My SY77, is this real life or is this just fantasy?

[4damind]

2017-10-03 - sy99.jpg

Still working with it... so, it's real live and not "just fantasy" that the SY sounds great

Well, ok, but. It's also a great keyboard. I mean that's one of the reasons that I still have one (SY77). I'd really like to have an SY99, in fact, I'd replace my JX10 with it, as far as a controller that is...

Yes, the keyboards of most of this higher priced synth are great. A big reason why many using such a synth also as a controller. I bought my SY 1991 and the keyboard is still working without one single problem. The build quality of today's controller is often horrible (I have also an M-Audio Axiom... full of software and hardware bugs, sticky keys etc).
Synth like the SY99 are IMO today not so important for music creation. There are newer or easier to use synth like the Nord, Virus etc.

[ghettosynth]

Well, I guess it's a matter of taste. I have a card of sounds called Alchemy, that I think it's amazing. FM is prominently used there.

All the sounds I programmed use FM (usually in combination with PCM). But PCM was never used as in common ROMplers, rather as raw material for synthetic, more abstract sounds (percussion sounds and drum sounds are great for that). So, it's exactly the opposite of what you said. It's FM, with a touch of PCM.

This is common in romplers though. I used them the same way in the JD800 and the TG500, later in the K2000, and today in Absynth. Just because later romplers exploited the lower cost of memory to just become more "romplerish", doesn't change that fact.

And from the ROMs, there are a few sounds that I also use, that make use of AFM very creatively. You have to remember that SY99 can have sound with FOUR elements, composed of two FM and two PCM sounds, all sounding from the main synthesis engine. To recreate that, you would need two sounds from Kontakt AND two sounds from FM8 combined, with complex PAN envelopes, with volumes matching and all sounding through the same FX channel. It's doable, but it's a lot of work. And how would you save that patch for later use?

For every advantage that you can cite for bundling engines in hardware, a similar advantage, and usually more, can be cited for doing it in software. What you're describing is rather trivial in many DAWs today, less so than in others. It's fairly easy in Reaper, and it's absolutely painless in Ableton and Reason.

When you use either a rack or a combinator to combine sounds not only can you easily route them through the same effects, manage volume and pan, map controls in a custom way, you can also use individual effects on each synth, or sets of synths. When you are done, you just drag and drop the whole thing as a new preset.

I am NOT a fan of non-per-voice layering in a plugin. I much prefer it to exist at the DAW level where I have MUCH better effects and MUCH more power in terms of routing and preset management.

[Uncle E]

I've not heard examples that are so convincing. I have multiple Yamaha FM hardware units and the ones without keyboards just sit on the shelf. For a while I was trying to do some direct comparisons, but it's too much work for so little reward.

Like you with the SY, I like FM8 and am not shooting it down. It does sound quite different from my DX7, TX81Z, and FS1R, and in many ways it's better. I keep my TX81Z around for Lately Bass but that's about it.

[fmr]

I've not heard examples that are so convincing. I have multiple Yamaha FM hardware units and the ones without keyboards just sit on the shelf. For a while I was trying to do some direct comparisons, but it's too much work for so little reward.

Like you with the SY, I like FM8 and am not shooting it down. It does sound quite different from my DX7, TX81Z, and FS1R, and in many ways it's better. I keep my TX81Z around for Lately Bass but that's about it.

I'm not shooting at FM8 either (which I also like). I'm saying that it is no SY, nor will it ever replace it, at least for me. Much less going through the pain of creating combinators of two FM8 and two Kontakt instances. I am perhaps too old for that, but I never worked that way. I store sounds in the devices, and call them from there. If I want to layer different sounds, I layer (duplicate) the MIDI tracks and call different instances, with different patches.

For my workflow, the SY is perfect. I'm not saying that it would work the same for everybody, but it works for me. And it worked since the beginning. It was love at first sight

It will only be replaced by a soft version of itself, if and when it becomes available.

[ghettosynth]

No doubt, also, FM8 has a far more evolved engine than the SY. The filter can be used in ways that are not possible with the SY and the SY is still limited by fixed algorithms. So, if we're talking about exact duplication of sounds, well, that's always going to be a challenge, on the other hand, if we're talking about expressive capability that yields "richness", then I'm not as convinced that FM8 can't replace the SY.

If you pile FM8 instances, maybe. You have to remember that SY77/SY99 FM sounds are almost always composed of MORE than one element (the layers, as you called). So, even admitting that we are talking here of JUST FM sounds, you would have to use ALWAYS more than one FM8 instance, with matched patches. Not very practical, IMO.

And no, the SY are not "limited" by fixed algorithms. Not only are all the algorithms editable, you also have a free algorithm that you can configure anyway you want. And it has filters too (two of them for each element, configurable HPF/LPF and with resonance). Not that I think filters are very much needed, but they can add something to the sound, sometimes.

Fair enough, mine's been down for quite a few years and I forgot about the free algorithm. I only recently got it on the bench to get it working again so I could put it in my analog studio. However, the filter point holds. The filters in the SY are at the element level, not at the operator level. FM8s filter can be freely routed within the algorithm, it's like having another operator. To argue that it isn't useful is roughly equivalent to arguing that RCM isn't really useful. You should study some of the FM8 factory patches to see how it's used. It is frequently used to filter modulators, not necessarily the output. This is roughly equivalent to having a much larger set of waveforms.

[fmr]

Fair enough, mine's been down for quite a few years and I forgot about the free algorithm. I only recently got it on the bench to get it working again so I could put it in my analog studio. However, the filter point holds. The filters in the SY are at the element level, not at the operator level. FM8s filter can be freely routed within the algorithm, it's like having another operator. To argue that it isn't useful is roughly equivalent to arguing that RCM isn't really useful. You should study some of the FM8 factory patches to see how it's used. It is frequently used to filter modulators, not necessarily the output. This is roughly equivalent to having a much larger set of waveforms.

Again, you are preaching to the choir. I'm not shooting at FM8, which I also like, as I wrote above

It's just that it would never replace SY for me. Can we agree with that?

Nor am I likely to adapt to create patches at DAW level either (maybe I will try to learn that in the future, but there is so much to learn, and so little time). Besides, patches created in a DAW cannot be used in other DAWS either.

[ghettosynth]

I've not heard examples that are so convincing. I have multiple Yamaha FM hardware units and the ones without keyboards just sit on the shelf. For a while I was trying to do some direct comparisons, but it's too much work for so little reward.

Like you with the SY, I like FM8 and am not shooting it down. It does sound quite different from my DX7, TX81Z, and FS1R, and in many ways it's better. I keep my TX81Z around for Lately Bass but that's about it.

Have you done much comparison with exact patches? I tried comparing patches with my TX802 and wasn't feeling a significant difference and didn't want to go to the trouble of trying to do any more aggressive blind tests.

I've had TX81Zs and sold them.

Of course the FS1R is something else and from a complexity and depth POV, FM8 is not substitute.

[ghettosynth]

Fair enough, mine's been down for quite a few years and I forgot about the free algorithm. I only recently got it on the bench to get it working again so I could put it in my analog studio. However, the filter point holds. The filters in the SY are at the element level, not at the operator level. FM8s filter can be freely routed within the algorithm, it's like having another operator. To argue that it isn't useful is roughly equivalent to arguing that RCM isn't really useful. You should study some of the FM8 factory patches to see how it's used. It is frequently used to filter modulators, not necessarily the output. This is roughly equivalent to having a much larger set of waveforms.

Again, you are preaching to the choir. I'm not shooting at FM8, which I also like, as I wrote above

It's just that it would never replace SY for me. Can we agree with that?

Of course, please don't misconstrue what I'm saying. I'm simply arguing that hardware isn't necessarily better than software. That if you play the factory SY patches and think "software can't do this", then the problem isn't really with the software so much as it's with your ability to use the software.

That's not to say that you may appreciate the sum of its parts or that some or many aspects of the workflow aren't better for how you like to work.

I've been hesitant to suggest Reaktor in this conversation because I don't think that it suits most people's workflow. For me though, that's the answer to most of these kinds of questions.

Nor am I likely to adapt to create patches at DAW level either (maybe I will try to learn that in the future, but there is so much to learn, and so little time). Besides, patches created in a DAW cannot be used in other DAWS either.

Well, like everything that we've been talking about, there are tradeoffs. It's a very powerful construct for building layers and the convenience comes, in part, from the DAW specific implementations. You could use a generic plugin host within your DAW, like bidule, but this comes with its own set of limitations and annoyances that don't give you the DAW specific advantages.

[4damind]

Btw. Thanks to Etienne1973 I found a way to import my old SY99 files to the SY and started the last hours with a rework of a old track I made 25 years ago

This is the first attempt and a quick mix and so a good starting point ... sounds are all from the SY99 (except drums), effects and mixing ITB (I've bypassed the SY99 effects to make this stuff in Cubase). I'm always surprised how different the SY sounds compared to the Virus or Nord.

https://soundcloud.com/52degree/frank-a ... rk/s-28hYs

[ghettosynth]

'm always surprised how different the SY sounds compared to the Virus or Nord.

I'm not following you here, why does that surprise you? Both the virus and the nord are VA synths, you won't easily get the sound of many of the samples that I hear in the piece that you posted.

[Uncle E]

Have you done much comparison with exact patches? I tried comparing patches with my TX802 and wasn't feeling a significant difference and didn't want to go to the trouble of trying to do any more aggressive blind tests.

Yes, I've compared exact patches. Not surprisingly, Lately Bass is almost completely different in FM8 than in the TX81Z. However, even comparing exact patches with the DX7 shows the differences. FM8 is purer and cleaner, often times in a good way but sometimes too clean and a bit soul-less. It's kind of like comparing a Rhodes to a DX7, ironically.

[Uncle E]

I'm simply arguing that hardware isn't necessarily better than software.

Yes, of course you're right. It's all in the eye of the beholder, anyway. It's strange that there aren't more plugins that mix synthesis methods in an SY77 kind of way, especially when you consider how wildly popular the ones that do (Absynth, Alchemy, Hyper Sonic) have been.

I just read that the SY99 has an SPX900 built-in to it. That's actually quite cool. I've got an SPX990, it's an excellent reverb.

[4damind]

'm always surprised how different the SY sounds compared to the Virus or Nord.

I'm not following you here, why does that surprise you? Both the virus and the nord are VA synths, you won't easily get the sound of many of the samples that I hear in the piece that you posted.

I'm not surprised in the meaning of "wow, why does it sound so different" I remember also the FM8 by NI (I don't own it) and this sounds IMO different compared to the FM of the SY (I don't speak about AWM or a combination of FM with AWM)

[himalaya]

I just read that the SY99 has an SPX900 built-in to it. That's actually quite cool. I've got an SPX990, it's an excellent reverb.

The effects on the SY99 are improved over the SY77 and there is also more variety.

[4damind]

I just read that the SY99 has an SPX900 built-in to it. That's actually quite cool. I've got an SPX990, it's an excellent reverb.

The effects on the SY99 are improved over the SY77 and there is also more variety.

Yes, the only missing thing is the midi sync for the delay. So there is no tempo based effect available.
But the effect unit is not such bad... 2x63 effect types and some combined effects like Sympho & Delay with extra "sends" for each effekt. Some special effects like the "Aural Exciter" and the quality of this effects is good.