Roland JD Xi Interactive crossover synthesizer with analog and digital sound engines

Wow! What a synth. The sounds are amazing. I should have got this years ago.

The Roland JD Xi is a great little synthesiser, especially for the price, and comes with two digital synths, one analogue synth, and many classic drum machine kits. If you know your way around synths/ workstations and the like, this is also pretty easy to get the hang of, and the onboard sequencer (step and real-time) is great to get a nice little 4-track tune going (though it does have its limitations). For someone like myself, who's into his minimal acid house, the Roland JD Xi does pretty much everything that I want. The only (very slight) criticism is that a lot of the finer tuning for your sounds is buried in sub-menus, but they're not particularly difficult to find and get the hang of. Definitely a five star piece of kit, which I would highly recommend.

Being a traditional keyboard player wanting to play a bit of synth as I did back in the 70'sI trawled through hours of You-tube vids/reviews and decided on the JDXI although a little dubious about the mini keyboard. I have to say, the sounds this little synth is capable of are outstanding. It basically has 4 separate channels/voices comprising 2 separate digital synths a drum machine and and an analogue mono synth all with many variations of sounds. There is also a vocoder with included mike, and basic sequencer. The small screen with orange writing seems either retro or a bit dated depending on your point of view and means menu diving is a necessity. In the end I just couldn't get on with the mini size keys. I thought of trying a full size keyboard midi controller keyboard with it but the 4 voices are on fixed, separate midi channels so no easy way to change sounds without much faffing about. In the end, the negatives outweighed the positives for me and had to return it. The JDXI is a great synth for anyone not bothered by the size of the keys and/or more probably aimed at groove-box type players.

This is just a fantastic musical instrument for "sketching" ideas, or for just playing as an instrument for the love of it. Look into the limited edition white one if it's not too much more though because the labels on the controls are kind of hard to read.It's basically 4 machines in one: a drum machine, two digital synths and an analogue synth. It sounds absolutely phenomenal. You can use it attached to your PC via usb and sequence it from a DAW like fl studio or ableton or you can play it on its own and use the built-in sequencer. Either way you can have all 4 parts of the synth playing at the same time.This is the best value for beginners in my opinion. Like, if you only get one synth, get this.

Everything is great , I think the keys have a very nice feel , the knobs same , great sounds and amazing that Roland included the overlays which I was really both surprised and impressed.Thank you Roland for this great keyboard!

This is actually a great sounding synthesizer and you get many bells and whistles for your money. However, I feel that I must deduct points simply because I feel that Roland has sacrificed build quality for what is under the hood. I had this synthesizer for little over a year with low-medium use and ended up breaking the middle E key. When I took the synth apart to look at the keyboard it scared the c**p out of me. The keys are of the flimsiest quality. The key that had snapped off was held on by less than 1mm of plastic! Ordering new keys can be costly as they cannot be bought individually, but as a subset. Be aware!

I have been a music producer for years I started out using Roland Synthesizers since late 1990's, this product delivers quality ( do not be put off by price or size of the mini keys ) this is a serious piece of equipment. If you had previous Roland synthesizers experience then excellent. The best thing I ever did was to purchase the Roland JD-XI Crossover Synthesizer. I would have give it more stars if it would let me.

As often the case with modern gear, thi JD Xi will take you as far as you can go with it, easy to get started with & jam on, but with a depth to make professional music at your fingertips. What a wondrous age we live in with analog & digital sounds on top at your fingertips.