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I owned a 505 for about 2 1/2 years. Here are some issues I had with it...
On board fx processor is absolutely abominable (and they hid the ring modulator WHERE?). The slicer is alright (if you're into that sorta thing), but suffers from lack of any gain functionality and you often end up having to drop the volume of the rest of your mix to compensate. The gated 'verb is alright for industrial sounds. Looooow-fi. Seperate delay and verb is a definate plus.
3 Stereo outs, but you loose all your effects on any signal you wanna send out of 3/4 & 5/6! What's up with that???
The filter sounds cheap and nasty, but in all fairness it CAN be used to create some nice effects - run a pad chord, crank the res and sweeeep that cutoff freq... yum (if you think you will be able to reproduce mad classic synth sounds on this box, it 'aint gonna happen. The 505 is a sample based digi-synth, thru and thru).
Individual part sliders - nice Megamix function is nice!
The thing has a nasty tendancy to crash on you when you enter step record mode - yes, I upgraded my ROM version, no, it didn't fix the problem. Yes, I've tried other 505s but encountered the same problem.
If you push the processing power of this machine too hard, it starts to freak out. If you think you're going to fill up all the parts, throw control changes at it left right and centre and get some killer acid riffs with nice tight portamento happening, think again. Even when you select the "note & bend" function for the D-Beam and move your hand over it too fast you can hear the processor wheezing away like an asthmatic ant with a heavy load of shopping (if I wanted a glissando, I would've asked for it!). You expect as such from a TR-909, NOT a "state-of-the-art" piece of audio hardware.
The analogue style modeling functionality on this machine is straight forward and easy to use (if a little time consuming). Very cool for makin' sound effects.
The knobs and buttons (ESPECIALLY the part mute buttons) are cheap, plasticy and get busted with the ease.
The thing looks like a toy (but beauty is only skin deep, right?).
Some of the menu items could have been replaced with knob dual functionality. What would've been wrong with having a toggle button on the LFO to access LFO 2? Too much wading thru menus.. uch! (same problem with the Virus!).
Cannot record continuous control changes in song mode. It IS a performance box, but ir you're gonna have a song edit mode, why exclude such an important feature?
Infinite spin (relative positioning) on the filter control & LFO knobs would have been infinitely better. If you are playing live and you change pattern/patch, you'd better hope and pray that your patch settings are somewhere close to where the knobs are sitting before you start a-tweakin'!
The overall end sound quality is average, very muddy running thru a large system - like I said, it does have 3 stereo outs, but you lose your effects!! ARgh! "But if you run it thru external effetcs & dynamics bla bla bla...". If you've got that kind of cash, get dedicated hardware!
The sequencer is very flexible.
The 505 is good for making all kinds of music, not just bangin' tekkers (The pianos, organs and pads sound pretty sweet - uses many waves from the 1080?).
I don't care what anyone says, it is IMPOSSIBLE to get good punchy bass out of this machine (I wasted many an hour of my life trying to model bass sounds just way I wanted 'em, but to no avail). Anyone who says otherwise obviously doesn't have any other decent gear to compare it to. If you want fat analogue bass, get a fat analogue synth.
Can apply effects/panning etc to individual component of a drum kit without much stress - I like!
Virtually impossible to find a MC-505 device driver for Cubase. Ended up writing my own.
Very easy to just turn on and start bangin' out tracks.
Conclusion for anyone looking at buying one:
Great for beginners, but if you are serious about your music, you'd be much better off looking elsewhere. Sure you can make some wicked tunes on the 505, but it just doesn't cut the mustard compared to what else is available. When you hear someone jump on stage with a 505, then hear a similar Joe go on after with an array of dedicated gear, there's absolutely no contest (yes, it IS a fair comment, the 505 is meant to be an all-in-one box). I'm not trying to say "the gear makes the music", but it's like somebody else said somewhere else on this board, you could be the best race car driver in the world, but if you're driving a heap, you're gonna get beat (or words to that effect).
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