Bizarre behavior with Roland XV-3080 mono patches - can someone confirm?

[Wiggum]

Hey all,

 

I picked up my first new hardware synth in ten years (Roland XV-3080), and I'm noticing some strange behavior with monophonic, legato patches.

 

When I hold a low note with my left hand (for instance, D1), and then transition to a note in my right hand (eg, D3), the pitch gets all screwed up. Instead of hearing an octave, you hear this awful tri-tone mess.

 

Please try this:

 

1) Hold D1 with your left hand, and before letting go...

2) Press D3 with your right hand

 

Do you hear it?

 

Try it with User Patch 061 (8VCO MonoSyn), or User Patch 105 (Minor Incidnt).

 

Also, you sometimes get a static pitch in mono mode, regardless of what note you are playing.

 

Try This:

 

1) Select User 093 (BOG)

2) Hold D1 with your left hand, and before letting go....

3) Hit D5, and play a descending, legato scale. The pitch never changes throughout the scale...

 

At first I thought there was a MIDI error, but I have tried different keyboard controllers to no avail. It almost sounds like the samples can't pitch bend up that far, and they are getting hung when portamento tells them to glide. You DON'T get this problem with staccato notes. If you try the above examples and let go of the keys between left and right hand transitions, all is well.

 

If this is common to all XV-3080's, I can live with it, but I want to make sure mine isn't the only one.

 

Thanks again,

 

Wiggum

[Wiggum]

Anyone?

[Guest]

I've got a XV-88 and it exhibits the exact same behavior that you describe.

 

Busch

[Wiggum]

Thanks Busch,

 

Annoying isn't it? It sounds to me like the samples aren't transposing to the higher pitch, and they are hanging at the upper bound. Maybe this is a limitation of any sample based synth, but I wish the portamento had been implemented better. Instead of bending into a potentially non-musical note, I wish the problematic samples wouldn't bend at all.

 

Thanks for the help,

 

Wiggum