Honest opinion of the Roland FA-07

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Received an FA-07 , The keyboard feel is nice, good weight, but honestly the only good sounds are the organs and pianos. Also the newer synth sounds are excellent in the FA. However, horns are very buzzy and its hard to even layer 2 or more horns to get that full band effect. The strings are ok, but are not natural sounding. Choirs and voices are not good. I play mostly R&B and 70s and 80s top forty. This is not the keyboard for this kind of music. I should have done more research, I sent it back in exchange for a a little more expensive Kurzweil PC4-7. I have read some bugs exist in the KUrzweil, but I know a guy who has one and he loves it. He says the pads are outstanding and has some pads similar to the old Ensoniq sound.
 
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I recently migrated from the Juno DS to the FA-06, a world of difference in sound quality!
Well, I read you sent it back, did you switch between SN-A and SN-S modes? When I received my Fa-06 I thought it had horrible sounds in it but when I switched between those modes I confirmed I made a great keyboard choice, imho. For those who just unboxed their FA series keyboard this is the setting you need to edit:

Good luck with your new keyboard!
 

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I was humming and erring about an FA07 about 18 months ago that resulted in me watching a lot of the Roland videos and spending about six hours playing one in my nearby shop.

I liked the keybed, some of the sounds but not other aspects of the OS, it was imo way better than a similar priced Yamaha in all aspects except acoustic piano,

I decided against it primarily on its design age.

I do wish Kurzweil would expand their almost non existent presence in the UK.

Good luck
 
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I recently migrated from the Juno DS to the FA-06, a world of difference in sound quality!
Well, I read you sent it back, did you switch between SN-A and SN-S modes? When I received my Fa-06 I thought it had horrible sounds in it but when I switched between those modes I confirmed I made a great keyboard choice, imho. For those who just unboxed their FA series keyboard this is the setting you need to edit:

The FA has three distinct kinds of sounds (besides the drums):

* SuperNATUAL Acoustic (SN-A). There are relatively few sounds in this category, but it is where you would expect to find the best patches for these particular sounds: piano, tine and reed EPs, clav, organ, acoustic and electric bass, acoustic guitar, and ensemble strings. These are "Integra 7" quality, and should generally beat the Juno DS equivalents.

* SuperNATURAL Synth (SN-S). These are the sounds that use their modeled "virtual analog" engine, which is designed for "synthy" sounds rather than emulations of acoustic instruments. This, too, is "Integra-7" tech, and should generally beat Juno DS.

* PCM. These are all the other sounds, and they are all sample-based, regardless of whether they are "synthy" sounds or other acoustic instrument emulations. These are derived from the old XV-5080. When it comes to acoustic instrument emulations, except for the particular sounds listed above in the SN-A section, these sounds will generally lag those of the Juno DS, whose sound don't come from the XV-5080 but instead come from later Fantoms and other newer sources.

The are also additional PCM-based sounds available on the SRX-based expansions, which can be loaded into either board (one set into the DS, 2 sets into the FA; but the DS also allows you to load your own sample-based fully playable sounds into expansion memory, whereas the FA does not).

So there really isn't a straight answer to which of these boards one would expect to sound better... it depends on the particular sounds you're looking at.
 

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