By Francis Carango:

My first impressions of the Roland Prelude Version 2..

The board instantly impressed me...and I have had very recent higher priced keyboards to compare..

Soundwise..it seems to be the same engine as the Juno Stage...Very good sounds..many outstanding..

Both the G70 and the E80, seem to sound better, most likely not as compressed, or at least more dynamic..

But, without a side by side comparison...the Preludes has the goods..

The MP3 player is a BIG improvement over the Juno Stage, E80 Version 2, and I believe the GW8....why?

It took over 4 minutes for the Juno Stage to scan the MP3's (about 700 files)..to be ready to play..

The E80 just under 4 minutes...The Prelude version 2...does a quick (about a second) read of the thumb drive, and apparently reads each file
just before play...just a bit sluggish to start..maybe less than a second..but seems like the better way to do things..

Version2 also allows the reading of lyrics (they must reside in the internal memory).

The ram must be pretty large...I have about 200 sequences and some styles in the internal memory, and it is not full..

My Prelude is the Latin version,and it has some great styles, and one touch settings to use with the styles..

Names of the styles I have never heard of..but I can recall songs that work well with them...no matter what the name says.

There are some great pianos on board (more sounds than on the Juno Stage)..And some of the best electric pianos found anywhere..

The surprise in the sound department are the sounds (tones) found in the "world" and "special" banks..
Many are from the SRX boards...As an example the organs and brass are better than most other boards I have heard..considerably better than the E50/60..

There are 1,193 tones and the additional "world and special" banks bring the count to 1,533...

The external input is great..a very hot input to handle low volume sources..

There are good volume controls to mix the real time sound, and song, MP3, Wave etc levels..along with the styles..

There is a good selection of effects including insert effects for styles, song, and real-time parts..

The addition of keyboard parts over and above the 16 parts that the sequencer uses is super..
.I hated the Juno Stage when I played sequences the "played" part had to use one of the 16 parts.....The Prelude is 16, plus 2 keyboard parts..

The version2 "make up" tools make the instrument great...both song and style edits in real time..
Not as simple to use as the G and E series, but usable..

All edits can be saved in play list (songs)..and user styles..

I have conversions of Korg styles (used with my E80 and G70)..and they play perfectly in the Prelude..

The Player can read 999 total and as many play list as you need..You can move the songs around, location selections within the play-list.
The Play-list editor works great too..you can rename titles , and spell to conform to 16 letters for SMF's and 32 letters for MP3's..

You can search for the next song (seq or wav/MP3) while a song or style is playing.

a single button for stop/start works great..

Changing the play-list is fast (less than a second)..compared to the E80 ( about 15 seconds)..

I was surprised how I was able to save all the edits as play-list changes on the USB drive..or the internal memory songs (where lyric songs need to be)..

The key feel is better than the JunoG, but not as good as the Juno Stage..I like the feel more than the E50, but not as much as the E60 and E80..

The speakers at 11 watts a side..are loud...much louder than the PSR (Yamaha) line, and louder than the Korg speaker models too..

They handle the full volume with out breaking up, but I would use some reserve and not push to the limit..

The MP3/seq player has additional -12/+12 volume control..and is very loud ..too loud for monitoring from the on board speakers..

The whole package comes in at 17 pounds 4 ounces..

The Roland Prelude with version 2 update..is a BIG TIME winner..

Sounds great - top marks to Roland.
All they need to do now is bring out an E81
(or G71). In the case of the E81, it needs to have range topping additions to the Prelude and be reasonably compact & not too heavy.

I like the E80 but it's just too heavy & cumbersome - although I would happily settle for a module version of it. This would be one way for Roland to increase their sales whilst still using the last keyboard's technology.
They could then, using the same chassis, repeat this with every new range topper which they introduce.
Tony

Still no style part swapping...major bummer.

Roland could have had the jump on other manufacturer's products at or near the same price point, by adding this essential, and extremely useful feature...especially for pros or advanced home users.

Ian the Disappointed

BTW...why is Fran going through you, Donny...as far as I know, he wasn't banned from SZ, and is perfectly capable of posting his own stuff?

good factual observations and assessment, all of which I can concur with as a Prelude owner.


Its worth noteing that unlike some very expensive keyboards who still have USB1.1 the Prelude has high speed USB2.

Gilbert.

[This message has been edited by gilbert (edited 10-13-2009).]

No, not banned ....but dissgusted.
I don't mind being my buddies liason..

What Fran should do is let you review it, and maybe get a more unbiased opinion.

Thanks for the review Fran...I mean, Donny

Don't worry Ian next week I finally have a few days off and will dine with Fran then hopefully he'll give me a tour of the New Roland Prelude in his studio..I look forward to playing it. stay tuned.

ROFLMAO

definitely an accurate review. having the GW-8

I can agree with most of the things in Frans review, but Fran mentioned the MP3 player is better on the Prelude than the GW-8...

I haven't even tried the MP3 player yet but why would Roland have a different MP3 player between these boards? Fran have you tried the MP3 player on the GW-8? what is the difference between the 2 boards??

i guess after 2 weeks of owning the GW-8E i can say i am extremely happy and still surprised i only payed AUD $1350.00 for this board.

the biggest downfall I have found is that with the styles there are no dedicated part mute / select buttons. you need to navigate through the 8 style parts using the UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT Buttons to highlight a track before you can make changes to it.

I have imported all of the G70 styles so far and most of them are very usable - you just need to change some style parts to make them work better in the GW-8.

Nick