Korg Forums

[darkgoob]

Hi-

I just picked up a Korg Wavestation SR for use with my Korg X2. Can I use the X2's joystick as a controller for the joystick function of the SR? If not then what does anyone suggest in terms of an external joystick of some kind?

Also, I am looking for an external patch editor that would run on Mac OS X or Windows XP/Vista on my Intel Mac, which I could use to edit the programs on the Wavestation SR. I did some googling but did not find anything yet. I figured it would be better to just ask the forums here.

And yes, I know I could just use the Legacy Collection plug-ins, but the problem is they require a free USB port to run (using the dongle) and I am already using both USB ports on my laptop during performances. Also I don't want to add more processor time since I already run Reason and Digital Performer in the background so I'm trying to avoid adding additional VI's to my set-up.

Thanks any help would be appreciated!

-=DG=-

[darkgoob]

I've discovered that MOTU Unisyn supposedly would work for this. Does anyone know if this would be the best bet? Thanks.

[dave]

I own Unisyn 2. I've trashed it off my Mac Pro and my G4's OS X partition. It may still be for sale but there hasn't been an update for the past two years and it's not being developed any further. It's as buggy as a termite mound. The only good version is v1.x which I run on the G4's Mac OS 9 partition, which, of course, you can't buy anymore.

Try MIDI Quest instead. Still being actively developed and it supports many more synths than Unisyn. Demo available for download.

http://www.squest.com/Windows/MidiQuest/MidiQuest-About.html

Kind regards.
_________________
Dave Bourke
- ideation -

[darkgoob]

Thanks Dave. Well I found I actually had a copy of Unisyn 2.1. I had bought it apparently when I bought Performer awhile back and just misplaced it. I tried it, and it works fine with the Wavestation SR.

I'll give Sound Quest a whirl though and see if it's any better. I did find the Unisyn interface to be quite klunky and difficult, and honestly after playing with it, I find that the Wavestation SR is actually quite easy to program using the front panel controls. Contrary to what most people say about it, it's very easy if you have the manuals, especially if you are accustomed to programming a Korg X2, which has a very similarly arranged interface. I'm sure having a numeric keypad would make things a bit faster but honestly it's no problem, if you know what you want to program it's very simple to do it.

Korg even included some cool "worksheets" in the manual which you can photocopy to think out your patches before you program them in, which I'm happy to scan and upload for folks if that would not be a copyright violation.

BTW, I would like to add a few thoughts about the WS SR.

I have to admit, so far I'm not too impressed with the sound of the Wavestation SR... granted, I'm trying to design some more lead-type sounds with it, but it doesn't seem to really surpass my Korg X2 in terms of effects quality or flexibility. In fact, certain effects (like Delay/Distortion) have no control channel, and others do not seem to have a control channel that would affect the wet/dry mix (like Distortion).

The wave-sequence functions are cool, but honestly it's nothing compared to what kind of things you can do with a more modern wave-sequence type synth, for example the Malstrom Graintable Synth in Reason. I have to say that once you stack a lot of, say, sine-based waves into a Performance, the way they all line up and interact with the digital effects is verrry klunky, with weird variations in sound (and not in a good way). Also if you set the length of a wave-sequence step to just 1, with no cross-fade, then you get a lot of weird clipping and pops (not in a good way). I don't even really like the pads on this thing compared with the X2's pads, which seem smoother and silkier somehow (maybe I need to do further evaluation but that was my impression after a few hours of messing with it). The 4-way joystick control is neat (I mapped it to the optical control on my Alesis Photon X25) but I'm not a fan of how mixing different patches using the joysticks affects the volume of the patches. It would be nicer if the volume of each patch would be at its maximum when the joystick is in the "middle" position, and then each would fade out as you went to the sides, as opposed to each volume being the max when it's all the way to one corner or another.

Overall I'm sure it's capable of some cool stuff, but I might be selling this Wavestation SR unless someone has some suggestions or some better patches I might be able to download that are a lot better than the included ones. I'll keep programming some things into it but I'm just not sure it's going to be useful vis-a-vis an X2 and an Alesis Photon X25 tied to Reason and DP5's VI's.

-=DG=-