Roland XP-80
Music Workstation (1996)

XP flagship: 76 keys workstation with sequence based on acclaimed JV1080 synthesis rompler engine.

KEYBOARD 76 velocity semi-weighted keys Channel Aftertouch sensitive. Main panel features a 320 x 80 backlit display, 7 sliders, a data encoder and a pitch bender.

Back panel terminal connectors:
- Midi interface
- main out + 2 aux
- 4 AUX assignable pedal expression
- sustain input pedalswitch
- click out + volume knob.

 

 

SOUND main core RISC HD6437034SC66F cpu manages up to 64 voices polyphony or TONES- relative DAC is a 18 bits Burr Brown PCM 69AU.
STRUCTURE: a basic pacth is composed by 4 PCM tones samples with edit parameters:
- keyzone assignment
- pitch tuning
- panning position
- delay start time
- FXM oscillator crossmodulation.

 

WAVETABLE is a 8 Mb (2X ROM) contains 448 PCM at 16-bits waves, split into 2 main families:
- 193 PCM percussive and chromatic one-shot
- 255 PCM acoustic instruments.

EXPANSION XP80 is expandable using SRJ-V board (usual size is 4 or 8 MB) fitted in 1 of the 4 available slots. There are 21 SR-JV available with different instrument styles, here is the list:

SR-JV80-01 POP   SR-JV80-02 ORCHESTRAL   SR-JV80-03 PIANO   SR-JV80-04 VINTAGE SYNTH   SR-JV80-05 WORLD   SR-JV80-06 DANCE   SR-JV80-07 SUPER SOUND SET   SR-JV80-08 KEYBOARDS OF THE 60's & 70's   SR-JV80-09 SESSION   SR-JV80-10 BASS AND DRUM   SR-JV80-11 TECHNO COLLECTION   SR-JV80-12 HIP HOP   SR-JV80-13 VOCAL COLLECTION   SR-JV80-14 ASIAN   SR-JV80-15 SPECIAL FX Collection   SR-JV80-16 ORCHESTRAL II   SR-JV80-17 COUNTRY Collection   SR-JV80-18 LATIN Collection   SR-JV80-19 HOUSE Collection   SR-JV80-98 EXPERIENCE promotional board. SR-JV80-99 EXPERIENCE2 promotional board.

 

STRUCTURE the tones can be combined in 10 structures (signalpaths) inspired from classic synthesizer D-50. These are pre-fixed audio patch that connects the 2 pair of tones into variable setups mixed with audio elements such as amplifier / filter and 2 digital processes:
- Booster amplifies the signal causing a distortion with new harmonics 18 levels of effectiveness
- Ring modulator.

 

click for structure list.

 

PERFORMANCE the XP engine manages up 16 parts each with assignable:
- Midi channel
- zone assign
- panning
- volume
- effect amount
- pitch tuning.
A special GM (General MIDI) bank reads SMF Midi for a total compatibility.

 

FILTER it is the TVF - Time-Variant Filter - features 4 modes:
- lowpass
- bandpass
- highpass
- peaking (the "PKG" emphasizes frequencies around the cutoff value)
In addtion a filter keytrack function with +/- 200% harmonic content cutoff over octaves.

 

 

LFO there are 2 syncable delayed modulators fade-in/out time; they do provide 7 shapes with adjustable symmetries:
- triangle
- sinewave
- sawtooth
- trapezoidal
- random
- sample & hold
- chaos random.

 

 

ENVELOPE each TONE features 3 EGs:
- EG1 amplitude: 4 segments + 3 times, 8 velocity curves + key follows option
- EG2 filter : 4 segments + 4 times.
- EG3 pitch 4 segments + 4 times, keyfollow + random pitch

 

EFFECTS XP DSP is organized into 3 main sections:
- EFX: 40 inserts algorithms :overdrive, phaser, EQ, Leslie, tremolo, flanger, delay, and pitch-shifter
- Reverb: 7 classic algorithms (Hall, Room, delay, stage) with adjustable damp time
- Chorus: digital chorus has variable rate, pre-delay, feedback and depth.

SEQUENCER a 16 tracks sequencer at 96 PPQN with grid/groove/shuffle quantisize.
SYNC internal tempo from 10 to 250 BPM or syncable to external midi device.
ARPEGGIATOR: 33 preset patterns.

MEMORY:
- 512 ROM preset
- 128 RAM patches
- 64 ROM performances
- 64 RAM performances
- 60.000 notes
- 99 songs.
Data can be stored to built-in 3.5" Disk drive to either 720 Kb or 1.44 Mb density.
Battery replacement: classic lithium 3V CR2032 in battery holder.

 

 

EDITORS there are some free and commercial editors for XP80 , generally they are the same used by 1080:

- Soundquest (MAC/PC $$)
- Jv1080 editor (MAX MSP beta)
- Changeit (old PC OS free)
- Jv1080 ED (atari st, free)

 

RELATED FAMILY:

 

Roland JV-1080 is more or less the Xp-80 rackmount version. Roland XP-50 61 keys previous version with less features Roland XP-60 same as xp-80 but with 61 keys VIDEO Roland XP-30 lacks sequencer but 2 built-in srjv ROM VIDEO Roland XP-10 older budget version, less features and 28 voices VIDEO

 

 

VST PLUGIN / SAMPLED VERSION free and commercial samples set:

	name	price	link	demo
none	none	none	n/a	n/a

 

AUDIO DEMO

factory demo 1 factory demo 2 factory demo 3 Roland disk demo 1 Roland disk demo 2 Roland disk demo 3 Roland disk demo 4 Roland disk demo 5 Roland disk demo 6 Roland disk demo 7 Roland disk demo 8 Rhodes 1 Rhodes 2 Rhodes 3 Rhodes 4 Organ hammond Organ weird acoustic guitar ambient guitar Moog D bass

synth bells synth magic choir synth sample and hold synth distortion synth m1 lore synth nineties synth bassliner synth bassliner cutoff synth bassliner 303 synth eighties pad 1 pad 2 pad 3 pad 4 pad 5 pad 6 pad 7 pad 8 FX

 

YOUTUBE VIDEO CLIP SELECTION demo demo2 demo3