Roli Equator released

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Roli announced Equator is now available on general release - €179

( until now only available with Roli Controllers)


What's the view of those that have it already?
Is it a great synth in its own right, or just for its MPE integration?

I've got MPE controllers so it's tempting, but i guess others will be interested who don't have MPE controllers.

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It's a $79 upgrade if you have Equator Player (which you get if you own a Lightpad Block or Seaboard Block)

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good timing, my seaboard block arrived a couple of days ago.
I'm tired of being insane. I'm going outsane for some fresh air.

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Perfect - finally something to rival Alchemy

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I have a Seaboard Rise 49 and it's the greatest synth controller I've ever used. Equator is excellent. It is powerful and sounds great but the best feature is the extensive modulation options for mapping the five dimensions of touch. You can do some really unique things by, for instance, modulating the LFO with the Slide parameter or the Ring Mod with the Glide parameter, or both. Each dimension is capable of modding multiple parameters at once. There's a whole slew of waveforms, effects, etc. The sample oscillators are insanely cool.

Oh and the interface is very slick and functional, no cheesy skeumorphism.

I don't really use presets so I can't speak to that, but if you don't have an MPE controller and just want packaged sounds it might not be the best choice.

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aMUSEd wrote:Perfect - finally something to rival Alchemy
I'm surprised that you think that. I don't see much similarity at all. Equator seems cool but there is nothing in it that can compare to Alchemy. No resynthesis, no granular, totally different modulation system. I can't think of many similarities other than they can load sfz.

I'd love to try equator though. But I don't see a demo. Kinda need a demo.

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Echoes in the Attic wrote:
aMUSEd wrote:Perfect - finally something to rival Alchemy
I'm surprised that you think that. I don't see much similarity at all. Equator seems cool but there is nothing in it that can compare to Alchemy. No resynthesis, no granular, totally different modulation system. I can't think of many similarities other than they can load sfz.

I'd love to try equator though. But I don't see a demo. Kinda need a demo.
I tend to think of Alchemy as the best performance oriented complex synth (in terms of ways to physically interact with it) apart from Kore 2. So I'm thinking more from that standpoint, not regarding particular synthesis types which is for me secondary.

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aMUSEd wrote:
Echoes in the Attic wrote:
aMUSEd wrote:Perfect - finally something to rival Alchemy
I'm surprised that you think that. I don't see much similarity at all. Equator seems cool but there is nothing in it that can compare to Alchemy. No resynthesis, no granular, totally different modulation system. I can't think of many similarities other than they can load sfz.

I'd love to try equator though. But I don't see a demo. Kinda need a demo.
I tend to think of Alchemy as the best performance oriented complex synth (in terms of ways to physically interact with it) apart from Kore 2. So I'm thinking more from that standpoint, not regarding particular synthesis types which is for me secondary.
They are pretty different beasts but from a performance side Equator is maybe the most advanced synth i could imagine without having to use several instances.
But of course Logic´s Alchemy is also now usable for MPE.
But the way you can set modulations in Equator is the best of any synths. The synthesis itself is not the latest and greatest but the amount of different performance oriented modulations is just awesome. But often it´s really hard to program usable presets and/or it´s easy to get sounds out of control :D
I like both and no one could replace the other.
Together with a Seaboard Rise Equator is awesome (but still with some bugs for me).
I do hope they release it for iOS as well some day.
For $79 i think it is a good buy. $179...not sure if i would bite without a demo.

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Yeah I think I'd probably upgrade after buying a seaboard block, and at least testing equator player. But it's a bit much on its own.

The great thing though about this and strobe is that you can set custom curves for each expression, which is useful.

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Echoes in the Attic wrote:Yeah I think I'd probably upgrade after buying a seaboard block, and at least testing equator player. But it's a bit much on its own.

The great thing though about this and strobe is that you can set custom curves for each expression, which is useful.
Not only that, you can set in Equator 4 different curves for each of the 5 dimensions (yeah makes 20 sources alone) where each can modulate other things and as many as your cpu can handle plus 4 different curves for keytracking as well.
Oh and then you also have 5 envelopes and 2 LFO´s on top of that.
But it can be heavy on cpu of course.
I also like the way you can use it via just clicking on the modulation source and then dial in your modulation range on the knobs/parameters which should be modulated by this source.
And it highlights all the modulation when you click on a source. It´s a pretty straight forward way with such a complex way of modulations.
Oh and what i really miss it while there are many you-tube videos of someone playing and saying how awesome it is but there is not really a deep tutorial how to program a patch or so ala´Dan Worral.

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My first impressions are pretty much inline with this thread so far.

Its great but its strengths definitely lie in the modulation section and esp the seaboard modulation options.
For such a fully featured synth some things feel very 'slimline' in comparison to my other synths with a similar amount of functionality.

Like I would love a few more options on the filters for example. The FX section is pretty slim...I would love a phaser for example, but so far I quite like the tone of the distortion section.
The Oscs and some of the included waveforms sound really nice. FM is nice.

I almost bought strobe, but then this came out on the very same day... I can help but still wonder about strobe now hahah GAS! but surely this will cover my MPE needs for a while.
For 79$ is was a worthy investment for sure, but if I didn't own the block, I think 179$ would be too much
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I took my time to find it, but they just lost me by posting all the Mac oriented consumer photos. Looks like it made on Mac for Mac. If not, they should not post pictures like this. It looks like they assume- everybody would use it on Mac (duh). Should just post view of the instrument, not do chip Apple advertisement.

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Aside from the obvious strength of the modulation section, you can make some pretty complex patches by layering three wavetable oscillators, two sample playback engines, and a noise source. All that layering, plus integrated effects, can often steer it in a D-50 sort of direction, which I like a lot.
Incomplete list of my gear: 1/8" audio input jack.

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bought the Equator upgrade yesterday. Woke up this morning to find an email from Roli giving me an upgrade code for free because of delays in shipping my seaboard block...sigh.
$pent $100 AUD I didn't have to $pend...
I'm tired of being insane. I'm going outsane for some fresh air.

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werp wrote:bought the Equator upgrade yesterday. Woke up this morning to find an email from Roli giving me an upgrade code for free because of delays in shipping my seaboard block...sigh.
$pent $100 AUD I didn't have to $pend...
Have you looked into the transfer policy? Maybe you can sell your upgrade? At the very least I'm sure they'd refund it.

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