Synth advice

ninwilky

Hey

I was thinking of getting a small synth, probably something thats around 3 octaves of keys for playing Alternative/ shoegaze/ Hard rock. However I've zero knowledge really of synths and nill experience, so I was wondering if anyone has any experience with synths in these settings. Basically I just want something that doesn't sound like it's from a 80's pop song or a chart song from Qbar. Any recommendations on products and sound settings would be greatly appreciated. My budget would be around 300 quid probably.

glashanator

For that money there's only 3 that I would mention. Alesis Micron,Korg microkorg and the korg R3. I've owned the micron,but its down to individual taste. The korg r3 probably would be the best of the 3.......but really you should do lots of youtube demo's and decide for yourself.....

These boards may be a bit dancy for you......but you did ask for a synth.

For those sounds (Alternative/ shoegaze/ Hard rock) you might be best with a midi controller and soft synths on your laptop, like ableton for example. thousands of sounds in those bad boys. bUt its one more link in the chain......swings and roundabouts

Ravelleman

Not really into synths but the Arturia Minibrute looks quite cool.

pinksoir

Arturia Minibrute is incredibly cool. It's monophonic though, plus there's a wait for them as they've proved so damn popular.

I would suggest, if you've zero experience with synths, to download a few VSTis and learn how to work them first. Programming synths is easy once youknow how, but if you don't it can be a nightmare. As for the ones recommended above by glashanator, they're perfectly good synthesizers but editing the sounds on them requires a bit of what's referred to as 'menu diving'. That is, a lot of the features can only be accessed by going through the menus as they don't have a 'knob per function' layout, partly because they're small, but mostly to keep the cost down for the end user. This is fine if you know what you're doing, but it can be confusing if you don't. If you can't programme a synth you'll be stuck with the presets on any of the ones you do buy.

This is why I recommend you learn a bit about synthesis (with software) before going out and buying one. It's pretty common for people to buy one of the synths above, which are all perfect for your uses by the way, but then they sell them quickly because they got fed up with not being able to work them properly. A VSTi will have all the features apparent on them and will allow you to get to grips with synthesis in a much clearer and easier way than with menu diving on a hardware synth.

Then you can go out and buy a hardware synth after if you want. One I'd recommend if you could stretch a bit further would be a Korg MS2000. They come up quite regularly on Adverts and go for about €400-450. They're basically the same as a MicroKorg, but with a knob per function layout and a full size keyboard. Great synth.

Another one would be the Alesis Ion if you can find one.

Also look for a Novation Ultranova or KS4

There's plenty of options out there for you.

ninwilky

Thanks for the responses. I tried the akai miniak in musicmaker last week and loved it so i was going to go with that but I'm going to play around with some VSTis first like you said and then I'll make a decision