The Roland Juno DS88 synthesizer is easily one of the five best synthesizers available for sale right now in the price range. Others prefer the 88-key options by manufacturers such as Korg and Yamaha which are nice synthesizers in their own respects, but this workstation by Roland is something very special. If you’re someone who focuses primarily on guitar and bass, this Roland Juno DS88 might be the perfect synthesizer for you. This synth is loaded with over 1,200 onboard sounds.
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User Interface/Style
As you can probably tell from just looking at it, this 88-key synth keyboard has a very clean and simple layout, which is always intriguing when you have such a complex instrument. You won’t have a hard time learning the in’s and out’s, and it is surprisingly quite easy to program. In terms of its body, you could say it is quite lightweight (35 lbs), especially for an 88-key keyboard. Keys are weighted and feel premium, and a built-in sequencer is also present. Unfortunately, the screen on this unit is rather small. It shouldn’t stop you from producing and making your own sounds, but it is something that should be noted. Other than that, it has a very simplistic and clean look/feel to it, and as it has already been noted, it’s hard to get quality like this (both hardware and software) in this price range. The Juno DS88 by Roland is a nice looking synthesizer.
Sounds
There are far too many sound variations and styles with the Roland Juno DS88 to list (and even more custom ones you can product), but just about all of them are nice. The organ and piano sound especially great on this model, and guitar/bass are fantastic too. In general, you should be able to replicate most sounds from the commercial pop and dance world with this synth. Of course, you’ll have the classic sounds like cello, accordion, piano, and tons more but Roland also included a nice variety of fun sound effects such as river/water sounds, lightning, jets flying by, and others. Overall, the sound selection along with the quality of the actual sounds themselves are absolutely sensational.
Features
The Roland Juno DS88 is absolutely loaded with features. It’s stacked with over a thousand pro sounds, enhanced performance features, and all of the sounds from the beloved Juno-Di model. It also updated with new acoustic and electric piano sounds, additional organs, and many other essentials. Users are also able to download new sound waveforms. The Juno DS88 also takes the legendary series to a new level of performance while adding many powerful enhancements all the while keeping operation streamlined and simple. The capabilities and performance features almost feel endless with this special synthesizer. It’s not hard to tell why this Roland Juno DS88 88-key synthesizer is talked about so frequently and in such a high light.
As you can tell from the image above, the layout and interface of this synthesizer keyboard is extraordinary. Very clean, simple, and easy to use even for a beginner to the musical world and new player.
Overall
To conclude this Juno DS88 review, it’s no surprise why this product makes the top of synthesizer lists time and time again. There just simply aren’t many items that can even compete with the DS88 (under $1000). People just love this line of synths and Roland does it better and better every time. With this model, you can now upload your own sounds to the synthesis engine, which is a pretty nice add to this model. Sometimes, people disagree on certain things about the DS88 but if you’re big into editing, programming, and playing around with sounds and how they work together, then you’ll most definitely love this synthesizer workstation, and if you are or were a piano player, then the incredible-feeling Feel G Ivory Keys will be something you will likely appreciate greatly.
It’s hard to say whether or not this is surely better than the Korg Krome or Korg Kross, but what I do know is that many individuals prefer this Roland synthesizer as their go-to concern and performance synths, even though it’s not considered to be one of the higher end luxury synthesizers like the Yamaha Montage 8, but it gets the job done, and then some.