Nice new Roland D80

Funnily enough it reminds me of the D-70 as well. LOL. I like the d-70 though so that's fine by me!

Maybe DUPITER-80 would be the perfect name then?

LOL. If it sounds awesome who cares what they call it! But there are some spooky parallels to the d70. The 76 keys and the four sliders plus its a merging and advancement of their current technologies as the d70 was back in the day. The JP-80 sounds great so far...

About those 76 keys... Don't you think a 61 and 88 (wighted) will come along if this becomes a success? I mean, look at the design. I know there has to be room for the "Jupiter 80" text, but seriously, if you cut away the last 15 keys, theres still room for all the controllers on the front panel and connectors on the back.
If they haven't considered this, why didn't they put 8 sliders up there to use as drawbars for the organ sounds they're so proud of? :P

Roland are the dumbest when it comes to explaining their past products, ie: the Jupiter-8.

So in one of the videos, the Roland engineer, says the story was, that the original Jupiter-8 was a deemed a failure because it could not reproduce acoustic sounds. So that means every analogue synth and drum machine they have released - Jupiter-6, SH-1000, 2000, 101, TB-303, TR-808 and TR-909 were all failures.

Funny that, most of these analog synths/drum machines have achieved cult status and are more popular than Roland's current products.

Also the Roland engineer in the video says @ 00:49 "Acoustic instruments in the Jupiter-80, no please no!"

Roland has a long history in the English-speaking world of having marketing and marketing terminology that doesn't quite capture what their synths are really all about. I'm glad at least Scott Tibbs is still there.

The launch campaign in the west for this instrument is classic; I don't think it really represents where the synth is coming from and what it can do.

I'm sure for those who are seriously interested in the instrument, and are familiar with the details of what it can do, and have a professional need for it, that it will be extremely appealing. It's definitely not a mass-market synth, nor a hobbyist synth, much like the V-Synth before it.

I was a bit aghast at first given the marketing and the look of the thing, but I'm very intimate with Roland's architecture for many years, and if in person this proves to be the advance that I think it may be, I'll be very interested.

Oddly, the off-putting thing for me at the moment are those buttons on the front edge below the keyboard; why, oh why?! What are they for? Could Roland make a cover for them? <G>

Those buttons under the keys annoy me to... I fear I might press them unintentionally... But I don't see them making a cover - that would be like calling their design a mistake, and I haven't heard of that before... And who knows - once you get to play with the thing, they might actually become inhandy.... Who knows, right?

There are definitely a few little mysteries like this I look forward to figuring out in-person with a JP-80 at some point, somewhere. :)

UPDATE: ah.. courtesy of US website with their little magnifying-glass thing for the photos, the mystery of the buttons below the keyboard... solved! They're basically quick bank- and patch-select, with a write button to the left so I assume you can bank/patch select quickly and write to a specific _user_ location quickly with an edited patch. Eh voila....

That's actually a great place for those buttons. They went with a similar placement on the Lucina, and they're very useful. I haven't had a single occasion where I've pressed them accidentally.

Python wrote:

Those buttons under the keys annoy me to... I fear I might press them unintentionally...

This is a real issue, but only under two assumptions : (1) the Jupiter-80 got you excited (2) you p...s sizes favorably.

I for sure fulfill the first assumption... I wished I could press those Jupiter-80 registrations buttons unintentionally, though :op

Well, I'm not THAT excited about the keyboard... But sometimes when you gig and the girls in the front row start..... Well, I don't think I really have to finish that scenario for you to get the point... Guess I'll just have to wear a cup then... :(