Emu Review: XTream Lead 1

History:

Purchase: Purchased for US$400 2nd hand off EBay. I bought it cause I wanted a compact powerful synth for dance music.

What I Like About This Emu XTream Lead 1: Pretty much everything, but especially 1. Emu has stuck to a similar interface for all their Proteus 2000 line models, and for good reason. It's fantastically easy to use. 12 realtime control paramaters available from the front panel, super easy editing, almost manual free. As I got mine secong hand, it didnt have a manual, but I got straight into the multilayer (4 per patch) editing, effects, the lot. 2. At first I thought i wouldnt like the small 2 line display, but Emu write the best Synth OS hands down, and nothing much more is needed on screen. 3. The sounds are almost all exceptional (see below), infact there isnt one that I couldnt use. The Arps especially are ludicrously usable, and the beats function makes song creation totally simple. Phatt comes to mind, its really phatt. It far outperforms PC synths. Now I want the Pure Phatt expansion card. 4. Convenient. Dont hide this synth away, you will want to have it right there so you can make tweaks that are just too hard on other synths. Its small (1 U), I have it under my monitor (yes I use a PC sequencer). 5. Value for money. No-one seems to some close to Emu for this. I like it so much I might buy another one (turbo this time)

What I Do NOT Like About The Emu XTream Lead 1: Nothing much I dont really like but ... 1. Not all the patches have the realtime controls setup for the same paramaters. Although there arent many like this, the odd one makes you wonder why... 2. Most of the sounds are great, but I found with some that back to back notes (ie continuous quarter notes) that there was an audible digital click, Ouch! This was solved by backing off the note length by 120th of a note, but its a bit of a pain. 3. Occasionally some curious timing is using multiple arpegiators. 4. Outputs. It only has 2, I think every multi channel synth these days needs at least 4 outs, and probably digital. The turbo model has it, and with that gets effects inserts (awesome). 5. I like the effects, they are good quality, but I'd like more. Dance is demanding on effects, especially delays. If there were insert-style effects per patch it would be perfect.

Emu XTream Lead 1 Quality Rating: The jog wheel was wobbly when I got it. But I think that was from the delivery. The plastic front panel could be better quality, just milled Aluminum. Otherwise is feels like a totally professional peice of kit, however it would need to be protected well is taking it out of the studio.

Review Summary: Love it. Get one. But get the Turbo model, I wish I had cause its even better. Maybe i'll get one as well. The turbo model gets 5 on this scale. I wish this was a 1-10 scale, id give this model a 9.

Rating of this Emu product: 4

This Emu XTream Lead 1 Keyboard MIDI Review Submitted By: Tim Warren

Review Date: 2002-03-21