#Yamaha montage review software#
#Yamaha montage review series#

Considering its capabilities, that’s a bit like squeezing some kind of sonic camel through the eye of a speaker needle. Well MODX only has the standard two, so even less. Finally, one of my criticisms of MONTAGE was that it only had four outputs which, for a synth that powerful, could seem lacking. While the AWM engine does have 128 notes, the FM has slipped down to 64 for MODX – still plenty for an FM synth in my book. It also has a plastic case as opposed to MONTAGE’s alloy one (but that does also make it lighter).

MONTAGE has extra controllers for a start as MODX lacks its touch strip, some controller buttons and aftertouch. In fact the only thing I could find that is less is the amount of user memory for your own sampling, reduced to 1GB from 1.7GB on MONTAGE.īut before you get too excited, on closer inspection there are (of course!) other refinements. MODX seems to be almost as laden with features as MONTAGE. The 7” TFT Color Wide VGA LCD touch screen? Check. OK, so MODX has the two synth engines that Montage boasts.

#Yamaha montage review software#

You can assign several to the Super Knob and adjust them simultaneously a Motion Sequencer gives you access to more movement and a touch screen makes you feel like you are using the best of software within hardware. As part of the Motion Control Synthesis Engine, synth parameters can be accessed and recorded with ease. The FM-X engine is great too, a more accessible FM synthesiser.Īnd indeed ‘more accessible’ just about sums up MONTAGE.

#Yamaha montage review series#

The MOTIF series was the flag-bearer for digital synths for many years, but MONTAGE blows it away with a sample library eight times the size. It has two synthesis types: AWM2 and FM-X within a Motion Control Synthesis Engine, which is quite brilliant in concept and execution.ĪWM2 is Yamaha’s sample-based engine with around 6GB of high quality sounds that really does cover everything real and imaginary.

MONTAGE is one of those old school digital synths that makes every sound imaginable, albeit with about a thousand bells added on. You’ll need a quick summary of my MONTAGE review before we head forward with the MODX 6, because this synth is a cut down version of that, but hopefully not too cut down. So where does the company go next? Cut down? Yes, slightly.

The MONTAGE was always touted as the ‘umbrella’ keyboard (that is the ‘brand leader’, the ‘mothership’ the ‘whatever other bad corporate lingo I can insert in here’) for an entire new line of Yamaha keyboards.

There’s always a ‘but’ though isn’t there? Well that kind of power doesn’t come cheap, and the most expensive of the MONTAGE range – the 88-note weighted keyboard version – will cost you just shy of three grand, with the cheapest somewhere around £2,200. In fact I’d go as far as to say that it is by far the most fully-featured synth I’ve looked at for MusicTech and, with its touch-sensitive screen and Super Knob, it was among the most fun to play as well. The Yamaha MONTAGE synth is something of a MONster synth in terms of both what it can do – that’s pretty much everything – and it’s physical size (I reviewed the biggest one and did myself a mischief trying to get it up the stairs). 2 Outputs, 2 Inputs, 2 x MIDI 4 foot controllers, 2 USB, power, headphones.Super Knob for multiple parameter changes.Motion Control synth with AWM2 and FM-X engines.Price £1242 Contact Yamaha | MODX 6 key features: