Reply 20 of 36, by yawetaG
Spikey wrote on 2020-11-04, 17:04:yawetaG, are you able to record short demos any of the bank that has the "pre-GM GM" sound set? Patches that would be interesting would be Overdrive Gt (O.D Guitar 1), Acoustic Bs (AcousticBass), Clarinet (Clarinet 1), and maybe some of the synth patches.
Not yet, I still have to set up my "studio" so I can actually make recordings (I have all the equipment, but setting everything up has been a work-in-progress for the last 6 months or so...).
But you can try U220 demo's on Youtube, as all the banks on the MV-30 make use of the 226 internal tones of the MV-30 (which is basically the same set as on the U220), just with specific settings per patch. So if you listen to a U110 or U220 demo you can get a decent idea of how it sounds.
However, don't listen to a D70 demo, it has some major differences in how its patches are assembled (on the U110/U220 and MV30 you have 1 tone per patch, whereas on the D70 you have four...).
To me, it looks a lot like a SC-55 bank's origin, and is interesting in that the GM spec appears to have potentially come out of this bank.
I think the bank just provides a bunch of instruments that happen to be ordered like in the GM spec. The other banks don't use that order, and in fact you can make your own banks because the banks with patch data are saved on a floppy and the MV-30 is versatile like that.
The GM-like bank also has an alternate version that makes use of the tones included on the optional MV30 card set.
Plus, the font used on the MV's LCD seems the same as what was used in the SC line.
That font is used on almost all of Roland synths from that period. 😁 The actual menu's etc. seem inspired by classic Mac OS, they look quite pretty.
The user interface is also really easy to use and the manual is good (all the opposite of the D70, which has a horrific interface and unreadable manual).
I have a Roland INTEGRA-7, which has the 1080/2080/5080 patches. I guess it doesn't have their GM set though, unless the 5080 GM Set is related to the 1080 one. Are you saying the JV's "GM" set was based on the SC, or the SC was based on the GM timbres of the 1080? Or were you speaking broadly, that the 1080's GM set was just higher quality GM?
All of the patches found in Roland's romplers ultimately make use of the same source data, often just using different compression algorithms. This is fairly easy to check because many patches will have the same names as on older synths, getting progressively higher quality on newer models. Some patches on later romplers originate from optional expansion cards for older models (e.g. JD990 has some patches that originate from the SPLA cards for the Roland D70, while some of the patches from the U220/MV30/D70 originate from two optional cards for the U110).
So the JV "GM" sets are based on the older "GM" sets in a fashion.
The MV-30 is cheap (equivalent of about 100 US bucks), and seems to have the 2 MV cards and 2 U110 cards, so I'll try and get it if I can.
That sound like a good deal. Keep in mind that the MV-30 boots off a floppy disk (the image is available on the web) and won't work without the boot disk. It uses a DD 3.5" disk.
yawetaG: Also, does the MV receive controller 0 (MSB), reverb, chorus, and Data Entry MSB (controller 6)?
Download the manual, it explains everything. MIDI control is quite limited, it uses sysex for most stuff (limited to sequencer section; sound module portion has no sysex control). It reacts to velocity, aftertouch (key & channel), pitch bend, modulation wheel, volume, pan. It does use MSB and LSB, but there does not appear to be any effect control available. There are no separate settings for the GM-like bank; it won't react to GM-specific messages because those don't exist in its MIDI implementation.
It is much more similar in use to a groove box (a desktop synth with live editing/mixing capabilities) than a GM module. Just like the D70 it really is a highly editable synthesizer. Basically the way I use it is by connecting a MIDI keyboard for playing the patches, and use the MV-30's own controls to mangle the sound (it's very good at that, D70 filter oblige). It's not very interesting as a mere playbacker (most patches are a bit boring), but the moment you start to edit the sounds it gets interesting. On one hand you have the filter (it's HARD and LOUD), on the other a slightly limited but quite versatile modulation matrix with a LFO with quite the modulation wave selection. It's easy to make nice evolving synth pads. There is a primitive phrase sampling ability, so you can record a short sequence of key presses and play that sequence by pressing a specific key. It's possible to make a drum set that can use any of the internal tones or one of the phrases you recorded. You can record 16 tracks on the sequencer (8 with the internal tone generator, and 8 using an external module) and then play that back and adjust the volume and panning live.
In short: it's really a nice tool for creating music. However, I suspect it will not work as you think it might for playing back GM.