My quick review of FA-06 +

[geeman]

@geeman The point of my post was exactly what I wrote above.
Roland like Korg are cutting to many corners to achieve a certain price tag.
The pads are cheap. My Arturia Keylab controller has much better pads.
But this was no argument against Roland or in favor of Korg. Korgs Krome has neither pads, nor a decent keybed and no sampler. I just think they should have added 300€ of quality to it.

Greetings, Saxifraga and all,

"...the Hold button tends to have double clicks wich deactivates all running tracks..."

Take pity on this keyboard novice / hobby musician, and please explain: Do you mean that using the Hold Pad of the FA somehow deactivates all the Midi tracks written into the sequencer... ?

"...Arturia Keylab controller has much better pads..."

I don't doubt that it does, Saxifraga, and a sturdy piece of kit it looks to be. Likewise I would prefer the pads of my old Akai MPC 500 (now broken) .. wished onto my new FA. But at what price? If I were considering a small compromise, the "Arturia Beat Step" looks appealing in price and specification with no computer necessary, I believe.

But surely, with sturdier pads, the lightweight body of the FA would need to be reinforced to suffer the pounding of said pads, which would increase the overall FA's weight, therefore removing one the attractions of the FA for me. Also, the player would need to move position to stand over the pads, rather than simply reaching out with the right hand.

As I am on a limited budget and with physical storage space likewise limited, this FA-06 suits me very nicely. And thanks again for your suggestions for compromise add-ons discussed on a previous posts, now acted on.
Cheers :-)

[synthguy99]

As long as the people of the world keep voting in governments promising "free lunches," things are just going to get worse every year. Businesses like musical instrument makers with small profit margins get hit the hardest.

[Keybdwizrd]

I played an FA06 at a Guitar Center today for about 20 minutes. Amazingly, it was hooked up in stereo through a couple of nice monitors, and there was no one else in the keyboard department.

I played through a lot of presets, and most of them sounded great.

I was pleasantly surprised with the synth action on the 06. I can see how people expecting anything close to a piano-type action would be disappointed. But as someone who has been playing synth actions for a long time, I found the 06 to be pretty good. It is fast and crisp, and no the least mushy. The keys don't travel downward very far, but IMHO this adds to the ability to play very, very quickly. If this isn't important to you, you may simply find the action to lack depth.

For reference, the action seems to be very similar to, if not the same as, the action on the Di and Gi. Same general feel, for sure.

It could certainly be a lot better. But after the horrible action on the Krome 61, and really mediocre action on the MOX/F6, I was prepared to be really disappointed with the 06. I wasn't.

[Saxifraga]

@geeman
Regarding the sampler Hold button:
I started several sampler loops. To have them play continiously you have to hold the 'Hold' button and then press the sample pad 1..16. If you want to add more you have to do it again with a different pad.
This is a nice feature to get a nice acompainment running.
But if you press Hold not hard enough down, you get easily a 'quadruple' click wich stops all sampler tracks at once (it does not influence the MIDI sequencer). During my test it happend to me several times. I would not use this function on stage because it's unreliable. Maybe someone who presses down harder on buttens may find it useful.
I think it should not be the dafault behaviour of the pads to stop the other samples playing, if you hit another pad. I like the Fantom G6 method of being able to configure the pads and their behaviour. Maybe I am a spoiled kid? ;)

[Saxifraga]

As long as the people of the world keep voting in governments promising "free lunches," things are just going to get worse every year. Businesses like musical instrument makers with small profit margins get hit the hardest.

Governments don't give 'free lunches'. Governments regulate traffic, finacial merkets, evironmental rules etc.
You would not love to live in a world regulated by 'silver barons'. Governments can also create demand for goods wich gets the economy restarted. But this is a discussion we should do somewhere else. Have a nice gov free sunday! ;)

[geeman]

@geeman
Regarding the sampler Hold button:
I started several sampler loops. To have them play continiously you have to hold the 'Hold' button and then press the sample pad 1..16. If you want to add more you have to do it again with a different pad.
This is a nice feature to get a nice acompainment running.
But if you press Hold not hard enough down, you get easily a 'quadruple' click wich stops all sampler tracks at once (it does not influence the MIDI sequencer). During my test it happend to me several times. I would not use this function on stage because it's unreliable. Maybe someone who presses down harder on buttens may find it useful.
I think it should not be the dafault behaviour of the pads to stop the other samples playing, if you hit another pad. I like the Fantom G6 method of being able to configure the pads and their behaviour. Maybe I am a spoiled kid? ;)

Hello Saxifraga,
Can't make my FA-06 reproduce that (above). Maybe some of the more experienced FA- owners could verify? Thanks for getting back.

[jblongz]

Today I spent over an hour with the FA-06, 08, and other boards. I was highly disappointed for quite a number of reasons.

Cons:
-Pads are not velocity sensitive
-Pads do NOT trigger patches, no trigger midi like the Fantom series did.
-Sounds were not that impressive. I keep hearing "SuperNatural". Even subtracting the 'Super' would still make it an overstatement.

Pros:
- It looked nice
- Screen was a decent size
- Lightweight.


Here's my soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/jblongz In there you'll see some tracks with "cinema" prefix. It is this type of quality why I won't settle for less with hardware, especially when software is achieving so much for me. These days I make more money with 2min scores than 2 hour gigs.

I left the Fantom X for the software world after I stopped doing gigs. I invested money in the entire EastWest, Arturia, AmpleSound, and NI catalogs among other products. A few months ago, I said "Maybe I should start gigging again". So I went out and tried the FA0, Motif MOXF, Korg Krome and I'm shocked at how they fall behind todays sample libraries. Truly shocking. They may be gig worthy for its portability and fast deployent without computer, but I have a new respect for software. And if Synth makers had the same respect, they would put more into their product. The FA series is something I would buy for my nephew. I hope their working one some really groundbreaking sound because I went to buy their unit today, and I'm now considering a new midi controller instead.

On a positive note, I loving the moog hardware synths!

[flyingace]

I only got to play the FA-08 last week and was impressed with the sounds and interface... I almost just asked them to order me the FA-06. Glad I didn't, I finally played one today and was surprised that the keyboard is the same one from Juno-Gi and my Juno-Di. I don't mind the short little keys with short throw on the Gi or the Di as they are truly portable synths, but I was hoping for better on the FA-06... it was the thing that just kept me from going over the edge and buying it :(

But as far as sound and interface, this thing is wonderful!