DonovanB
OK. a mate bought the GR-20 which is a guitar synthesiser. he uses it on his fretless bass.
I despis synth sounds, most times they dont sound real. but fork me, this thing is freaking awesome!!! the sounds are incredible.
has anyone else used one? I want to hear what others say about it?
AlanRatcliffe
GR-20 is nice in one respect - it's a technophobes guitarsynth. ? Easy to set up and use and sounds decent. The problem comes in when you want to do something that's not preset. It doesn't offer many options for editing sounds. One other slight downside is that the GR-20 doesn't work well with piezo 13-pin systems, so you are stuck with the Borg-like GK-3 on your guitar. All-in-all, The GR-20 is a decent way to get into guitar synthesis, but quickly frustrating for the majority of MIDIguitarists (who are generally a "tweaky" bunch), due to the lack of editing. Roland are not doing a top-of-the-line guitar synth (like the older GR-33) anymore, but putting more of their energies and R&D into the VG-systems.
One advantage any of the all-in-one guitarsynths from Roland (including the GR-20) have is a fairly fast response - the system uses a "trick": as the pitch to MIDI conversion takes some time (especially with lower notes), the moment the system senses you are playing a note, it triggers the percussive attack of the sound, which gives it time to figure out the correct note and fill in the pitched, sustained portion. Nifty for using the built-in sounds, but if you want to use the MIDI out to drive another synth/module/softsynth, the response is far slower (expect up to 20ms delay on a low E).
In comparison, the Terratec Axon AX-100 converter gets a faster "E" response of as low as 6ms (with a plectrum player) for either internal or external sounds and offers the ability to do advanced things like string and playing position splits (you can have different sounds when you play closer to the bridge, middle or neck). The internal soundset is a fairly mundane GM/GS module, more added in for completeness as Terratec know that most of their users are going to be using the Axon to drive external modules and softsynths.
Roland's own GI-20 offers many more editing options, but needs a separate synth - it's just a converter. The GI-20 also has the latest Roland conversion, like the GR-20 (but to be honest, I had a hard time noticing any tracking or speed improvements over the older Roland stuff). The older GR-33 and GR-30 also offer far more editing options, but dated soundsets in comparison.
