Roland Fantom 06 or VR09B?

[miden]

As a second 'board...which one  - there is a price difference of approx $900 (AUD) is it worth paying that extra for the Fantom 06, or for pretty much organs and synths would the VR09B be enough?

 

Should be a no-brainer right? hahaha, but I am stuck between the two and cannot make up my mind if the $'s are justified

 

 

[David Emm]

I think it depends on how much gear you already have (that is, the number of bases you can cover) and how much cartage you're willing to tolerate. You also can't seriously edit the VR synth unless you have an iPad that will run the editor they released, so there's a compatibility window to consider. If the presets do what you need done, you might lean towards better places to drop $900. 

 

Also, I haven't dug into it, but the 06 might easily beat the VR on number & quality of sounds, splits and etc. Its a full workstation where the VR is a focused performance instrument. That might integrate better with your bottom board. Or go low-budget. Use a computer fan to inflate a bladder feeding a Melodica for the undernourished bagpipe effect, save big bucks.

[CEB]

The sampler on the Fantom is a very powerful  entertainment tool.  Mine is loaded full of sound effect, famous samples from cartoons and movies, risers and drops. Set intros. Etc…  but I don’t need organ. If I do I’ll use a Hammond or setup an external zone on my Kronos 88.  I’m using a FA-06.  The organs suck. The Fantom organs are probably way better I hope.  

[miden]

Thanks guys...it's a Studiologic SL88 on the bottom - have been using Mac mini and touchscreen setup with a Waldorf Blofeld on top..but it's getting to be a bit of a pain with all the wiring and stands needed to do really simple small gigs.

 

I'd essentially be controlling either of these (apart from synth and organ parts of course) from the SL.

[AnotherScott]

13 hours ago, David Emm said:

You also can't seriously edit the VR synth unless you have an iPad that will run the editor they released

There's also a freeware editor for Mac/Windows, which actually does a lot more than Roland's editor.

 

14 hours ago, miden said:

is it worth paying that extra for the Fantom 06, or for pretty much organs and synths would the VR09B be enough?

As an organ, the VR-09 has the advantage of high trigger, 9 drawbars (vs. 8 sliders plus on-screen control for the 9th), dual manual and bass pedal support. The Fantom-0 has assignable out, so you could attach an external pedal for upgraded rotary effect if you ever want to, which is clumsy on the VR (e.g. you can't put the external effect on just organ if you're splitting layering with another sound).

 

As a synth, Fantom-0's ZEN-Core is generally more capable than the VR's SuperNATURAL, plus all the editing is on-board. Fantom-0 also has the optional model expansions to emulate specific analog Roland synths.

 

Other things that could come into play, even if you're only using it for organ and synth: On the Fantom-0, you can split/layer up to 8 or 16 sounds with their own effects, as opposed to only being able to split/layer two sounds*, with shared effects on the VR. (Whether it's 8 or 16 depends on whether or not you have seamless switching between sound sets enabled... though seamless switching doesn't work for organ sounds regardless.) For quick patch changes, the Fantom-0 gives you 16 labeled touchscreen buttons at a time, the VR gives you 4 unlabeled hard buttons at a time.

 

There are other differences of course, but I think those are the ones most relevant if strictly looked at as a second board for organ and synth sounds.

 

* ETA: You can go beyond 2 split/layered sounds with the aforementioned third-party editor, though still with significant limitations compared to the Fantom-0.

 

[miden]

17 minutes ago, AnotherScott said:

There's also a freeware editor for Mac/Windows, which actually does a lot more than Roland's editor.

 

As an organ, the VR-09 has the advantage of high trigger, 9 drawbars (vs. 8 sliders plus on-screen control for the 9th), dual manual and bass pedal support. The Fantom-0 has assignable out, so you could attach an external pedal for upgraded rotary effect if you ever want to, which is clumsy on the VR (e.g. you can't put the external effect on just organ if you're splitting layering with another sound).

 

As a synth, Fantom-0's ZEN-Core is generally more capable than the VR's SuperNATURAL, plus all the editing is on-board. Fantom-0 also has the optional model expansions to emulate specific analog Roland synths.

 

Other things that could come into play, even if you're only using it for organ and synth: On the Fantom-0, you can split/layer up to 8 or 16 sounds with their own effects, as opposed to only being able to split/layer two sounds, with shared effects on the VR. (Whether it's 8 or 16 depends on whether or not you have seamless switching between sound sets enabled... though seamless switching doesn't work for organ sounds regardless.) For quick patch changes, the Fantom-0 gives you 16 labeled touchscreen buttons at a time, the VR gives you 4 unlabeled hard buttons at a time.

 

There are other differences of course, but I think those are the ones most relevant if strictly looked at as a second board for organ and synth sounds.

 

 

 

Yes, thanks Scott...quite big differences really. When spelled out like that makes the extra seem fully justifiable!

[ProfD]

It really depends on the type of music being played. 

 

IMO, the VR-09B is enough specially if the music requires preset bread and butter sounds (organ, AP, EP, clav and synth). 

 

The $900 difference can be left in savings or put towards accessories, pedals, amplification, etc.😎

[stoken6]

5 hours ago, ProfD said:

It really depends on the type of music being played. 

 

IMO, the VR-09B is enough specially if the music requires preset bread and butter sounds (organ, AP, EP, clav and synth). 

 

The $900 difference can be left in savings or put towards accessories, pedals, amplification, etc.😎

This. Yes you get a lot more with the Fantom-0 for your $900, but if you don't need it, why pay for it?

 

Cheers, Mike.

[Motif88]

Get the Fantom 0…in less than 2 years you’ll be happy you did.

[Stokely]

That would be an interesting choice for me as well.  We all have differing needs.  In my case, the workstation features (sequencer) are not going to be used.   A lot would depend on whether I'd ever use this as a single keyboard at a gig.  For "low level" gigs--e.g. we played at a Harley dealership that hires bands, it was 11am and nobody was there so it was basically a money-making rehearsal--I only bring my MODX7.  So I need pianos, organs (ipad), and synths, as well as some splits for certain songs.  I think my max number of splits is 3  (songs such as Let's Go and Ride Like the Wind).

If it was only ever going to be a 2nd keyboard, I wouldn't need the split functionality but I'd still probably want more synth programming ability for my band so the Fantom would be the choice there too.  Caveat:  I really don't know how much synth programmability is in the VR09, I owned a VR700 and I know the 09 has more than that one did.   The ability for the Fantom-0 to add in the JX, Jupiter etc engines (even if they cost more) is quite appealing to me also, especially the JX because I owned a JX-10!

 

[nadroj]

Can anyone remember if @OB Dave’s Drawbars worked with the FA? If they do, would they work the same with the FANTOM-0?  

[ProfD]

42 minutes ago, Stokely said:

If it was only ever going to be a 2nd keyboard, I wouldn't need the split functionality but I'd still probably want more synth programming ability for my band so the Fantom would be the choice there too.  Caveat:  I really don't know how much synth programmability is in the VR09, I owned a VR700 and I know the 09 has more than that one did.   The ability for the Fantom-0 to add in the JX, Jupiter etc engines (even if they cost more) is quite appealing to me also, especially the JX because I owned a JX-10!

The Roland VR-09B offers control over ADSR, cutoff and resonance on synth sounds using the drawbars. 

 

During a gig those are the most common synth parameters to tweak.  Otherwise, an editor has to be used for deeper synth programming. 

 

From your previous posts, it would probably be beneficial to determine how much synth programming your gigs require. 

 

Your synth needs may be slightly beyond presets but not modulation heavy either.😎

[AnotherScott]

1 hour ago, nadroj said:

Can anyone remember if @OB Dave’s Drawbars worked with the FA? If they do, would they work the same with the FANTOM-0?  

Those DB-1 drawbars did work with the FA. The Fantom-0 similarly uses sysex for drawbar control, but you'd have to look at the MIDI Implementation Charts for both units to see if they used the same sysex as each other.

[miden]

One final question, as I will be using a SL88 on the bottom, would the Fantom O have better pianos or the RD-88? haha,  yeah I know it's a cross jump, it was just the dealer had a really cheap RD-88 available, and if I keep the Blofeld, it might make an interesting combo.

 

I've only heard online demos of the RD pianos, but to my ear they sounded rather "short" in the sample if you get me.

 

 

[stoken6]

40 minutes ago, miden said:

One final question, as I will be using a SL88 on the bottom, would the Fantom O have better pianos or the RD-88? haha,  yeah I know it's a cross jump, it was just the dealer had a really cheap RD-88 available, and if I keep the Blofeld, it might make an interesting combo.

 

I've only heard online demos of the RD pianos, but to my ear they sounded rather "short" in the sample if you get me.

 

 

So you want to MIDI the SL88 into the RD88? If so, remember that the RD88 doesn't support MIDI in on 5-pin DIN, only on USB. And while both SL88 and RD88 have USB MIDI they are (FAQ #19) both USB devices, neither is a MIDI host, so you can't simply connect them with a cable. 

 

Personally I think SL88+VR09 is a nice budget-ish combination provided the VR09 does enough of the things you need. Don't forget Franky's editor for the VR09 to bust its capabilities wide open.

 

Cheers, Mike.

[miden]

23 minutes ago, stoken6 said:

So you want to MIDI the SL88 into the RD88? If so, remember that the RD88 doesn't support MIDI in on 5-pin DIN, only on USB. And while both SL88 and RD88 have USB MIDI they are (FAQ #19) both USB devices, neither is a MIDI host, so you can't simply connect them with a cable. 

 

Personally I think SL88+VR09 is a nice budget-ish combination provided the VR09 does enough of the things you need. Don't forget Franky's editor for the VR09 to bust its capabilities wide open.

 

Cheers, Mike.

 

No, sorry I didn't write that too well...I was thinking of removing the SL88, and replacing it with the RD-88 and then the Blofeld synth on top.

 

The original plan was to sit either the Fantom -06 or VR-09B on top of the SL88 and midi out from it to the top "synth". Been having some glitching with the software setup at gigs, nothing major that I couldn't fix in a few seconds, but it got me worried that if something major happened, well.....whereas with hardware it's much safer....these last couple of shows were the first time any glitching in performance has happened..

 

Anyhoo, I am probably going to go SL88 + Fantom 0 - I think it gives me a few more options down the track. Just need to find the extra readies somewhere