Was the DX-7 that bad of a synth? I owned a DX-7IIFD for awhile. I wasn't that impressed with it, but it was not a horrible synth.

No it wasn't it could do great things. You just had to find the right patches. And running it through some outboard effects can really make it come to life. It had some of the best velocity sensitive patches that really responded well to playing dynamics. In my opinion much better that most modern romplers.

It just didn't have the ability to make analog synth type sounds, though later versions of Yamaha FM such as the SY-77 could do that much better than the DX-7.

It was the first affordable digital synthesizer and made history as well as featuring on many hit records in the 80s. Plus nowadays there are more free patches online for it than any other synth. It may be awkward to program but a least there are many 1,000s of patches that may be a good starting point to tweak.

Thank you Nigel. The only reason why I ask, is because I was listening to a boradcast. On NPR, about music from the 1980's, and someone made the comment, that the DX-7 was heard on most synth songs form that decade. I think, the gentelman was complaing about that.

Paul

While the DX7 was heard on many songs during that decade it certainly wasn't the only synth as Oberheim, Sequential Circuits and Roland Jupiter synths also featured very heavily as well.

Yeah that's waht I thought. Like the oberheim OB* on Van Halen's JUMP! Or the Jupiter 8 on Journey's Seperate Ways.

I was a big fan of the DX7 and one of the first in my country to own one - I bought it before it was available. And ... I still got it.
The big deal was that it had FM-synthesis. An amazing clear sound very different from other synthesizers, so it was never a replacement, but an addition. Often the DX-7 was used as a replacement for electronic pianos and such. But it had a distinguished sound.
Before the DX-7 I had a monophonic ARP Pro Soloist. But I got tired of it, and wanted polyphony. And when the DX-7 came out it not only had 6 oscillators that could be patched differently but it had a 16 voice polyphony which was awsome at the time, because most synthesizers had a 6-voice polyphony. (If it were analogue it would have needed 16 x 6 oscillators!)
The DX-7 could be used as a synthesizer as you can hear in this clip by Casiopea, my favorite group at the time (they still play though). http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=VqPc7-GjCrA
keyboard player Minoru Mukaiya in action.
Enjoy!

[This message has been edited by drdalet (edited 10-09-2008).]