Access Virus C

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Sequential Circuits Prelude

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"This vintage (circa 1982) Sequential Circuits Prelude is a 4-section analog orchestral synthesizer consisting of Piano, Organ, Brass and String sections. Like many other similar 4-section synths of this type, all 49 keys will play simultaneously for 49-note polyphony. Chorus/Flanger, LFO, EQ, Octave.

Two of the sections can be played at the same time. Though editability and storage are limited, it has an on-board chorus/flanger effect as well as a 7-band equalizer. The string sounds are a really cool feature of the Prelude, and the on-board effects, especially the crazy LFO and the 5 band EQ are great for thickening and modulating the string sound beyond the scope of traditional orchestral sounds. I also dig the Organ + Brass sections together. And the LFO can really tweak any of the voices into something completely different and is quite fun to "play" manually. The Octave option replicates tones an octave down, fattening up the sound immensely!

The Prelude has a very appealing and intuitive layout and appearance in line with the rest of the SCI synths of the time period and is definitely one of the finest orchestral-type multitimbral synths among others in its class.

Specifications:
Polyphony - 49 voices
Oscillators - 1 per voice
Effects - Chorus / Flanger, Octave, LFO, EQ
Memory - None
Keyboard - 49 keys
Control - No MIDI, no sequencer. Straight up old-school!"

Roland Juno-106

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KORG Poly-800

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Alesis ION

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"Polyphony - 8 voices (4-part multitimbral)
Oscillators - Alesis proprietary DSP Analog Modeling: 3 oscillators per voice (Sine, Square-Pulse, Saw-Triangle).
Filters - 2 multi-mode filters with 16 filter types.
Envelopes - 3 EGs: Pitch/Mod, Filter, and the Amp have their own ADSR envelopes.
LFO - 2 multi-wave LFOs and 1 S&H. Ring Modulator. FM. hard&soft OSC sync.
Effects - 4 Individual Mono/Stereo Insert Effects and Stereo Master Multi-FX Processor (80ms slapback delay, chorus, flanger, phaser, distortion, fuzz, compression, limiter) and built-in 40-band Vocoder.
Keyboard - 49 keys (velocity, release velocity sensitive).
Memory - 512 Patches, 64 Multi-timbral Setups.
Arpeg/Seq - Arpeggiator: MIDI-sync-able multiple-pattern plus *random* feature.
Real-Time Controllers - 30 360-degree Parameter Knobs, 2 Assignable Modulation Wheels, Assignable Pitch Wheel.
Control - MIDI (4-part multitimbral) IN/OUT/THRU"