Yesterday I went out to buy a birthday gift for myself (Aug. 15 - Turned 21). It was te Orchestral II expansion board. Compared to the Orchestral I, this board sucks; even though Roland hyped it up so much.

Don't get me wrong. Some of the sounds are good. However, there are so many faults. For example, bibrato is encoded in all of the samples!!! This sucks. At least with the Orchestral I, you could use modulation to get vibrato.

This Board concentrates too much on Celtic sounds and I believe that it is a valuable waste of ROM space. All of the samples are recorded at 48Khz, but the board still doesn't please me as much as the Orchestral I board.

I'm looking to trade this for an Orchestral I board know. If you are into Film Scoring, Celtic Music or are looking for more Orchestral Strings as opposed to the many Solo Strings that are on the Orchestral I board, then this board (Orchestral II) is for you.

The sounds aren't bad, it's just not my taste. If anyone is interedted in an even trade, let me know. This board is one day old and I still have the bubble wrap, box and manual.

The Infamous EPU.

Thanks epu. I was thinking of buying the Orchestral board when I get my XV-88 however no I wont. Also there is a rumor that an SRX Orchestral board is next up in production
(I really want a guitar board!!) Anyway sorry this is not an offer to buy.

I have an orchestral 2 board and I really think it's sounds are "romantic", good for classical mood music and some solo harp pieces, the ohly thing I was dissappointed about was the fact thatI expected some tutti's and thril/tremolo/suspense hits like you can find on the super sound expansion board or on media traxx cd roms... So they wern't present on the orchestral 2 board.

All my SRX slots are still empty, I'm going to wait untill I can buy something really usefull for my brand of music that I make.

Is it just me, bue I'm not really out on guitar/brass/flute boards in the SRX series because they all sound well on my XV-5080, they should make a compilationboard of these very mystical etnic instruments,.. In essence, make a new world board but with more cosmic power ...

OR something like Sound idea's drone archeology, massive collection of textures to add a spacy feel to your sound..

cd

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Sorry epu,

I just got the Roland L-CDX orchestral CD for the 5080: I'll let you all know how it sounds when my CD-RW drive arrives in a day or two.

I'm guessing the retailer doesn't take returns on JV boards?

Chris

Actually, I went into Sam Ash yesterday and they had one Orchestral I Board on display. They let me do an exchange which is very cool. The Orchestral I board is hard to find these days. You have to order them as many retailers here don't carry them in stock anymore.

What's funny is, this board sounds way better then the Orchestral II Board which came out 7 years later!! The Orch I board came out in 1992 and the Orch II board came out in 1999 if I'm not mistaken.

Although the Orch II board has a sampling frequency of 48Khz and the Orch I board at 44 Khz, the Orch I board has a better all around colletion of instruments, and unlike the Orch II board, does not have vibrato embeded in its samples (thank good).

I really love my collection. I'm glad that Roland released the XVs and SRXs. This help bring SRJV and XP prices way down. Now I hav ethe Hip-Hop, Bass & Drum, Orchestral and Exp II boards.

The Infamous EPU.

Here's my 2 cents worth.

I tried the Orchestral 11 board a while back and didn't find it any 'better' than the orchestral 1 board- only different or complimentary if you could put it that way.

The string samples and patches a way warmer IMHO and better than those in the Orchestral 1 board- same with the brass. I agree that there are too many celtic sounds but I suppose these sounds are trendy at the moment!!!! The best sounds by far on this board are the choir sounds- absolutely superb IMHO. I will check out this board again before I make my final decision to buy it as a complimentary board for my 1st orchestral board. Cheers.