whare near as cool as cs 5. i like this synth for its sound,recommended..

brandon

August 4, 2009 @ 4:14 pm

also (chris) clark uses this

il

July 23, 2009 @ 10:47 pm

Cool little machine, not as good as the SH-2. However it's downside is it (like the SH-2) is WAY overpriced now. It's going for at least twice as much as it's worth (on ebay) which is going to make for lots of disappointed people when they pay over £300 for a small limited synth like this (usually with rust and faults and bad tuning). Another one that should be avoided unless a GOOD sensible price. If you get it at a fair price then it's happy days :)

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