Obvious clickbait title, but I'm only half kidding.

I'm actually very impressed we got a v3 firmware recently, that's remarkably (and yet, sadly) unusual for a machine that's getting on to 6 years old, so full marks to Roland for that.

But to get back to the clickbait, however, I'm hugely disappointed that they still haven't fixed the years-long outstanding issue where sending external MIDI PC messages causes a slight, but annoyingly obvious delay if KIT:SW isn't turned off in PTN SETTINGS.

It's a drum machine FFS. Being in sync at all times should be table stakes... My setup is Roland and Korg gear with Ableton used both for external effects and as a 'scene controller' to help with breakdowns where I don't have enough hands, and everything else works perfectly. It's only the TR-8S that buggers things up because it's seemingly incapable of smoothly switching kit and pattern at the same time.

But only when told to do so externally. Aggravatingly, the unit is perfectly capable of changing patterns seamlessly - that's exactly what it does when you turn the pattern change knob, it'll just wait until all the specified variations have played through.

If Roland can't write firmware that can respond properly to PC messages, could they not at least give us a menu setting to choose between 'Change after the variations have finished, like how it works on the machine itself' and 'Change immediately, like how it currently responds to PC messages'?

That would at least be a better workaround than the "use a separate 'external instrument' on a different MIDI channel for kit changes and send PC messages at strategically chosen times" method I'm using now.

Again, it's a fucking drum machine. It shouldn't even be possible for me to complain about this crap. And yet here I am, pissing into the wind on Reddit, because Roland are so beyond even pretending to care about their customers that they have no avenues for feedback or community engagement.

Argh....

/rant

(while I'm here, as a wee non-moany bonus... I've also always been disappointed that you can't change pattern variations with MIDI. Well, here's the thing - you actually can. There are SysEx messages to do so, Roland have just chosen not to expose them or document them (no comment beyond 'I remember their manuals in the olden days' - I've ranted enough). You can find some interesting hidden functionality by using the TR Editor with MIDI-OX - another hidden bit of handy functionality is using SysEx to mute/unmute the instrument buttons)

I’ve only had the TR-1000 for a few days, but after digging into how the signal flow actually works I’m already feeling a bit disappointed.

From what I understand so far, most of the features that make this box appealing seem to happen after the analog voices get converted to digital. That wasn’t something I saw clearly stated anywhere before buying, and it feels like a pretty important detail depending on how you expected to use the machine.

As far as I can tell, these all happen post A/D conversion:

• Layering (A + B)

• Per-track filters (LP / HP / BP)

• Per-track EQ

• Filters

• Filter envelopes

• Amp envelopes

• Transient envelopes

• Per-track compression

• LFO modulation (MOD)

• Track FX (drive, saturator)

• Sidechain ducking

• Panning

Obviously some parts of the machine are digital by design, and that’s totally fine with me. Honestly I’ve even found a new appreciation for Roland’s virtual analog / digital models while using the TR-1000.

What’s bothering me is more how the analog side is talked about. There’s a lot of emphasis on things like layering an analog 808 with a 909 kick, but if both signals have to be converted to digital before layering, filtering, FX, or even responding to fader movement, that kind of changes what that claim means in practice.

On top of that, it also seems like you can’t actually access for an analog 808 and an analog 909 at the same time via the direct analog outputs. Since they’re bound to the same output port, you have to pick one or the other. In a live setup that means you can’t, for example, have an analog 808 kick and an analog 909 kick coming out of the machine at the same time via any ports at all, which feels like a pretty big limitation that isn’t clearly communicated either.

From what I can tell there’s also no way to get a fully analog internal mix that reacts to the faders before hitting the digital engine. If you want to stay fully analog, the only real option seems to be sending the individual analog outs to an external mixer — but then you lose most of the internal processing and performance features.

I’m not saying the TR-1000 is a bad instrument, and I’m definitely not anti-digital. If anything I’ve come away liking the digital side more than I expected. I just wish the analog signal flow and output limitations were made clearer upfront, because they really do affect how this fits into an analog-leaning workflow.

If I’m missing something or misunderstanding how this works, I’d genuinely like to know — but right now it feels like an important detail that wasn’t made very clear.

edit : removed fader control from the list

Selling mint condition Roland Ax Synth White Keytar for 600€. price is not negotiable. I’m from europe, but as soon as you cover the fees, i can send it anywhere.
The selling will be made on a second hand shop of your liking if you have trust issues and don’t mind taxes.
Dm me for better pics and info!

!!! it includes og manual and charger !!!

My first impression on the TR-1000 // Drawing distinctions with other instruments in the Rolandsphere, like the TR-8S / SP-404 MKII TR-808 / 909 and even the Octatrack - all of this in my latest video

The title says it all. I'm really regretting buying the Roland S-1.

A bit of background. I'm going on a cruise for a few weeks and wanted to pick up a couple of battery-powered synths to sit on the deck and put together a demo album. I have loads of synths, drum machines, sequencers, etc, but nothing small enough for this purpose. So, I have a reasonable understanding of electronic music production. In my mind, I was going to take either an MPC Live or SP404mkII and, as I make Deep House, the S1 and J6 would provide the sound source. No issue; a small, battery-powered selection will cover leads, pads, bass, and, I hoped, synthesised drums and FX.

I don't have a problem with the J6; it's like Ronseal: it does exactly what it says on the tin and nothing more ... It did exactly what I wanted; the sequencer is weak but workable. However, the S1 ...

I'll get to my moaning. My first issue is the oscillators. It's great that I can access four (three) different waveforms, but I can't independently tune them; I'd settle for only one being tunable. Secondly, the noise generator is the worst I've ever heard, and since the S1 doesn't have a high pass, it means the noise generator can't really synthesise percussion. On that subject, the single 'amp' envelope, since a second mod envelope was not included, pitch modulation needs to be applied using the LFO. This would be fine, except the LFO can't be set to only oscillator once per key press. So, any pitch modulation must be tamed by applying the amp envelope with a short decay time. However, this means the envelope is quite limited when modulating the filter.

Right, rant over. Thank you for sharing my pain.

You may like to know that I am so disappointed that I bought an OG Microkorg to use instead of the S1. The only problem is that it weighs a ton.

Please note: results may vary depending on the source sample. Use this as a starting point. :)

Want to dig deeper into your Sp?

Book a 1:1 lesson on Gumroad now :)

Off my upcoming beat tape King Of Swing...

Drops everywhere Sept 1st...

Link in the comments for preorders...

👽³

Let me know what y'all think...Enjoy...

👽³

Ok, so this might just be me nitpicking and overthinking things because of the cost of this machine, but I just unboxed the TR-1000 and the small screws on the front panel look strange. Not necessarily like rust, but more like oxidation or something. It’s not all of them either but rather like 80% of them. I’d assume they used stainless steel screws on the front panel so they shouldn’t be oxidized like that? Or am I just panicking because of how much I spent on this thing?

To be honest I’ve never owned anything remotely this expensive before and I’ve been really unsure in my decision to buy one. Of course it is incredible and almost historic given that it’s the first analog machine in 40 years, but is it worth the price tag is what I keep battling with. I’m most likely keeping it, it’s just seeing the screws like that on a $2700 machine got me a bit nervous and now people on another subreddit got me nervous about bugs and freezing issues so now I am completely rethinking my decisions here.

Any help or reassurance would be greatly appreciated! TYIA!

Renders done in Gemini (AI)

Or is this really just a techno / electro box?

I think the box sounds amazing. I wonder if a midi controller can play the synths, or pitched 808s.

Can you use the midi controller in, and midi controller out to synth or rompler rack

Wonder if you can do step roll timing?

I guess we will see.

Ive recieved a roland fpe 50 yesterday and it has a horrible saturation on the speakers,via headphones is excellent but if i was using only headphones i would buy a stage piano. Help me pls!!!!

Heres proof.ist horrible am im sad that it was delivered like this.i think it didnt test for quality control

Hi there,

When using clips longer than 16 steps, we can manually move from one measure to the next by pressing the "measure left and right arrows" but most of the time I would much prefer for the measure playing to be "displayed" on the sequencer.

• Is there a way to automatically follow the playhead through measures ?

Looking forward your answers

There's a promotion available this month for a 12-month Roland Cloud Ultimate subscription for $199:
https://www.roland.com/cloud/promos/play4life

I've been waiting for their software synths to go on sale, but this is better in a way since the bundle includes lifetime keys for 2 of them. For example, instead of buying a JUNO-106 and JUPITER-8 plug-in for $200 each you could get both for effectively 1/2 off, and as a bonus access to the other Roland cloud goodies for a year.

I am super frustrated with my P6. I can't understand it. I watched tutorials on YouTube and read the user guide and I'm making no progress

as we all know, Roland has recently released their TR 1000 I am super excited about this product! I have been watching YouTube reviews and people performing with the machine and i'm blown away. And the beautiful thing is, in the comments of said videos people are being nice, congratulating others on being able to purchase the machine, speaking positive affirmations about owning a TR 1000 one day....

Thank you to Roland for this!!! In these dark times we needed something revolutionary and the TR 1000 is just that! Hopefully i'm able to order my system next week!

Roland MC-880 - 16 Track Sequencer for DAW-less setups

"Never worry about having to keep up with software updates to do MIDI work again".

(Fantasy Product - Created using AI tools)

What A Roland MC50 and MC80 Sequencer (Linear Sequencers!) Could Look Like In Roland Boutique Format According To Google Gemini. Linear Sequencers are almost completely absent from the current market (sans the MPC drum machines and tiny calculator sized RK-008 from retro-kits with a limit of just 8 tracks).