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Akai is a Hong Kong manufacturer of consumer electronics. It was founded as Akai Electric Company Ltd in Tokyo, Japan, in 1946. Grande Holdings in Hong Kong purchased the Akai brand, and now distributes various electronic products such as LED TV, washing machines, clothes dryers, air conditioners and smart phones, through collaborations with other electronics companies bearing relevant expertise. inMusic Brands in the United States took over Akai's brand, starting the ‘Akai Professional’ label, that distributes high-end audio electronics products.
A music workstation is an electronic musical instrument providing the facilities of:
A sampler is an electronic or digital musical instrument which uses sound recordings of real instrument sounds, excerpts from recorded songs or found sounds. The samples are loaded or recorded by the user or by a manufacturer. These sounds are then played back by means of the sampler program itself, a MIDI keyboard, sequencer or another triggering device to perform or compose music. Because these samples are usually stored in digital memory, the information can be quickly accessed. A single sample may often be pitch-shifted to different pitches to produce musical scales and chords.
The Ensoniq Mirage is one of the earliest affordable sampler-synths, introduced in 1984 as Ensoniq's first product. Introduced at a list price of $1,695 with features previously only found on more expensive samplers like the Fairlight CMI, the Mirage sold nearly 8,000 units in its first year - more than the combined unit sales of all other samplers at that time.
The Korg Triton is a music workstation synthesizer, featuring digital sampling and sequencing, released in 1999. It uses Korg's HI Synthesis tone generator and was eventually available in several model variants with numerous upgrade options. The Triton became renowned as a benchmark of keyboard technology, and has been widely featured in music videos and live concerts. At the NAMM 2007, Korg announced the Korg M3 as its successor.
The Emulator is a series of digital sampling synthesizers using floppy disk storage, manufactured by E-mu Systems from 1981 until 2002. Though not the first commercial sampler, the Emulator was among the first to find wide use among ordinary musicians, due to its relatively low price and fairly contained size, which allowed for its use in live performances. It was also innovative in its integration of computer technology. The samplers were discontinued in 2002.
The EPS was one of the first few affordable samplers on the market. It was manufactured from 1988 to 1991 by Ensoniq in Malvern, Pennsylvania, USA. The EPS is a 13-bit sampler and replaced the Mirage - widely regarded as the first truly affordable sampling keyboard.
The Korg 01/W is a workstation synthesizer, released in 1991, and was intended to replace the M1 and T series. The workstation/ROMpler was based on AI², an improved version of the AI Synthesis technology found in the M1. The success of the AI² architecture ensured it was used in the majority of subsequent Korg synths of the 1990s.
The ARP Quadra was a 61-key analog synthesizer produced by ARP Instruments, Inc. from 1978 to 1981. The machine combined pre-existing products: the Omni, Odyssey, a Solina-esque string synthesizer unit, a phaser and a divide-down organ with ADSR envelope, and a 4075 24 db low pass filter into one box. It has four sections. Bass is on the bottom two octaves, has two unison bass circuits, with AR and a single pole low pass filter and a related AD envelope for cutoff. A string section is similar to the ARP Omni. Poly Synth, and a two voice Lead Synth similar to the Odyssey and a five way mixer with four unit outputs, a stereo pair, a line mono and an XLR out.
The AX60 is a polyphonic analogue keyboard synthesizer manufactured by Akai Professional in the mid-1980s. It was Akai's answer to the popular Roland Juno series synthesizers. The AX60 uses voltage-controlled analogue oscillators and filter circuitry based on the Curtis Electronics CEM 3394 integrated circuit.
The Prophet 2000 is a sampler keyboard manufactured by Dave Smith's Sequential Circuits (SCI) and released in 1985. It was the company's first sampler, and, despite its low audio fidelity and technical limitations by modern standards, marked a shift toward affordable samplers with better audio quality than its predecessors. It is also considered to be one of the earliest multitimbral samplers.
The LinnDrum Midistudio was going to be an electronic musical instrument produced by Linn Electronics as the successor to the ill-fated Linn 9000, which was an integrated digital sampling drum machine and MIDI sequencer. The Midistudio is essentially a rack-mount version of the Linn 9000 with some improvements. It was revealed at the 1986 Winter NAMM Show in January for a list price of $5,990. However, it never went into production because Linn Electronics went out of business in February 1986.
The Studio 440 was a sampler, sequencer, and 32 sound drum machine manufactured by Dave Smith's Sequential Circuits (SCI) and released in 1986. The sampler's core is similar to that of the Prophet 2000 and Prophet 2002. There is a 3.5" floppy disk drive to store samples and data.
The Akai Professional AR900 is a stereo 16-bit MIDI digital reverb, that could also be controlled by the optional AR900T remote control. It belongs to the "Akai White Series", a family of musical products launched in the last part of the 1980s. It was produced between 1986 and 1989.
The Oberheim TVS-1A is a polyphonic analogue synthesizer manufactured in the United States and released to the market in 1975. Its two voice digital keyboard can be operated in either polyphonic or monophonic mode. The TVS-1A also featured sample and hold and an onboard 16-step sequencer.
The Roland S-50 is a 61-key 12-bit sampler keyboard produced by the Roland Corporation in 1986. It featured a 3.5-inch DSDD floppy disk drive and had external CRT monitor support to facilitate editing of samples. It could hold up to 32 samples. A rack-mounted version was also available, which featured expanded memory.
The Roland DJ-70 is a 16-bit linear A/D Conversion & 20-bit linear D/A Conversion sampling workstation and was released in 1992 by Roland Italy.
The Roland D-70 is a 76 note Super LA synthesizer produced in Japan in 1990. it featured a 240 x 64 pixel backlit LCD display and competed with the likes of the Korg M1 and T-series workstations and Yamaha SY77 workstation, although the D-70 was not itself a workstation because it lacked a sequencer. The D-70 can also split or layer the four tones that constitute a patch and has D-50 style TVF filters. It has onboard drums sounds and is 6-part multi timbral. It has four left control faders that can be assigned in real time to the following paramemeters: Level, Pan, Tuning, Cutoff, Resonance, Attack, and Release. It has three modes of play: Mono, Polyphonic, Split. Despite being anticipated as a "Super D-50", it is in fact a different machine, a prototype of very successful JV series full-sample playback synths (ROMplers). It's very similar to JV-90, though has fewer quality samples and fewer editing capabilities.
The Oberheim Prommer is a monophonic sampler capable of programming EEPROM chips for use in Oberheim DMX, Linn, Simmons, and Sequential drum machines, allowing you use you own samples in these devices. The device can be triggered by MIDI, or via Oberheim's pre-MIDI parallel bus.
The Roland S-10 Digital Sampling Keyboard is a 8-voice polyphonic synthesizer, produced by Roland Corporation in 1986. In the following year of 1987, an upgraded rack-mounted version, the Roland S-220 was released. The upgrade doubles the voice amount to 16, with 5 audio outputs, and only a 30kHz sample-rate.
References
- ↑ "Akai X7000 Sampling Keyboard (SOS Jan 87)". www.muzines.co.uk. Retrieved 2018-07-05.
- ↑ SynthArk, Designed by www.1234.info / Modified. "X7000". www.synthark.org. Retrieved 2018-07-05.
- ↑ text., Synthmuseum.com website, including all information and images, is copyrighted as a collective work and is the property of Synthmuseum.com, Inc. This copyright does not supersede any copyrights that may exist for previously copyrighted images and. "Synthmuseum.com - Akai : X7000". synthmuseum.com. Retrieved 2018-07-04.
- ↑ "Akai X7000 | Vintage Synth Explorer". www.vintagesynth.com. Retrieved 2018-07-04.
- ↑ "Akai X-7000". www.polynominal.com. Retrieved 2018-07-04.
- 1 2 3 "Akai X7000 Sampler (MT Jan 87)". www.muzines.co.uk. Retrieved 2018-07-05.
- ↑ "Patch Sheet For AKAI X7000 Sampler Keyboard | PatchArena". patcharena.com. Archived from the original on 2018-07-05. Retrieved 2018-07-05.
- 1 2 "Music Technology, December 1986" (PDF). Retrieved 2022-09-18.
- ↑ "Orbital: Recording 'Chime', London Studio". www.soundonsound.com. Retrieved 2022-09-18.
