Behringer pro 800

[egbert101]

Nah, I got the analog hardware phase out of my system. Too much time and energy and not enough music.

[kritikon]

The opposite for me. Too much software = less music + too much time and effort. I can get pleasant noises out of most hw analogues very quickly, far less so with plugins. I find plugin synths generally to be a steep learning curve and conducive to throwing my mouse out of the cot in a tantrum. Software was probably mostly what made me leave music for a few years, it just leached all joy and pleasure out of it. I have to use a DAW for many things (be stupid not to), but try to keep mouse-diddling to a minimum.

[kritikon]

Out of interest, what price is Pro800 actually selling for out there? I hadn't properly checked before, but now Rubber Monkey in NZ has it listed for NZ$800 (September arrival) which is US$481 at today's rate. Previously none of the NZ sellers had inflated the Behringer price too much (they always have a hefty mark up here in NZ, maybe it was too obvious with Behringer). Used to equate to very similar prices to elsewhere but that seems a hike up if it's genuinely selling for $400 elsewhere. It's still a great price for an 8voice analogue, but makes me think NZ is gouging prices in places it didn't dare tread before. Elsewhere, Music Planet is selling the 2600 for $1k alongside the Monopoly $1k...price drop to 2 yrs ago

[kcearl]

$399 US

My gray meanie 2600 was $569 and monopoly was $500 but both were on sale.

[kritikon]

Thanks. So NZ dealers are up to their usual tricks then, profiteering big time. Rubber Monkey generally have best prices in NZ, so I hate to think what other dealers are going to try to charge for the Pro800. Rock Shop etc will no doubt be >$500

[vurt]

Thanks. So NZ dealers are up to their usual tricks then, profiteering big time. Rubber Monkey generally have best prices in NZ, so I hate to think what other dealers are going to try to charge for the Pro800. Rock Shop etc will no doubt be >$500

you not have any of their super partners or whatever they were called?
the shops they partnered up with like andertons and such?

[kritikon]

Not that I'm aware of - too small a market. They don't sell many synths here. Though there is a very good electronic dub scene, and d'n'b type stuff used to go down well at festivals etc....Sadly, Kiwis mostly still seem to go for jangly guitars and bands that sound like they were recorded and produced in their granny's dunny at the bottom of the garden.

[D-Fusion]

I must say it sounds great. Alot like Repro 5 by uhe it shows how accurate software emulations can be

I have one and no. It does not sound like Uhe Repro at all.

You can create some similar sounds that don't use resonance if you add a EQ that slowly goes down from around 1khz to 20khz.

If you add resonance The Uhe Repro and a Prophet 5 looses Volume and Bass while the Pro 800 get more volume and Bass.

[egbert101]

Currently £369 at Andertons, which I guess is about right, but is a bit disappointing in terms of cheap plastic looking. Maybe they'll make a decent keyboard version and stick another £300 on top!

[Ex Machina]

Currently £369 at Andertons, which I guess is about right, but is a bit disappointing in terms of cheap plastic looking. Maybe they'll make a decent keyboard version and stick another £300 on top!

Isn't the Pro-800 enclosed in a metal case? From the pictures I've seen, it looks like a solid piece of kit (just like the Behringer Pro-1). Yes, the Pro-800 features those cheap membrane switches which make it look a bit garish. I really wish Behringer had replaced those membrane switches with proper buttons and included an LCD screen with rotary encoders beneath the display. That archaic 3-digit LED is an epic fail, IMO even if an LCD screen and real buttons would have added $200 or more to the list price of the Pro-800.

But then again, the Sequential Prophet 6 and OB6 also feature useless LED displays and those synths cost over $3,000 just for the modules. AND they have two fewer voices of polyphony and don't sound any better than the Pro-800, IMO.

[Ex Machina]

Just keep making the Pro 800 but with the filters and oscillators from other synths. A Wasp that only has polyphony would be too simple but give it the controls of the Pro 800 and they'd really have something.

For some reason I always thought the Wasp and the OSCar synths were both made by Oxford Synthesizer Company. I guess it was the yellowish color of both synths that made me think they were of the same lineage. But the Wasp was made by Electronic Dream Plant (and was the first synth owned by Nick Rhodes of Duran Duran).

I usually don't recommend synth emulations because they almost never sound as good as the original hardware. But GForce Software makes the impressive "ImpOSCar2" emulation of the original Oxford Synthesizer Company OSCar.

Dave Spiers is the mad genius behind GForce and the company's excellent synth emulations (and the fantastic sample-based Virtual String Machine plugin).

The ImpOSCar2 isn't a Wasp but it's an excellent sounding synth emulation.

[Ex Machina]

A couple of years ago I sold my Sequential Pro One keyboard that someone literally gave to me in the 90s for a small fortune even though it was completely beat to hell. I had planned to replace it with a Behringer Pro-1. But then Behringer announced the Pro-800 and I thought I should just wait for that even though the Pro One and the Prophet 600 are different sounding synths.

I was super stoked when I heard that Behringer would be selling the Pro-800 for $400. That's an insanely good deal for an 8-voice VCO poly, or so I thought. But I don't know. I'm just not feeling it in any of the Pro-800 demos I've heard so far. Here's one for a bank of "Ambient, Electronica, and Melodic Techno" sounds:



The sounds seem pretty lackluster to me. Maybe it's just that particular bank of sounds. But I'm not hearing a beefy analog tone in any of the patches. The Pro-800 sounds kind of thin to me.

It's probably still worth $400. But I don't think it's any sort of replacement for my original Pro One keyboard.

[D-Fusion]

A couple of years ago I sold my Sequential Pro One keyboard that someone literally gave to me in the 90s for a small fortune even though it was completely beat to hell. I had planned to replace it with a Behringer Pro-1. But then Behringer announced the Pro-800 and I thought I should just wait for that even though the Pro One and the Prophet 600 are different sounding synths.

I was super stoked when I heard that Behringer would be selling the Pro-800 for $400. That's an insanely good deal for an 8-voice VCO poly, or so I thought. But I don't know. I'm just not feeling it in any of the Pro-800 demos I've heard so far. Here's one for a bank of "Ambient, Electronica, and Melodic Techno" sounds:



The sounds seem pretty lackluster to me. Maybe it's just that particular bank of sounds. But I'm not hearing a beefy analog tone in any of the patches. The Pro-800 sounds kind of thin to me.

It's probably still worth $400. But I don't think it's any sort of replacement for my original Pro One keyboard.

The Pro one and the Prophet 600 are very different in terms of sound.

The Pro one and Prophet 5 have a Punchy and focused lowend with snappy Envelopes and a more focused sound While the Pro 800 and Prophet 600 has more Buzz in it's sound and a more Relaxed Envelope behavior.

You can get some Phat Beef out of the lowend if you combine a Sawtooth and a Triangle when making Basses but it is not a replacement for a Prophet 1 or 5 even with the new Faster envelope mode which is more Punchy but still not as Snappy and focused as it is on the Prophet 1-5.

[D-Fusion]

Starsky is out with a deep comparison

[Ex Machina]

This Pro-800 demo sounds more like what I was expecting. I don't know if the synth is being subtly processed by an external chorus and/or reverb. But it sure sounds fatter and warmer than the Pro-800 in the other Limbic Bits demo I posted above.