Time for a new one..MicroKorg XL or R3?

[xmlguy]

Welcome to the R3 owners club!

If you get a 10 AA battery holder, and put only 9 NiMh cells in it, using a jumper to bypass the empty cell, then you've got a 12V nominal battery pack. All you need then is a DC adapter plug and wire it with the proper polarity. You don't want to use all 10 cells because the voltage of NiMh AA cells can be up to 1.45V or so at full charge. With 9 cells, the voltage may read up to 13V, but will quickly drop to 12V or a little lower at the R3 current draw.

If you have an interest in electronics, you can make a 12V regulated DC-DC power supply with a few dollars in parts. You can convert most simple AC-DC power adapter circuits by just removing the transformer, diode rectifier, and main filtering capacitor - the front end before the DC regulation occurs.

http://www.play-hookey.com/analog/exper ... lt_ps.html

http://www.play-hookey.com/analog/exper ... lt_ps.html

[jita1]

i just went through this myself and got an R3 at gc and discovered the same lower store price than the webstore price mentioned above.

If someone has a pic or part number for a battery pack add on for the R3 I'd appreciate it- that was the main reason I was considering the xl.

I wound up choosing the R3 because of the additional effects and the second audio input, since I might try vocoding and guitar at the same time.

The R3 builtin sounds are a ton of fun, I'm looking forward to trying out some of the downloadable patches and playing with the editor but I haven't really had time to play through all the builtins yet. This is a really, really fun machine!

Welcome to the R3 club. I haven't had time to really do much with it yet but the editor software is really cool. It's very user-friendly. I did find that some things are easier to tweak from the keyboard itself. Trying to turn knobs with the mouse doesn't work too well for me. I'm going to check out some of the available patches, including xmlguy's vocoder this weekend.

[vibedog]

Thank you for the welcomes and the idea for the battery holder. I measured (with calipers) the power thing that plugs into the R3 and I believe the correct term is

"Barrel connector
5 mm OD x 3.5 mm ID with center pin"

a google finds such a thing at powerstream.com although I found what appears to be the same thing in a bin full of wall warts. So who knows, maybe I'll try to wire up such a thing and if it works, I can post an image.

Cheers.

[kimu]

hi, nice threads, let me add a couple of question as a maybe-future-r3-buyer (cannot play on microkeys...)

i have tried R3 two ro three time at my usual shop, never digged too much beyond preset anyway.

my impression has been that the sound is really "clean and thick" and sometimes a little bit "toyish"... since i read several review of people having the same impression but also i have read people saying R3 is a powerful synth for its price and dimensions, my question is if the preset do not represent at the best the synth and if it is possible to have really raw and fat sounds on R3.

just another one, filter cannot auto-oscillate, correct?

thanks to all that would share their impression as r3 owners.

[xmlguy]

Using the presets to judge how a synth sounds is a very poor and misleading approach. It's like judging the quality and capability of a computer based only on the software the manufacturer has provided, not based on what the computer can really do if you choose the right software for what you want to accomplish.

On a synth you can't get an accurate feel for how it really sounds until you go through a wide range of the engine parameters and to build your own patches. Therefore, it takes more work than just kicking the tires, pressing preset buttons, hitting keys, and listening to crappy monitors, which is the typical pattern I see customers doing at Guitar Center. The problem is that these same people often post comments about how these synths supposedly sound based on this terribly weak approach to evaluating the gear, and there's no way for readers to judge that person's comments vs. someone like me who've spend hundreds of hours on it building patches, and on other synths for comparison.

[kimu]

you are right, for this reason i would like to have opinion from R3 owners.

[TecRoc]

Hi Kimu,

IIt´s now about a year since i bought my R3 and i´ve used it extensively in my studio and on stage.
First impression was and still is: This is a Synth you can really have fun with playing.
And at the same time you can call it a swiss army knife for serious sound (patch) creation.
I mostly use the R3 with my MPC-2000 XL and its Sequencer to sync and play the R3
as well as sampling my favourite R3 Sounds (mostly single drum sounds or arp-loops) into the MPC.
That way I already have accumulated a little R3 drum-library on my mpc, which enables me to use
more of the R3 synth sounds at the same time.

But now considering the sound and tonal character of the R3:

First of all, do not judge by presets. They often just represent the most common sounds in contemporary
music(e.g. Unisono leads) and some classics (like e-pianos). If you really want to know, what it can do,
you´ll have to think about the type of music and sounds, that YOU like the most and program a patch on your own!
But be told, to create more complex and distinct sounds you´ll need to be familiar with synthesizer
architecture and functionality. Here the software editor of the R3 really helps a lot! I own various analog and
digital synthesizers (JP-6, Matrix-1000, K-1, EX-800 & EX-8000) and i can tell you for sure, that each
has its own unique sound. Among those the R3 in my opinion covers the widest range of different sounds
in a single unit (considering hardware synths).

The overall sound could be described as precise, sharp and filigree, although it is also capable of doing
some smooth things too. It really can sound "toyish" too, but i consider this a possibility and not a characteristic
of the R3. It definetly is good for arpeggio sounds (due to ModSequenzer). BTW, the Sound Set of Phillipp Muench
shows a more experimental, noisy and atmospheric side of the R3. You should try to check it out, if possible!
If you want analogue sounds: it is possible. But you should not expect to get a mini moog or a Roland Jupiter.
It simply cannot accurately reproduce the subtle tones of a specific analogue unit with its unique filters and even
odd behaviour(minimoog tuning). But it can ressemble most analogue patches.
To sum it up:
the R3 is the most versatile Synth i have, plus the Vocoder and the FX are not just a bonus, but essential and very powerful!

I hope this was a helpful view and not too confusing.
Cheers!

[kimu]

Hi TecRoc,

many thanks for your post!

i currently have M3/M50 as main workstation for home studio and live gig respectively, then i also collected some traditional VA as Virus B (now become Snow), Waldorf Q (now become Blofeld), Plugiator and V-synth GT.

i added then during the years a couple of (second-hand) mini-synth as Micron and xio...

i am thinking about R3 mainly because it haves 37 normal keys (cannot play on micro-keys), integrated vocoder and VA patch structure (never felt very confortable in programming on workstation) but that can be also more complex then traditional VA.

I would mainly use it for experimental/progressive music, i mean pad, texture, arps and sequences and leads (both electronic and more analog sounding...)

do you think could be the right choice?

[kimu]

Hi guys

i am just come back from a "session" to my delear where i tried R3, microkorg XL and traditional microkorg. here my first impression:

microkorgXL is a very good machines, the microkeys feels much better than the old micro and even i prefer standard dimension, are enough playable for roaring solos or fast chord progression. The XL mantains the "sounds" of the micro, listen to it you would say that XL descent from micro sounds are really fat, they fill the soundscapes even with only 8 notes of polifony. filters are very good too both in sound-shaping and in resonance, it's a pity korg don't make them auto-oscillating. and weel FX you know, are superb as in korg tradition.

the two big knobs reminds me to old radio o hi-fi of 20-30 years ago and have a geneorus steps (or click i do not know which is the best word in english) on the admitted positions. the little knobs on the right instead, used for tweaking parameter are without steps and also with very little friction with the panel, so sometimes is quite difficult to stop on the desired value.

for me, if it would have had standard keys, it would be a must-buy synth today, but feel not very comfortable on microkeys.

R3 instead, if from one side is slightly simpler to program thanks to richer panel, sound more precise and clean than microXL, sounds (dry) do not fill the space and seems thicker, even filters seems to be different from one on XL, in R3 seems that cutoff and resonance alters less the overall sounds.

looking at the editing pages, R3 and XL seems almost identical, so just trying, even if they sound different, it's difficult to define what is changed in synthesis engine

[vibedog]

Good luck on your decision and I'm glad you have had plenty of opportunities to play the different machines.

I just went through this decision myself and ultimately decided not to make keysize the deciding factor. I like the full size keys much better; however, the R3 keys are very cheap feeling, imho worse than a $100 casio I have. So as far as the keys go, they are certainly good enough in any portable situation, and at home I have a m-audio axiom controller which has much, much nicer keys on it. So if keys are really a big issue for you, you'll probably want something that neither the XL or R3 offers and need to get a separate controller with a more realistic feel. It sounds like you have had a lot of time with the synths, and if you are leaning towards the xl except for keysize, then that may be the direction you want to go and perhaps invest later on in a better-keyed controller if need be.

These machines are so cool and fun that there isn't really a bad choice as far as my tastes are concerned.

[kimu]

Thanks for your comments vibedog!


i tried to write down a comparison chart between R3 and XL.

you can find it here

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=Z12SRUUE

feel free to add any other useful information

[jita1]

Well, I finally spent some time getting to know my R3. It's really cool. I loaded up many of the R3 libraries that are available here and they sound good, including xmlguy's Hypervoc. I have more sounds than I can handle. I'm going to have to spend some time tweaking sounds to develop new ones.

Kimu, the MicroKorg and MS2000 presets are available for the R3 in the download section, in case you didn't know. Keep this in mind while making your decision...

[MrDuke]

Hey guys, I'm a R3 owner and I thought I'd post it here since it sort of involves both machines...

I'm trying to recreate a quite simple sound (I'm guessing it's a preset on the MK XL?) on the R3... it's heard on this video at exactly 1:28 onwards: http://www.sonicstate.com/news/2009/03/ ... rokorg-xl/

[jita1]

Hey guys, I'm a R3 owner and I thought I'd post it here since it sort of involves both machines...

I'm trying to recreate a quite simple sound (I'm guessing it's a preset on the MK XL?) on the R3... it's heard on this video at exactly 1:28 onwards: http://www.sonicstate.com/news/2009/03/ ... rokorg-xl/

Sounds like a filtered organ sound with an arp. Probably would be relatively easy to create in the R3.