zephonic

Let me add some context: I didn't spend much time with the bread and butter sounds (piano, EP, organ, clav, gtr, etc.) but what little I played didn't impress me much. Serviceable, but a bit déja vu. I was mostly interested in the synth stuff; you know, Roland's pads, synthleads, bell-like sounds etc. They have traditionally excelled at that, and my first impression is that the new Fantom has it in spades, and it seems there's plenty of new flavors to discover and savor.

Had a brief encounter with the F8 just now. Looks like there"s a bit of a learning curve (zones/scenes/tones), it"s different from the Rolands of yore. Soundwise, it feels hifi and up to date, while retaining that Roland character. I want to have a better idea of the architecture and possibilities before I take the plunge, but it would take something major to hold me back, I think.

Says this guy on gearslutz: https://www.gearslutz.com/board/showpost.php?p=14200818&postcount=463 Hopefully it"s just a unit got damaged in transport.

When it comes to composing and songwriting I'm pretty much 100% ITB, and yet I kind of look forward to sequencing in the new Fantom. I fondly remember doing that on the Fantom X, or the MPC2000 even longer ago. The one thing that always stood out to me was the MIDI timing. Things just felt tighter than Cubase. If, as I understand it, the Fantom will be able to dump 16 tracks of audio simultaneously into your DAW, I can see myself adopting a hybrid workflow, where I do most of the MIDI on the keyboard, and just mix audio in my DAW.

Open Labs Neko.

I'm trying to understand why they added the on-board speakers. Not sure what sort of use case they envision for them?

Cover band stuff is the majority of my gigs, and my MODX and Krome suffice for most of those. Heck, we live in amazing times; any Juno, Kross or MX will get you going for not a lot of $$$. Frankly, the Fantom seems like overkill. That's not why I want it, though. I need an instrument that I love playing, that allows me to express myself. I'm still undecided on whether I really need a Fantom or can make do with a Jupiter X. But dammit, I want my aftertouch back.

I"m not saying they favored Ferrari specifically, not at all. But to me it feels like the story is becoming more important. American Idol doesn"t favor one candidate over the other, they just chase emotion and whatever the public connects with. I feel F1 under Liberty Media is turning into something like that.It"s still racing and all, but you see the change.

Not to take anything away from Leclerc's thoroughly deserved victory today, but on reflection it does seem that today's race laid bare the distinctly more commercial "reality TV" nature underneath the sport. It is clear that the story matters enough to influence the outcome. Previously, penalties were given for Leclerc's transgressions today, but him winning for Ferrari at Monza is the most "Feel Good" story of the year, so we're not gonna let that get in the way. I'm not suggesting he should have been penalized, and I'm happy he won today, but it is clear that the sport has changed direction. We can expect to see more "American Idol"-like moments in the future. Hamilton's reaction was telling.

Congrats to Ferrari, Leclerc, Carlo and the other tifosi! It"s special to see a Ferrari win at Monza. I thought he would get a 5s time penalty for cutting turn 2 on lap 36. It was similar to what happened with Vettel in Canada, although his return to the track was less dangerous. Still, from a sporting perspective it"s probably good he wasn"t penalized (just as Vettel shouldn"t have been penalized in Canada). I feel sorry for Vettel, but it was another unforced error. Happy to see Renault in 4th and 5th, hope they continue to improve.

My Roland vocab dates back to the days when they simply had patches, performances and parts. It used to be Tone It looks like the Zone is a hybrid of what used to be a Patch/Liveset and Performance/Registration, while a Scene is like a supra-Registration. Maybe they change it up every generation just to keep us on our toes. My guess is your basic building block for splits is the Zone/Scene, but I suppose they added Regions for quick splits á la Nord. I could be wrong, though.

I think the idea is that the XLR outs negate the need for DI boxes.

Don't get me wrong, I totally understand that the new Fantom isn't necessarily all that impressive if you haven't been longing for one the way I have. It just has the features I've been missing since I retired my Fantom X7 from gigging three years ago. A nice 76-key action with aftertouch and my preferred pitch/mod stick. Would I rather have it cheaper? Sure. But the lack of connection I have had with my keyboards over the last few years hasn't been worth the money I saved. So I'm willing to take a hit if it brings a little more enjoyment to my gigs. If you mean this came totally out of the blue, then yes. I had absolutely no idea they were gonna come back, thought they were done with the high-end market.

A dude from Germany on Gearslutz says he tried the new Fantoms at the store and the synth actions are noisy but the 88 is fine.

Of course it will. 18-24 months from now. And I assume you mean successor?

Totally irrelevant, but my OCD hates how they use inconsistent typography for the product logo. Caps except for the n and m? I"m sure it"s intentional, because that"s not something that would slip through the cracks. Weird how only the FA seem intended as Caps, but the T and O are still caps even though they are slightly smaller. Or it"s like the FA are a different font, but that still doesn"t explain the mismatch of the nTOm.

At this point, I"m just glad Roland hasn"t abandoned this market. After the Jupiters were discontinued I really thought they were done here. I regretted selling my Jupiter 50, thinking they weren"t gonna make another thing like it. As much as I have appreciated my Yamahas/Korg/Nord, I don"t vibe with them quite the way I vibe with Roland"s stuff. Sweetwater lists them as in stock and shipping now. I can"t wait! As for future updates, I remember the Fantom X didn"t have audio recording at first, that was added with the 2.0 update. So adding multi-sampling with an update sounds possible to me.

And it don"t stop! Not just new Fantoms but new Jupiters as well! https://www.roland.com/global/products/jupiter-x/ https://www.roland.com/global/products/jupiter-xm/ Roland is back, alright. Now I don"t know what to choose! Fantom 7 or Jupiter X?

Whaddayaknow?!? 12 hours later, my wish has been granted!

I"m in TEARS! Tears of joy... ...at last! Fâk the new MacPro, I"m getting me a Fantom.

+1 for new Roland flagship. 76 keys with aftertouch, please, and some velvety Roland goodness.

Congrats, Carlo!

Congrats, Carlo, it was looooong overdue. Leclerc was nearly flawless this weekend, and thoroughly deserved his maiden victory. Ferrari are looking good for the high-speed low-drag circuits, so the perception is they will be strong at Monza as well. I expected a 1-2 for them at Spa, giving their dominance in qualifying. I was surprised Albon didn't have to give the place back after he left the track with all wheels while overtaking Ricciardo. I hope both Ferrari and RBR will rake in strong results for the rest of the season, so as not to have Hamilton sleepwalk his way to title #6.

Well, first ever pole for Verstappen and RBR-Honda. It is the second slowest track of the season, but still... This could prove to be interesting. I hope Bottas will finally bag another win.

That looks like the driver fell asleep...