Roland V-Combo VR-09

[WesG]

Can anybody else confirm this report of the EP release-pitch bug?

[voxpops]

Can anybody else confirm this report of the EP release-pitch bug?

Yes. The semitone rise occurs on all new EP patches except the SA stack when increasing the release. Bizarrely, the Wurly rises by a whole tone!

[Philip Clark]

Can anybody else confirm this report of the EP release-pitch bug?

Yes. The semitone rise occurs on all new EP patches except the SA stack when increasing the release. Bizarrely, the Wurly rises by a whole tone!

 

Whew. Glad it's not just me. lol

[Philip Clark]

Roland Product Support (Roland Corporation U.S.)

Sep 19 04:43 PM

 

Hi Philip,

 

Thanks for the email - we have confirmed this on our VR-09 as well, so will be reporting this to the engineers in Japan. We will let you know as soon as they provide more information for us on this.

 

Best Regards,

 

Product Support

Roland Corp. U.S.

[WesG]

Are the old patches affected?

[voxpops]

Are the old patches affected?

No.

[WesG]

Phew oh. So it's sAfe to upgrade at least..

[brenner13]

Yep, still gots me bag pipes, backwards feedback, and sick Mellotron flute patches after the update. I've updated almost all my EP/Pad layers with the new Pure EP sound. I'm very happy to not be stuck with the previous dyno'd bell attack of the original presets and quite anxious to see how they work in the mix at tonight's gig. Have to remember not to touch the Release Fader on those EP patches...what a weird anomaly.

[m fossa]

ok..heres the skinny..Ive owned or played almost all the keys you can imagine..all have problems..I have a Hammond xk3 and the vro9..nothing touches the xk3, but its over 2 grand and I got vr9 for under 1000..its very close to VK8 but not exactly..the twin leslie makes a huge diff in sound..and you gotta do the work and really program it the way you want..percussion is processed by chorus/ vib which is not like B3..and if the B3 sound is at a scale of 10(altho one B can sound diff from another) xk3 is 9.5 vk8 is about an 8 and vr9 would be maybe 8.5..but I can pick it up w 2 fingers and throw it over my shoulders! Ive been gigging and studio for 40 years and these days its about ease..don't blame your tools...a good musician can get a decent sound out of anything..the pianos are ok etc but a lot of it is in your head..if you midi up an 88 weighted keyboard to any piano sound it automatically sounds better..try it (im sure a lot of you guys have)..listen its great to have all the best stuff..sometimes it isn't practical..especially if youre an opening act for a biggie..no time, no stage space etc..youre lucky to get out alive..oh another thing..when u mic a leslie on stage it usually comes out sounding mono anyway..the VR9 ans the xk3 leslies are more than adequate..even Don Leslie said so shortly before he died..as far as piano, the Roland people keep sampling their pianos too close to the hammers..I hate the hammer noise around maybe 800-400k or so..take it from Yamaha,,no hammer noise on my Motifs.bottom line...you get what you pay for you take what to need to each different gig..don't blame your tools..if you want a B3 ..buy one and pay someone to move it..I started in 1973 on all what would be considered vintage stuff and..with all the gremlins, and what it sounds like thru the pa, make it easy on yourself..I used to drag all that stuff around w me includind more modern 88 key motifs etc, but I was just impressing other keyboard players and the sound out front was not any different so...stop complaining, and looking for perfection.it aint here! thx for listening to an old pro..

[m fossa]

oh almost forgot..on the tremolo efx control for trem2 on the wurly only controls speed (like 140a) not depth (200a) this does annoy me..trem is too deep and cuts off attack..should be able to control both,,if not then depth more relevant than speed..but I can live w it..I too will not get my panties in a bunch..music is not anout the instrument( altho it can help) its YOU dudes and dudettes,,,the players...xo

[brenner13]

Okay, so Ive been messing with the new EPs and found that it gives a nice little scoop up of pitch on the key release with a release fader setting of 2. To my ear, this give the sound a more authentic character of the real thing. I don't really know much about the mechanical intracasies of tine and reed pianos, but can imagine some sort of mechanism comes in contact with the tine or reed to make it stop vibrating as a key is released. Perhaps worn pieces may actually cause a slight pitch change upon contact? Regardless, I quite like the anomaly effect and have saved several new EP registrations using this artifact. Also found that if you want the notes to sustain longer, the decay slider provides more than ample adjustability.

 

I've also noticed that when layerd with pads or strings on the bottom, the envelope faders do not modify the EP's; only the lower tones so one can fade in a nice pad to taste as one plays the piano part and adjust the release as long as one likes without any weird pitch drift. Nice!

[voxpops]

My Roland DP10 damper pedal has become intermittent since installing the upgrade. When it quits working I have to restart the VR to get it functioning again. I haven't tested it with another keyboard yet, but it has never given me any trouble before, and it seems unlikely that it's the pedal that's faulty if it starts working after a reboot of the board. Hmmmm...

 

As to the pitch thing, I think brenner may be right about tines tending to pitch up on damping (I vaguely recall that with my Wurli, although it could be false memory syndrome), but it was certainly the case with the Electro 2's Wurli - and it got kind of annoying after a while. However, IMO it's risky having those faders sitting there waiting to be jogged and unwittingly shifting the pitch on release.

[theGman]

As one who is kinda scared to download the update, I might just hold off for a while.

[brenner13]

It might just be the honeymoon effect, but the new EP's got grins and a nods of approval at the gig last night. The Wurly sees more action for now, but Pure EP is full and punchy when needed. Thank you Roland...great update.

[partyarty]

yes, I gigged with the update Friday the 19th and used some of the new pianos and pads and it was definitely an improvement! One other question, are the cover band sounds useful from the axial website? I haven't bothered with it yet.. or are they so song specific, they don't have much use otherwise..

 

http://axial.roland.com/articles/the-cover-band-collection/

[brenner13]

I

My Roland DP10 damper pedal has become intermittent since installing the upgrade. When it quits working I have to restart the VR to get it functioning again. I haven't tested it with another keyboard yet, but it has never given me any trouble before, and it seems unlikely that it's the pedal that's faulty if it starts working after a reboot of the board. Hmmmm...

 

Yuck, that's no fun. The DP10 is half-damper compliant, right? I've been wanting to upgrade from my Yamaha FC5's, but they work so good and are so compact. I'm not for sure whether the VR09 responds to half-damper? Weird that it worked fine before the update.

I've tried an M-Audio SP-1 for sustain, but it would intermittently latch and require a couple of forcefull stomps to release, but I'm pretty sure it is just poor engineering of the pedal. Now it is only used as a third switch for rotary speed on my VR09 when both hands are too busy to flip the pitch stick or encounter the D-Beam and I got two more Yamies for sustain duty and back-up.

Bummer about the DP10, I've heard they have a great feel and don't slide around like the squared hockey pucks do. Perhaps there are other quality piano style sustain pedals that don't do the half-damper thing that might work? That has to be an agrivating bug.

[voxpops]

That has to be an agrivating bug.

Yes, and I've tracked it down. Nothing to do with the DP-10 (which works perfectly either in switch or continuous [half-pedal] mode), nor the OS update. It's the way I have some of my registrations set up. I'm not quite sure why, but it seems as if certain of my registrations are set as if they are the lower part of a split, and others are the upper (even though none are actually split). Further correction: it's simply how I have the pedal assigned! These are synth and organ voices that I normally don't use damper on (and I usually have the damper set to control the rotary speed, so have not previously noticed the anomaly). If, with damper set to control sustain, I hit a registration where the damper is not currently active, when I change the voice (say from organ to piano), the damper remains inactive. This threw me. So there's nothing wrong with the board - just the operator!

 

What I do wish is that the damper selection was similar to the Nord Electro, where you can have it as standard damper (sustain) on piano voices, and rotary when organ is selected.

[Dr88s]

What I do wish is that the damper selection was similar to the Nord Electro, where you can have it as standard damper (sustain) on piano voices, and rotary when organ is selected.

 

I an not generally vocal about complaints / wish lists, but the global assignment of pedal behavior rather than registration-specific assignment is incredibly frustrating to me, and something that would seem easy enough to fix in a firmware update.

[WesG]

I have complained about that on Roland's blog, too. Maybe some more voices would help....

 

Wes

[Marillo]

How many of you have found the lack of arpeggiator limiting on this machine? Is there a workaround with the looper?

 

For me the omission of an arpeggiator means I need to take another synth out with me on the gig, which kind of defeats the object of the 'perfect 2nd board over your 88-note piano' USP.

[Dr88s]

I have never used an arpeggiator on any of my boards. Just doesn't fit in with the type of music I play.

 

This is first and foremost a clonewheel, with the VA stuff added value IMHO. Do the SK1 and Mojo have arpeggiators?

[WesG]

What kind of music uses arpeggiators, anyhow? I wouldn't even know what to do with one!

 

I'm finding it annoying that the ADSR sliders affect both synth patches in a dual, though. I wonder if I can get around that with the iPad editor...

 

Wes

[brenner13]

yes, I gigged with the update Friday the 19th and used some of the new pianos and pads and it was definitely an improvement! One other question, are the cover band sounds useful from the axial website? I haven't bothered with it yet.. or are they so song specific, they don't have much use otherwise..

 

http://axial.roland.com/articles/the-cover-band-collection/

 

Glad to hear another positive voice for the new sounds.

I've breifly tried the Axial patches...I really like the organ presets and several of the synths are very close representations of the signature tones of those classic tones, however some opinions of the set is that these are merely starting points for users to refine into the sounds of their own reminiscences.

[brenner13]

Appregiators are essential to cover some classic rock tunes and just plain fun to dink around with...Arturia's iSEM, and iMini and many other iPad synth apps get plenty of arp usage in my own tunes. I am among those quite disappointed with no arp action in the VR09, but still pleased with the board for what it does.

[To B3]

Crossposting this here and on the Clonewheel Yahoo forum, hope you don't mind. Here it goes:

 

Finally tried to update to 1.03. Already did the 1.02 one, and no problems.

 

This one, nothing. Followed all the instructions, everything went fine until the part where you have to put the flash drive on the VR09. I holded the 2 buttons, powered it ON, even let go the buttons and nothing, blank screen, just that.

 

Switched flash drives to be sure, still nothing. What could I possibly be doing wrong?

 

I know there are glitches as alerted, but I got nothing. Hope any of you can shine a light here. Thanks!

[Ken Beaumont]

Do you have the "_R053_VR09" folder in the very top of the directory? When I did mine I copied the flash drive contents to my computer then deleted everything in the drive by formatting it on the VR-09.

 

Then I copied the _R053_VR09 folder to the device and inserted it into my VR-09 with the power off. Then I held down the ROTARY SOUND [ ON/OFF ] and ROTARY SOUND [ FAST/SLOW ] button and turned on VR-09. The update took about 1/2 hour.

[theGman]

I have a a bunch of presets saved; the ones added by Sweetwater when I bought mine (1.02) and the ones I added myself.

 

If I do the upgrade, will these remain in their respective slots?

[brenner13]

My registrations are all still there, however I saved them to a thumb drive before the update to be safe. Also it may be best to use a different, blank thumbdrive freshly formatted in the VR09 for dragging the update file to the thumbdrive when on your computer.

[To B3]

I did the upgrade, finally it worked. It was an error when saving the OS.

 

Liked the new sounds (speaking of the EPs, dont use synths currently), thought they sounded fuller and respond better to dynamics than the old ones. The new wurly is killer. Maybe it was an impression, but the overdrive, that before went from 0 to unusable in a button touch, now sounds more tamed and more musical too.

 

And my registrations went untouched.

[keyman27]

Do the SK1 and Mojo have arpeggiators?

 

My Nord Stage 2 Compact has an arpeggiator. (How do I make that 'poking with a stick' smilie?) But I very rarely use it.

 

I played around with the VR-09 at the music store and I really like it. I don't really have a reason to own it because it's redundant with the NS2. But in terms of cool new gear lust, the VR-09 hits the sweet spot of low price and great features.