Hot news; See the software section to download the freshly scanned YRM MIDI Macro & Monitor Manual or the YRM-306 cartridge. A rare DX7-II/FD Editor, brought to my attention by Chris Conkie
Well it didn’t go unnoticed. Yamaha’s Reface range of synths have stirred up quite some emotions on the web. I thought to add my impression on the Reface DX here since it’s been a long time for a new FM synth to hit the market.
The unit looks good, nice design touch on the DX Legacy. It’s small but the keys have velocity which is a nice surprise. Runs on batteries, Small speakers, USB, FX unit built in, AUX in, interesting…
But now… 4 operators. Ok, I see in the manual that you now have feedback on every operator so it should sound better than e.g. DX100… but it’s still a bit cheap for the price on which the DX is estimated. The Aux in is only for hearing music from your mobile device? no external FX signal processing? Although there are four configurable ribbon panels editing FM will still be a pain in the *. This all is a bit disappointing. I understand you can now share voices via the browser. That’s nice, but I wonder if you can edit your patches through the browser.
It looks like the hardware adds so little to the FM system that Yamaha would have been better off releasing it as a FM sound module with editing capabilities over the web or other midi controller hardware. Having FM with some good FX built in is a nice asset to any producer but it’s just a shame to pay extra for the keyboard…
Here’s a video from Sonicstate which shows you the ins and outs:
For extra ‘reading’ material – Yamaha has released a Synth book app which also features samples of various Yamaha classic instruments.
Yamaha Synth Book App for IOS
Weird thing is: THEY COMPLETELY LEFT OUT THE CX5M RANGE!!
I got a call from Chris Conkie who had some nice screenshots for me so I added 5 new ROM images to the Software page:
Enjoy: https://cx5m.net/software/
An awesome free(!) VST/AU plugin. The CX5M is still a very ‘friendly’ system to develop FM sounds on, but DEXED brings it home again to the 21st century.
This looks very promising: Not sure what the dirty lo-fi engine means but this app has some very nice features which could make this FM-synth the most useful FM-App on the iPad.
Well, CX5M lovers – I found this link while looking for some FM stuff and it took me back in time: http://yates.ca/dx7/
Great resources from the Yamaha community back in the 80s!
Here’s Emilio P.G. Ficara’s writeup about how to reuse the FM chip on an old PC ISA SoundBlaster soundcard:
http://ficara.altervista.org/?p=1381
I’m not sure if it would have been easier connecting the PIC directly to the FM chip though but it sure is a nice project.
Chances are you have a thing for the 80s, checking out CX5M stuff and all. The sound of that era is quite recognizable to say the least.
There are a lot of musicians out there still grasping that sound and producing new 80s music. There are great tunes to be discovered on the Future City Records label. Check out their stream here on soundcloud.
As you might have read I do not only stick to the CX5M but also some other apparatus like the TX81Z hardware or PX7 on Reason. However these are FM type generators and my recent diversion was made by the Korg Volca series.
Although I was already drawn to the Volca Beat (I was looking for a real a step-sequencer) I initially tried the Roland TR-8, the sequencer had swing settings and ah well.. you never go wrong on the good old 808/909 sound.
But playing around with the TR-8 I discovered the machine was less surprising than I had hoped for. Also the effects were responding a bit ‘clunky’ and the driver for muliti recording audio was not to my liking also, the whole TR-8 started to stutter it’s playback. Now I knew the Volca was the way to go.
And it has not let me down. Switch it on and play away. That’s how it’s supposed to be! It has it’s own sound, it’s very portable (battery and speaker) and I also like the fact that the Volca’s are so accessible for tweaking. (Since I also have an Inverse Poly 800 waiting for the Hawk mod this Volca is right up my alley!)
I already implemented the snare fix and MIDI out as you can see on the picture above. Those of you who have tried know it’s normally not possible to put a MIDI connector at that place but filing off the connector’s rear and use small wire you can precisely pull it off.