![]() What's more, at higher levels, we did experience some ground loop noise. However, there are quite a few downsides which let down what should have ultimately been a Nord Electro challenger: it’s roughly £400 more than the market-leading Nord Electro 5D SW61, plus there’s no octave transposition per-engine, no separate outputs per-engine, very rudimentary FX tweakability, no amp simulations, no splitting between the piano/EP/ organ/layer sections, and no user-sample memory So what’s the conclusion? Well, on one hand you have solid build, portability and a lovely-feeling keyboard with decent organ, piano and EP engines, paired with some really solid-sounding FX. General patch selection and saving is easy via Scene memory (four banks of four patches). ![]() You can layer any two engines simultaneously, though there’s no splitting, except for within the organ engine itself. The final engine is the Key/Layer engine, which offers a small range of mostly useful (though ultimately pretty unexciting) keyboard and synth sounds, including some good clavinets, basic lead sounds, warm string and synth pads, and useable synth brass and poly patches. There are several useful and solid-sounding piano variations to choose from, and all work well for comping and soloing. Next to the EP section is the Piano section, which includes various piano types (grands, uprights and electric grands). In particular, the tine and reed pianos are excellent, and with some valve drive and a little custom EQ and compression, you’ll find the Vox to be a very convincing electric piano emulator - it’s a real joy to create and play classic Rhodes/Wurli patches. Next up is the EP section which, like the other engines, features a dedicated volume control along with a variation screen with preset variations of either Tine, Reed or FM-style pianos (which sound nicely authentic warm, clear and soulful). You can control wah and volume using the included expression pedal. Each of the sounds has its own preset effects, which can then be layered with the front panel global effects. ![]() The onboard effects all sound very musical and warm and there’s enough onboard to cover most situations including a delays, reverbs, chorus, flanger, phaser, wah and compressor. Switching in the NuTube valve circuit adds weight and harmonics to all the sounds, and hopefully we’ll see this make its way into more upcoming Korg instruments. ![]() For percussion, though, key click and vibrato are all preset and not editable, letting down an otherwise solid engine. It’s nice that, unlike Nord’s Electro, there’s a multifunction lever to the left of the keyboard that acts as a pitchbend on the synth sounds, as a tremolo/panning switch on the electric pianos and as a rotary speed control for the organs. Regardless, it’s great that you can also use the drawbars to EQ sounds and to change certain settings (such as LFO pitch speed, envelope controls and filter cutoff/resonance). Although the LED drawbars work fine in the main, if your fingers get sweaty or you want to make super-quick changes, then it’s sometimes tricky to be accurate with them. Then you’ll find a splittable (natively or over MIDI) organ engine capable of Tonewheel (CX3), Vox and Farfisa Compact emulations. If you want a longer version, there’s a 73-note model for an extra £100.įrom left to right: first up you’ll find controls for valve drive and a Dynamics dial which controls how the sounds interact with your playing style. Vox has also minimised the lip on the key front edge, making this board very comfortable for palm slides and piano playing too. The keyboard itself is the tried and tested keybed from the Kronos LS and it works very well, with enough accuracy and control for piano sounds, while retaining speed for synth and organ playing.
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