Roland introduces Juno-X

[konaboy]

when you think about it, it's remarkable with this homage to the 106, which to be frank, was a completely irrelevant synth for a decade or two.

 

if you weren't around at the time, you may not know this, but in the 90s everyone wanted digital synths with more realistic or impressive sounds, and lots of presets, like the d50, m1, 01/w or early samplers.

 

i clearly remember that I struggled to sell a 106 for £100/$100 back in the day when I wanted to "upgrade" to a roland d70.

 

in fact i ended up swapping it for a 909, which I was able to get £100 for.

 

funny how things work out, if only i had known better...

[GovernorSilver]

5 hours ago, Moonglow said:

I can’t believe the first sound featured in this video (approx. 1:22) was that synth ep + pad program. Sounds like an incredibly low-level synth. 

 

I can believe it.

 

There are musos out there who started out playing Korg Microkorg, Alesis Ion, or Korg Minilogue 1st-gen in their high school/college bands.   These same people are now a little older, possibly making more money than before.   Roland is aiming Juno-X at those people.

[jeffincltnc]

5 hours ago, konaboy said:

roland reps on the demo vids have stated it's based on the f-0 keybed. so a downgrade from the top of the range fantom and jupiter.

 

I've just heard differing info that the keybed is from the Jupiter X and Fantom 6/7 lines and we agree has aftertouch.   I guess we'll see when these ship.

[marczellm]

On 4/30/2022 at 6:49 PM, Moonglow said:

I can’t believe the first sound featured in this video (approx. 1:22) was that synth ep + pad program.

What is entirely too funny is that in the official Fantom-0 demo video, the guy announces "our cutting edge SuperNATURAL Piano" and starts playing a two velocity layer sampled piano that I can recognize from miles away because it was in my 2002 FP-5 that I grew up practicing on.

[Mighty Motif Max]

 

The main sound difference I hear (good headphones w/Sonarworks correction) is less stable pitch on the real 106. Otherwise it's good enough for me...I have the 106 model in my FANTOM anyways so that's nice.

[zephonic]

Mine is on the way, should be here end of next week.

 

I really hope I'm done exchanging boards after this. My carbon footprint on this alone is guaranteed to induce karmic debt of epic proportions.

 

I don't even care it's the same action as the Fantom 0. If it has usable aftertouch and sounds like a Roland, I should be good.

[AUSSIEKEYS]

As much as I disliked the pissy sounds of my Juno 106 i bought new back in the day this new beast is impressing me in that its a more useful beast overall and has the simple addition of touch sensitivity that many analogues missed out on. 

 

BUT as much as the video revlews Ive seen do this keyboard some justice Im appalled at the crummy video advert Roland throws at us (think it randomly came up on facebook or utube?). 

 

Roland surely you could do better to sell it.

[Mighty Motif Max]

6 hours ago, AUSSIEKEYS said:

BUT as much as the video revlews Ive seen do this keyboard some justice Im appalled at the crummy video advert Roland throws at us (think it randomly came up on facebook or utube?). 

 

Roland surely you could do better to sell it.

You should see the new Allen Organ Co. APEX videos...Roland’s look like top tier production in comparison.

[Macsaint777]

Got mine on the way. Should ship May 19th. Can’t wait!

[zephonic]

 

 

Seems pretty close

[ElmerJFudd]

 

[RABid]

Quote

JUNO-X comes equipped with an expressive 61-note keyboard with aftertouch and loads of connectivity for every musical workflow, including balanced and unbalanced audio outputs, a stereo audio input, and MIDI I/O. There’s also a mic input for vocal performing or feeding the onboard Vocoder. USB is available for data backup, audio/MIDI communication with DAWS, and remote editing with the free JUNO-X Editor for macOS and Windows. A high-quality stereo speaker system provides built-in sound monitoring, and Bluetooth® is available for streaming music from a mobile device.

That quote comes from Roland.com. After reading some posts here I was starting to believe that it does not have aftertouch. My real question is does the Juno X and Jupiter X use the same keyboard/keybead? Has anyone had a chance to try the two side by side and compare the feel?

[Doerfler]

On 4/30/2022 at 1:54 PM, konaboy said:

Roland reps on the demo vids have stated it's based on the f-0 keybed. so a downgrade from the top of the range fantom and jupiter.

Rob, here is your answer according to Woody

[RABid]

2 hours ago, Doerfler said:

Rob, here is your answer according to Woody

For me it would be worth paying extra for the Jupiter X. I want it as a primary lead keyboard. If it was just a secondary keyboard for pads, not such a big deal. I have a System 8 and while it is fine for playing pads, I would not want to play quick leads on it.

[zephonic]

The aftertouch on the JunoX requires much more force than the old Fantom X7 or XP80, not effortless, even with sensitivity set to 100. But the vocoder is a lot of fun, sounds great right out of the box.

[zephonic]

So I've decided not to keep the Juno-X. I thank Sweetwater for not throwing rotten eggs at me. I went from the Hydrasynth Deluxe to the Juno DS76 to the Fantom-07 to the Juno-X and now...I'm back to the Juno DS76.

 

I've realized that the Fantom-0 and Juno-X are not really well-suited for the gigs I do, and I don't really have a use for them at home either as I'm pretty much completely ITB.

Shame about the aftertouch, if that was a bit easier to trigger, I probably would have kept it because it sounds great.

 

To me it's interesting though that the JunoDS punches so far above its weight. I've always been a flagship snob.

[AnotherScott]

4 minutes ago, zephonic said:

So I've decided not to keep the Juno-X. I thank Sweetwater for not throwing rotten eggs at me. I went from the Hydrasynth Deluxe to the Juno DS76 to the Fantom-07 to the Juno-X and now...I'm back to the Juno DS76.

Juno DS is a nice, high value board. I think Fantom-07 is mostly better... but depending on what you need, maybe not enough better to justify the additional cost.

[zephonic]

1 minute ago, AnotherScott said:

Juno DS is a nice, high value board. I think Fantom-07 is mostly better... but depending on what you need, maybe not enough better to justify the additional cost.

 

It's mostly the touch display. It's smaller than the full-phat Fantom (try saying that 5 times fast) and they just shrunk the UI, which was gonna be a PITA on gigs. With both the MODX and Krome I have developed a sense of what does and does not work on touch UI's. My feeling was that Fantom 0 was just gonna frustrate me on stage. Otherwise it's a very capable board.

[ProfD]

1 hour ago, zephonic said:

So I've decided not to keep the Juno-X.

 

I went from the Hydrasynth Deluxe to the Juno DS76 to the Fantom-07 to the Juno-X and now...I'm back to the Juno DS76.

 

I've realized that the Fantom-0 and Juno-X are not really well-suited for the gigs I do, and I don't really have a use for them at home...

 

To me it's interesting though that the JunoDS punches so far above its weight. I've always been a flagship snob.

Brotha @zephonic, it's all good.  Sometimes, we have to go through it in order to get to it. 

 

Most gigs do not require the flagship models of today. That's why there is no shortage of KB options available at various price points. 

 

IMO, the Roland Juno DS line is aimed at gigging musicians because it contains all of the sounds, features and functionality a gig might require.😎

[AnotherScott]

1 hour ago, zephonic said:

 

It's mostly the touch display. It's smaller than the full-phat Fantom (try saying that 5 times fast) and they just shrunk the UI, which was gonna be a PITA on gigs. With both the MODX and Krome I have developed a sense of what does and does not work on touch UI's. My feeling was that Fantom 0 was just gonna frustrate me on stage. Otherwise it's a very capable board.

OTOH, I think there is little if anything on the Fantom-0 that you must touch the screen for, I think every part of the interface is also navigable with hard controls. That is, on the Juno DS, you navigate its screen via a wheel, cursor keys, increment/decrement buttons, enter/exit buttons. On the Fantom-0, you can do the same, all those same controls are there, except you also have the ability to navigate the screen by touch. Both boards also allow you to use the touchpads as shortcuts for an alternate method of sound switching (8 pads on the Juno DS, 16 pads on the Fantom-0). Both also have a set of direct category buttons (10 buttons beneath the screen on the Juno DS, 16 buttons a bit further to the right on the Fantom-0). Juno DS lets you re-define the category buttons as Favorites, you would use Scenes for that on the Fantom-0... and while you can still scroll through them with hard controls, this is an area where you'd want to use the touchscreen, since it's the only method of direct selection. But those on-screen buttons are quite large, and labeled with their sound names, which is a nice advantage, plus there are 16 of them available at once instead of 10. The only other place I can think of that pretty much requires touchscreen use is the number pad function (shift-enter on the Fantom-0), which gives you an on-screen number pad, whereas on the Juno DS, you can hit a button to re-define the category buttons to function as a number pad. But for most uses, I think you can operate with hard buttons and knobs on the Fantom-0 just as much as you can on the Juno DS, there is very little you must use the touchscreen for, in terms of things you'd use hard controls for on the Juno DS. If anyone else here has used both boards and has a different take on this, I'd be curious to hear. I've used both, but neither extensively.

 

The Juno DS has a different set of sampled sounds, mostly based on the Fantom S/X, whereas the Fantom-0 uses the older XV-5080 sounds, and newer Zen-Core sounds. And the effects architectures are different... the Juno DS has fewer total effects, but you can gang up what it has on a single sound in a way that I don't believe you can on the Fantom-0. So it's possible someone might just want those particular sonic qualities/capabilities. And of course, the Juno DS is less expensive. But apart from those things, personally, I'd give the Fantom-0 the edge for everything else.