A reason to appreciate VSTis

As good as modern virtual synthesizers are I keep thinking how nice it would be to use hardware.
 
I have just recovered my old Korg Poly-800 from the loft, and amazingly it works, but what a pain when you are used to virtual instruments. Programming one parameter at a time with just a 4 digit LED display is pain when you are used to having all the controls laid out on the screen and adjusting them with a mouse or the knobs on the controller keyboard.
And it does not sound that good either.  Mind you the Poly-800 was a bit of a dog, let’s face it you don’t see many VST emulations of sample sets, and there probably is a good reason for that.
 
Of course if I could get my hands on a knob laden modular synth with lots of patch cords.

When I had all of my "real" hardware synths, I still preferred to work with them from the PC and for exactly the same reason you mentioned.

I had one of the very first ARP 2600s.  We used to cart it to jobs and attempt to use it.  It actually occasionally worked as it was supposed to.  I wouldn't trade any of my new virtual instruments for my old hardware stuff evah nevah.  Did love my Mellotron...but it too was a complete PITA.  

Mesh
I never owned (or worked on) an actual hardware synth, but I imagine it would be nice to be able to manually turn/twist/pull the knobs unlike it's VST counterpart. On the other hand, I like the fact that I can have the sounds of a 5, 10, or even 30k dollar piece of hardware for under a 100 quid. However, it feels like it does take away some of that 'organic' feel of having the hardware.......(still, it's the sounds that matter the most).
 
Glyn, do you have Korg's Legacy collection? (I believe the Poly is included in that).  
   

The legacy collection includes the Mono/poly which is a vey different beast with 4 VCOs. I really like it.
The Poly-800 is an early DCO synth. The waveforms were just square waves, sawtooth was approximated by mixing sever squarewaves a octave intervals.
 
There is a single filter which can result in weridness playing anything but lead lines or block chords.
 

I still have my Korg M1, but the internal battery died years ago and I've not got around to changing it, so no internal presets...  (the raw ROM samples are still there)
 
I was thinking it might be easier to get the Korg legacy collection than try to change the battery.  Then I could use a real M1 as a controller for the software M1.. 

I have the M1 as well.....no batteries required. :))

Hi,
 
I don't know enough about keyboards ... I know the sounds I like and would love to fiddle with, but trying to re-create them and find them ... has not been an easy proposition.
 
I did buy one of the Arturia's programs, the Jupiter, and I like it a lot, despite it having a set bank that is stuck with their own sounds ... one mistake/hit by your finger, and you just lost everything you got kinda thing!!!! ... but there is one issue ... I have no idea how to use the Sequencer, and in the couple of years of having this, still can not figure out how to use it, and I guess that no one knows either.
 
I've kinda given up getting help until the day I'm retired, or only working part time. The concentration needed to learn these things is getting too difficult to bother with. I can't even get something to double up, or repeat kinda thing, and that makes learning real hard, and being partially blind, really difficult all around.
 
As time goes by, VST's may be the trick, but in the end, no one will know how to use these things, except create ONE RIFF ... for their song, and that is a massive waste of an instrument. Pretty soon, you might as well get rid of the 5 strings on a guitar ... as teaching someone to play it will be too difficult and time consuming.
 
Hopefully, things will improve ... but I can not see buying a piece of hardware that will be redundant tomorrow and worthless for anything else, except one riff! But I would like a synthesizer, if anything to learn and not have to be limited to the VST stuff that is making it harder to learn all around.

slartabartfast
Your observations about the difficulty of programming physical synths has goaded my longstanding annoyance at the absolute absurdity of designing VST interfaces so that they look like cartoons of the old physical synths. A virtual "knob" to control a parameter...really? A knob that responds by moving a mouse forward and back by imitating rotation...jeeze. There are so many more easily controlled methods of data entry, and no reason whatsoever to make these interfaces so just plain silly.

 
The future is coming...

Mesh

Moshkito
Hi,
 
........Pretty soon, you might as well get rid of the 5 strings on a guitar ... as teaching someone to play it will be too difficult and time consuming.
 

Imagine if they decided to put 6 strings on a guitar.....we will all need to study string theory.

If an orchestra can now be done on an iPad by a well known classical musician, it's on the tube, you already know that most kids won't learn an instrument ... there won't be a need for it, when you can do this easily on a 25 dollar little keyboard plugged into a small computer! Strings will be history! The sounds just a memory! Folks playing it, a rarity!

Glyn Barnes
Of course if I could get my hands on a knob laden modular synth with lots of patch cords. 

From the department of Drew has been a bad boy. A very bad boy. Very bad. Very, very, very, very bad. Bad, Drew, bad:
 

Nice, and plenty of rack space for more modules!!!!

Glyn Barnes
Nice, and plenty of rack space for more modules!!!!

Unfortunately there are so many wonderful (eurorack) modules available (and more being made every month), I could fill it up pretty quickly.
 
But I am trying to force myself to keep to a strict diet regarding any new purchases at the moment.

Glyn Barnes
Of course if I could get my hands on a knob laden modular synth with lots of patch cords.

I've never owned a synth that required patch cords, but I did own a Roland SH-101 and a Korg Poly 6... both were a lot of fun, easy to use and sounded great. Tuning on the other hand was a nightmare depending on the electricity source and stability.

codamedia

Glyn Barnes
Of course if I could get my hands on a knob laden modular synth with lots of patch cords.

I've never owned a synth that required patch cords, but I did own a Roland SH-101 and a Korg Poly 6... both were a lot of fun, easy to use and sounded great. Tuning on the other hand was a nightmare depending on the electricity source and stability.

I had about 10 minuits with a Moog modular once! I used a EMS Synthi A at college, no patch cords here but a matrix patch bay where you made the connection with small jacks. This is more convinent bit of course its not expandable.
The first synth I owned was a Yamaha SY-1, later I had a SH101 and the MC202 sequencer version. Tuning on the SH101 was reasonably stable compared to the Synthi A.
 
I entered the MIDI and digital world with the Korg Poly 800 and a Yamaha DX100, I am not sure which I had first.

This little guy was born in my basement in 1981 and went to many jobs. It had a patch bay on the back. Because it was a kit, it came with schematics so mods were (relatively) easy. (That's when you make a patch change and commit to it with solder.) It sounded a lot like a monophonic Prophet 5. But it would drift a bit if the A/C kicked on. Oh yeah - no MIDI, and you selected one of 16 patches by cycling through them with a single (noisy) pushbutton.
 
http://www.vintagesynth.com/misc/proteusI.php