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So, I just played the Alesis Fusion...


LithoJazzoSphere

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yesterday. I didn't have a whole lot of time, but they had both versions. Their appearance in general doesn't really improve in person (I never cared for the dashboard-style looks), but the blue lighting of the wheels is really snazzy. The action feels nice, perhaps a bit light, which may be good for some people. The "Holy Grail" piano wouldn't quite satisfy "this" Monty Python, but they certainly could have done worse. Velocity switching is not as smooth as it could be. The stock leads are fairly nice. I will leave it to the rest of you to test out the rest of the sounds, as I was limited on time.
A picture may paint a thousand words, but a melody can paint a thousand pictures.
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Ditto here. It seemed a very entry level keyboard based on Rom sounds. More on the likes of a full featured competitor to the Juno D than a competitor to the Fantom et al. The funny thing is that specs indicate a much more powerful synth. Wonder if it's just a matter of needing some revoicing.

 

Jerry

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I tried it too. EVERYTHING sounded phasy. I thought maybe GC had the signal routed wrong or something.

 

Very disappointing first experience.

I played in an 8 piece horn band. We would often get bored. So...three words:

"Tower of Polka." - Calumet

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Well, I do not have the luxury of having any Fusion for trial around (not in Brazil...), but the user review trend so far, comming from reasonable people as you guys are, seem to indicate that Alesis goofed it. Perhaps they forced the price ticket too much and ended up with no real chance to compete with the big three workstation manufacturers (I'm keeping Kurzweil out of this picture because it is just like apple stuff, good but too expensive for most of us).

 

Well, to be on the fair side, let's wait and see if someone has a different experience and then gives us more details.

"I'm ready to sing to the world. If you back me up". (Lennon to his bandmates, in an inspired definition of what it's all about).
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  • 3 months later...

Not to resurrect this, but I sat down yesterday and spent about an hour on the Fusion.

 

Overall, I was truly underwhelmed. While it may be tweakable and all, it just screamed "cheap" to me.

 

My observations:

 

-It had this annoying light flicker thing going on occasionally where the button lights seemed to flicker. None of the other boards plugged into the same circuit were doing this, but who knows. Maybe more sensitive to voltage fluctuations or whatnot...

 

-Action. Absolutely hated the 88's action. The 61 was fine, but the 88 just sucked. Felt lifeless. I compared it with the MAudio, which IMO sucks too. I'd swear they both felt the same. Is this a Fatar action?

 

-Chassis. Nice new look, but felt flimsy when I picked it up to check weight. it kind of flexed, if you know what I mean.

 

-Display. Unimpressive, but utilitarian. Thought that it'd be more in line with what Roland and Korg were doing with theirs. Read: colorful, touch, etc...

 

-Sounds. Strings were tinny and hollow compared to Yami and Roland. Organs- big miss here. Pianos compared to Korg's, IMO, which I don't care for. EP's etc were useable. Overall, the presets wouldn't work for me in a live setting.

 

I didn't mean to upset anyone, but this board really really really left me wanting. I went to GC to specifically check this out because my past Alesis experiences (QS7) were great in their day. I just really feel let down by this board. I know it has so much potential, but it's really missing the basics that, to me, make a board a hit or miss.

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Right out the box the only thing that caught my attention were the leads and pads.

 

The Stock sound set was comp to my old QS6.1. it just did not have that wow factor to make me want to dig deeper into the board. It maybe a work in progress and I am sure some of the updates have improved the soundset but we will have to see. I am sure Alesis has lost a lot of potential buyers who are put off by the intial patches.

 

For now I will keep an eye on it.

 

Who knows This maybe a sleeping giant just waiting to get out....I guess time will tell.

MY Toys - Kurzweil PC1X, Roland A-90, Yamaha KX88, Yamaha CS1x, Novation 49SL MkII, Presonus Studiolive 16.4.2, JBL PRX615M

 

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