Originally Posted By: Peter K. Hewer
If you want to get better sounding pianos, strings, etc. for the playback of BAIB midi styles which will give better sound quality the Ketron SD2 or the Roland SD-50?


The sounds are virtually neck-and-neck, both are great sounding, each have their fortes on certain instrument patches IMO.

Does anybody have both of these and what do you say about them? (A salesmen for the Roland SD-50 said that things are relative, he said the sounds on a Roland SD-50 are good but not comparable to those on a $4000 synth ).[/quote]

I've USED both, but only own the Ketron. Have a buddy who owns the SD-50, have used it at his home studio for playing kehyboards thru so he can record them, also have hooked it up to BB, sounds darn good IMO.

And so does the Ketron, for that matter. I like the Ketron for its good full sounds, shirt-pocket size, ease of use with minimal controls (Resets each time its turned off and on again, no need for that extra button, only other control is the Volume slider and one multipurpose LED indicator) works as it is supposed to work, travels, takes up minimal space on the live gigs (I use stickon Velcro to keep it in place right on top of the Keyboard Controller) and has really great Upper Banks sounds.

IMO that salesman told ya right. But be advised from me that the Law of Diminishing Returns kicks in mighty hard when evaluating purchase of the "top shelf" vs the workingman's tool, and either of the two units you mention are robust workingman's tools that can indeed turn in fine performance.


Quote:
Are both of these (i.e. the Ketron SD2 and Roland SD-50) far better than the Native Instruments Bandstand in terms of midi playback sound quality?


IMO, Absolutely. Yes.

Another thing to consider besides just the sound quality, is that the Hardware MIDI solutions also automatically yield NEAR-ZERO LATENCY all the time, important for those who play a MIDI instrument in realtime with a Controller, whether live or recording. I found use of software solutions on live gigs and such could suddenly become very problematic for a whole host of reasons. Power kicks out and you are faced with rebooting a computer and setting everything back up when you're supposed to be onstage playing. Hardware synths will just come back up ready to go again in a couple seconds once you figure out who kicked out which AC plug.

Either unit is capable.

You should just spend some time auditioning both, that's easily done nowadays considering mfr's websie demos, youtube videos, etc. and then take your pick. I don't think you can go wrong with either of the two choices given.


--Mac

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