The Korg DS-8 is a 61-key
FM synthesizer produced by Korg in 1987.
It is a 4-operator 8-voice, 8-part-multitimbral
synthesizer with a 61-note keyboard that
has velocity and aftertouch sensitivity.
It has no filter and only the basic delay,
chorus, flanger, and double effects. It
was released to compete against synthesizers
such as the Yamaha DX7 and TX81Z. At the
time, Yamaha probably didn’t care
that they had a competitor in the FM synthesis
arena – After all, Korg licensed the
technology from them.
Sound (3) or (5) in Glitch Mode
While this synthesizer is capable of all
of the sounds that FM is known to excel
at – bells, basses, synth brass,
electric pianos, organs, and noises –
it really does do a mediocre job at best.
Even though it has 100 internal patch
memories there really isn’t a need
for more than 10 since that’s about
how many different sounds this machine
is capable of.
If this synthesizer is placed into “glitch
mode”, which happens when the synth
experiences buffer overflow errors during
a MIDI sysex dump, it is capable of some
of the strangest, freakiest sounds, many
of which are reminiscent of old modular
synthesizers. Playing MIDI files and sequences
through the synth in this mode can result
in either the strangest, most amazing
sounds, or a useless wall of noise and
frequency aliasing.
Since no mortal Human could program these
sounds naturally and it requires quite
a bit of effort to achieve this mode,
I’m using the “normal”
rating of 3 in my rating calculations.
Versatility (4)
As mentioned in the “sounds”
section, this synth is really only capable
of doing about ten sounds well. This doesn’t
really lead to a great versatility rating.
You can use it for things that lend themselves
to “FM sounds” and not much
else.
Playability (5)
Even though it’s just your basic
plastic keyboard, the keys are comfortable
enough and the aftertouch and velocity
sensitivity make it useful as a controller
if nothing else.
Control (4)
It has no filters, minimal effects, and
not much in the way of fancy modulation,
but it does have some nice envelope generators
and the pitch stick can be used to great
effect. It has no knobs, but the timbre
and envelope sliders are handy.
Features (4)
Since this is just “your basic FM
synthesizer” there’s not much
to report in the feature area beyond what
was mentioned in the “Control”
and “Sounds” sections.
Simplicity (5)
FM synths are notoriously un-simple. However,
the real premise of the DS-8 was giving
a clean, user-friendly interface to FM.
In that respect it does well enough –
its far easier to edit a patch on the
DS-8 than on a Yamaha DX7. Even so, there’s
only so much you can do for the inherent
complexity of FM.
Reliability (7)
At the time of this writing, I have two
of these synths. They’re fairly
sturdy and the lack of protruding parts
(i.e. knobs) means there’s not much
that can be broken off. They’re
pretty plastic-y and flimsy, but rather
sturdy considering their materials.
Class (2)
This synth doesn’t really have any
class or coolness. The only thing it has
going for it is the nice shade of blue
used for the LCD backlight.
I really can’t recommend this synth
to anyone, even in glitch mode. It is
quite possibly the most useless piece
of gear I have ever used. If you have
a desperate need for FM but don’t
want to deal with the hassle of actually
doing to calculus involved in figuring
out how to program sounds this might be
for you, but probably not. What FM does
well can be done better with a sampler
– they’re often easier to
use and more versatile than any FM gear
you’ll run across.
