In short, it's a belter. You've got two banks of 128 sounds plus two drum banks. It can be run multi-timbrally but, with just a two-digit LED to guide you, I wouldn't advise it. Fear not as even in single mode it's just great.

The sound banks are divided up into sections so you've bass, synth, strings, pads, keyboards (like pianos, organs etc) etc. The bass and top ends are well-defined and, even though this is a rompler, there's so much in the way of variety you can be pretty sure you'll find what you need.

Looking for that classy Prophet 5 bass or shimmering Joy Division ARP string sound? No bother as they're here plus loads more! You can tweak the filter and envelopes a bit and then save them to a filer or librarian program if you're into SysEx commands but it's very plug-and-play in any case.

If you're the sort of player who wants to use analogue sounds live but doesn't fancy paying loads for them or carting old synths about, this could be a solution. For sixty notes, it's a winner. I love mine and would recommend them to anyone...even you!

I like the drum banks, probably because they cater less for the TR808/909 than they do for that seemingly forgotten stalwart of 80s pop, the Simmons SDS5. I thought music hardware manufacturers had forgotten how fabulous the Simmons kicks and toms sounded, but this fact obviously didn't escape Akai -- well done.

If you've got an SG01V, or you're planning on getting one, get the SG01Edit program (search on Google for "SG01Edit" and you shall find it). It's free, very easy to use, and it gives you access to all the SG01V's somewhat hidden editable parameters.