The EL-backlight display gives an immediate visibility to several parameters yet nothing is too cryptic. Knobs would be great but that doesn't keep me from loving this synth. I've got it to where I can program faster with one hand since everything is centrally located yet not cluttered. The unit came to me with a bunch of wind patches programmed into it. I guess these were the stock patches since the VX600 was made for the EWI wind controller market. The sounds that I have made have all been very pleasingly analog.

The filters are crisp. They almost sizzle. They resonate with almost a liquid quality kind of like Roland's MKS-80 but not quite that colorful. They have a color more like a Prophet 5 but the bottom is strong with a bit of bounce like a milder version of Yamaha's CS80. Nothing about this synth is like an Oberheim(the afore mentioned breath). The matrix programming is deep enough to consider this unit very flexible(Patch cables would be good..or would it?). Some matrix settings can cause the auto-tune to miscalibrate so choose a patch that has a basic program to auto-tune. Multi-timbral mode has all that is to be desired for me. The VX600 has this neat chord feature where you can assign up to 6 notes in any fashion you choose to be a chord that you can play with 1 note. You can do this for every note in the octave(12). Use a foot controller and then your totally flying solo! My only gripes about this synth are that the only knobs on this keyboard pertain to the would be EWI player. That's not likely you nor I so what a teaser that is! The other is that the keyboard (37-note)itself is squishy and I mean squishy though it does have a mono pressure controller in it(squish...woohoo!). Use your favorite controller when you can. Overall the "strength-to-weight" ratio for this synth makes it better than any keyboard of its size. It almost makes me wish that all of my other big keyboards were this size!

modulation matrix , curtiss vco's, small portable, nice display, ins outs (1 for each vco with splitter cable, easy to make yourself)

Cons Very unreliable, i had 3 (even when they were new in 1988) all 3 packed up in the end, always same problem, calibration errors) HORRIBLE software envellope generators, Cpu can't handle decent attack speed. So no percussive sounds, The sound of the synth is also quite squashed, the strings dont breathe like on other Curtiss vco based machines (ie prophet 600, roland jupiter6 etc)

conclusion Only if you can buy it very cheap (+- 180 euro) then have a go, but be prepared to pay maintenance bills reguraly.

the original price was 2000 euro and i bought my first one in early 89 when they were phased out after only 1 year production.

Tip: in order not to loose your patches when changing batteries, simply leave the power on when changing them, so... duh ... with the card inserted, no magic here :).

I wouldn't try this with the battery inside the machine as currents are 220/110V in some parts of the machine.

Allez, créez!