Korg Forums

fjs714 · Senior Member Joined: 09 May 2007 Posts: 402

Hi Fellas,
One of my synths is a Triton rack with some EXB boards and I love the thing. I also have a Fantom xr rack.
Having said that, I enjoy going to Ebay and comparing prices of equipment. As a rule the Roland XV5080's average price is at least $100 dollars more than the Triton rack. WHY?
Am I so blinded by the sound of my Korg?
Thanks
Frank

Kevin Nolan · Posted: Thu May 23, 2013 6:43 pm Post subject:

I own the Korg Karma (same synth engine as the Triton) with MOSS, Vintage and Orchestral board; and an XV5080 with Vintage, Asia, Vocal, Orchestral 1 & 2 cards added; and also recently bought a Triton rack.

While they are very different and cannot truly be compared, there is no doubt in my mind that they XV5080 sounds utterly contemporary today, while the Triton, though still a very strong workstation, does sound a tad dated, especially on its more 'raw' instrument programs. I think the reasons are connected to the following:

- While Korg have specialized over the years in true 'instrument sampling' and have been successful in each respective generation especially with live performers, each generation of workstation does genuinely 'date' the predecessor as sampling becomes more sophisticated. Hence, the Triton suffers because it lags the likes of OASYS, Kronos and the likes of the Motif

- By contrast, Roland have historically been more about sampling instrument 'elements' which allows them to be used in more generic, synthesis and atmospheric sounds that still sound contemporary today. Take the JD800 for example. On board are about 110 sampled sound 'fragments' - each one as usable as a raw waveform as is a sawtooth or square wave on a subtractive synth. Add to that Roland's historically 'lush' effects (and the JD800s control surface) and you still have an utterly modern package.

And it's similar with the XV5080. I use it as an awesome synthesizer - where its huge range of waveforms and its stunning COSM effects can make it sound very analogue, organic and truly gargantuan. The same applies with its expansion boards. Its Vintage board is superior to the Vintage card for the Triton range, while Roland's Vocal board allows for truly breadth taking choral sounds to match anything Vangelis and Tomita used in their heyday (and hence why the XV-5080 synth engine and the Roland expansion cards are as big a reason why people are buying the Integra7 as much as for its newer Supernatural Sounds).

Don't get me wrong - the Triton is still excellent - and in fact I'm in the middle of a large job of going though all available MOSS program banks and Triton program and combi banks so as to select and load onto my Karma and Triton Rack the very best available; and even today the very best Triton and MOSS sounds all loaded deliver a very potent synth. Its just that the XV5080 does deliver something extra in the synth / atmospheric department that seems to be still in high demand.

All of this is my take on the matter - will be delighted to be contradicted !!!

Best regards,
Kevin.

Epidemik · Posted: Sun May 26, 2013 3:11 am Post subject:

The XV5080 prices are slightly higher because of the expandability, backwards compatibility, similar faeatures/waves from the JD990, having built-in SCSI, COSM/RSS effects, musical filters, plus it still sounds nice...

The Triton Rack is catered more to electronic/dance and the PCM Boards really don't add much to the palette, IMO, but with the MOSS Board it's on another level, hince the prices alone cost as much as the Triton...

I also like the 5 Insert/2 Master effects in the Triton + a very good EQ...

Another gripe with the Roland XV5080 is the sound engine being bypassed when you load in sounds using the SCSI, plus you only have 1 MFX + reverb & chorus in sample playback mode or standard mode...

Still have & love both though as they are classics Very Happy

_________________
Born to Murder the World

DH56 · Posted: Sat Aug 10, 2013 12:55 am Post subject:

They are both such stunning sounding modules and I still use them quite regularly in my Soundworld mixes. I would normally say that it comes down simply to supply and demand, but I do notice that there seems to be about an even number available when I check on EB so not sure why the Triton-R would go for such lower prices.

I use the XV-5080 mainly for its ethnic instruments and orchestral sounds from the SR-JV and SRX expansion boards. The Triton on the other hand I use mainly for its gorgeous swirling pads and textures and I have gotten a ton of mileage from the dual arpeggiators.

I have a CD-ROM drive hooked via SCSI to my 5080 and have all of the Roland sets for it but messing with loading sounds are just too much of a drag with all of the partials and the lot so I stopped messing with them.

Sadly, I never upgraded my Triton with any add-ons because another synth I got soon after kind of took over my studio. It was an old workstation that begins with an "O" Wink

MrDuke · Junior Member Joined: 13 Nov 2007 Posts: 64

Question

Is the Triton Rack still worth your while to buy, or is it hopelessly dated (like I fear)? You can get one on eBay for peanuts, and I've considered it. The 32MB WaveROM does seem quite, ahem, "humble", when compared to the multi-gigabyte Komplete software packages of today (especially considering what a mammoth it physically is)

What about the sampler - I've let myself understand you need the SCSI expansion to be able to install a hard drive or a CompactFlash reader, but samples are still loaded in the (limited) memory, yes? I suppose it's still better than using floppies...

Does the MOSS board hold up to, let's say, Roland's SuperNatural modeling? I've also considered buying the Integra-7 (which is really the 5080 + SRX cards + SuperNatural stuff). The problem with MOSS is that it (still) costs as much as a used Triton Rack itself, so I'm wondering if it's worth it - that would really push the price of the Rack to I'm-not-sure-that's-reasonable territory.