GR-700 Review by Paul Colbert, April 1984
ROLAND GR-700 Guitar Synth
Reviewed by Paul Colbert Published in "One Two Testing" April 1984
First acoustic guitar.second electric guitar.third ELECTRONIC guitar. Can still hear them famous words ringing in the ears from the time Roland initially went potty about the idea of a guitar synth. It was at the launch of the GR-300, and they were extolling the virtues of a new breed of guitar and, presumably, guitar player. The six string was being dragged screaming into the 19th century, if not the 20th. Roland have been the only company to actively pursue the dream of guitar synthesis into the eighties. If youre a wise and fortunate human, youll still possess issue two of O.T.T. [One Two Testing] containing T. Bacons thesis on the development of said instruments. The GR-700 and 707 controller form a significant step forward because for the first time the combination lives up to the full promise of guitar synthesis a guitar that can control ANY synthesiser (as long as its MIDI compatible). The GR-300 and GR-500 before it were impressive machines, not without faults, but they were purpose built, self-contained devices. in truth, massively complex effects units with ambitions towards being synthesisers. The GR-700 is what many guitar players have been waiting for, but it is going to fox a large number of people. 1
So at last you can MAKE any sound that a keyboard man can make, but that doesnt necessarily mean you can PLAY it. The 700 project splits into halves-a futuristic looking six string instrument with a Roland designed tremolo system and a few extra controls, plus a box that sits on the floor containing most of a JX-3P synth alongside essential pitch to voltage conversion circuitry. Keyboards are 1ike switches, theyre easy to work with, but guitars have the awkward habit of putting out frequencies, genuine notes, for lords sake. Guitar synths are the "Pushmepu1lyous" of electronics in that they have to accept a frequency, understand it and convert it to a useful voltage which can then drive the synth electronics to produce. yup. exactly the same frequency, but now behaving like a synth.
Guitar Pitch to voltage chips can be easily confused. They need a pure, uncluttered frequency to work on; a fundamental. Unfortunately, guitars and guitarists are not so disciplined. Often there are areas on the fretboard which promote extraharmonics. Certain attacking manoeuvres from the plectrum can have the same result.
GR-700 Review by Paul Colbert, April 1984 These additional, underlying frequencies cause the P to V circuitry to 'glitch' ie, lose track of the note being played and descend into hideous and unusable gurgling. Most often this will occur when you hit a string sloppily, or when youve left it to decay for a long time. Harmonics can endure beyond the fundamental thats why really beautiful, matured guitars have a sound that blossoms: the notes as they sustain become richer because the harmonics surface above the fundamental All of this is bad news for a guitar synth. The original Roland solution was to place the special synth pickup as close as possible to the bridge where the harmonics are at their lowest. Incidentally, its whats known in the business as a Hex pickup six individual outputs, one for each string. Its height and positioning are crucial to maintain a good signal. Now Roland have hit upon a second dose of medicine. In experiments with the older guitar controllers they found it was possible to move the trouble spots on the fretboard by altering the tuning, or changing the weight of the body. They deduced that it was the natural resonance of the guitar and the neck, which dictated this diaster zone. They needed a way of damping the natural resonance of the neck to keep: e harmonics under control. Thats why the GR-707 ended up with a. polycarbon bar, which runs from the top of the body to the tip of the headstock. My reaction, on seeing the completed model, was how the hell are you supposed to play it. In fact the bar is two inches below the line of the fretboard so it doesnt obscure your view of the frets when the guitar is around the torso. And within ten minutes of strumming, Id completely forgotten it was there. If youre really anti, the bar can be unscrewed, which would be a pity because it is successful. There are fewer glitches on the 707 than on any of the previous Roland guitar synths. On more down to earth matters, the rest of the body is alder with a slim maple neck and rosewood fretboard slimmer, 2 Id swear than previous Roland controllers and a mite acute at the edges for my fingers. It hangs without any trouble, but sits on your knee with all the comfortable stability of a warm jelly. Though there is a rubber pad on the bottom edge of the body, which is meant to grip your strides, the shape and the balance, is too much for it, and the guitar usually slides off. When a synthesiser company has a hand in designing a guitar, its safe to presume that oddnesses will happen, and they do. Roland have re-jigged the traditional idea of a headstock by placing the machines in reverse order. They run along the bottom of the headstock so that the bottom E has the longest length of spare string between nut and machine, and the top E has less than an inch. This, reveals Roland chap Dave Green, is pretty logical when you consider the major fly in the Guinness of any tremolo system. They wander in pitch, usually because there are several centimetres of top E and B between the nut and machine, which can stretch and then slip in tuning. The thick bottom E's and A's are the wires least likely to give, so why not invert the order? This is a fortunate scientific discovery for Roland because, as the polycarbon bar has to be attached to the top headstock, it would have been far more difficult to site the machines there anyway. But let us not carp. The tremolo block, itself, is another example of Roland brainpower. It works on a hinged plate, kept under tension and gliding up and down inside a substantial hole cut into the alder body. Its not a through the body job like a Strat, but owes more to the Kahler and Floyd Rose devices. The saddles are topped by small bronze rollers so the strings dont stick, but the bridge required extra attention thanks to the Hex pickup. When most tremolos are pushed down, they have the side effect of lowering the strings as the bridge drops in height. This may be okay on an ordinary guitar, but on the 707 that would dump six lengths of wire directly onto the Hex pickup -- a challenge even the bravest pitch to voltage chip would file under suicide. Rolands trem will slacken off the strings yet compensate mechanically to keep the bridge at the right height.

GR-700 Review by Paul Colbert, April 1984 I was surprised at how well the 707 synth section tracked the guitar when the trem arm was heaved around. It reacted quickly to fast vibratos, and clung to all but the most lunatic detuning manoeuvres when the harmonics and glitches became certifiably insane. The 707 has a bolt on neck, and is. well. functional, I suppose, but I can see quite a few guitarists making use of Rolands new pickup kit which allows the Hex coil to be fixed to your own persona1instrument. If you're preparing to spend l500 on the 707 synth section, you probably will have already forked out a sizeable amount of dash for a 'name' guitar. Still, as Dave Green pointed out, with a bright silver 707 around your neck, everyone is going to notice it's YOU knocking out the brass section, not the keyboard player. supplies a pseudo front panel of knobs and switches for the JX-3P. Like the JX3P keyboard, there's a stereo output from the stereo chorus, plus an input to control the filter cutoff and oscillator pitch from an external pedal. Also, and this is a departure from the JX-3P, you can expand the memory space by using a plugging in RAM cartridge known as an M16-C. XLR outputs as well, if you like lockability. Before we finally move on to fingers and noises, there is one more similarity between this machine and the previous Roland guitar synths. You can decide how many strings should be routed to the electronics all six, or maybe just one and those aforementioned touch switches will do the job. For example, you could want to use the bottom E for a synth bass note, then be able to kerang out a normal guitar Synth The 700 is the sound source - a JX-3P in a flat, silvery box with large rubber feet. It stands about 7 inches high and two and a half feet wide with a sloping front to take l1 square, black footswitches and a flat section at the top for a VERY large LED display and a series of touch switches beneath a membrane. The 700 has 64 programmable memories arranged in 8 banks of eight. Four of the footswitches are numbered one to eight, and the extra three on the left are labelled bank, edit and hold. The LED display is split into two sections and each figure in the readout is at least two inches high. The left side of the display presents the bank info (tap the bank footswitch and then the desired number), and the right side shows the patch selected. The 707 controller makes contact with the 700 via a 24 way pin connector which marries with a socket at the base of the guitar and at the rear of the 700. The guitar also has a straight jack socket output. The back panel of the 700 has two further Dins, one for a M1DI Out (theres no MIDI In because the 700 doesn't recognise key assign information), and another for linking with the PG-200 programmer - the add on box that 3 Sounds This is where we start resting on the couch and talking about sound psychology. Remember, youre controlling a proper synthesizer and you have access to all its effects detuned oscillator banks (two), ADSR envelope generators, syncing, and.so on. And because youre now encountering fewer glitching or mis-triggering problems than ever before, the net result is you go mental. The GR-707 feels and plays like a normal guitar, and thats what you try to do, but string sections don't work that way and brass sections dont work that way, so you still have to alter your approach to get the best out of' the instrument, even though it could be played like a standard six string. And the immense expression within the Roland can catch you out. A soft. lilting flute or violin might inspire you to stroke the strings gracefully to make the best of the effect. But all you do is wreck the triggering because although the chord on the remaining five, without the rest of the oscillators coming into play. This selection can be programmed into the memory.

GR-700 Review by Paul Colbert, April 1984 synth is being delicate, YOU still have to deliver a powerful twang to give the 700 a good signal. And it is very strange to hear violins, organs, surf, etc issuing from a guitar. Previous Roland GR's have had a character largely dominated by the natural envelope of a guitar string. Most exponents have plumped for long, sustaining chords. The synth sections have almost been used as giant and good natured fuzz. boxes. Though it's arguable that those tones are still the most immediately successful applications, with practice you can work your way into percussive, piano and clavinet styles. But again, its a matter of adjustment. The most common approach to a keyboard is to sling three or four notes in on the right hand. and one or two notes down the bass. Unless you've got mitts like coat hangers, all the notes from your chord are going to fall within one octave. On a guitar, the average E major can encompass six octaves, with a note from each. Thats why you have to think again. That vast breadth of frequencies will produce a diabolical mess with certain synthesiser voicing. You have to learn that the use of two or three strings may be a lot better, even though you have the capability for all six. The guitar controller has a master volume for the onboard pickups and the 700, a balance control to alter the levels of the guitar and the synth, a control for the filter cutoff, and another knob marked edit. This is directly related to the JX3Ps editing system, where you select a parameter, then change the value with the edit control. Slow, but it does mean you can program the 700 from the 707 panel. Its vital to consider the 700 system as a twosome a guitar and a synth, particularly when youre playing around with the hold button. Atmospherically, the Roland can be at its most powerful by creating a massive string or brass-like sustained chord, locked into place by pushing your foot down on the hold switch. This means you can then solo over the top of it with the normal guitar pickups, without retriggering the synth. Though once again, the mighty phrase MIDI raises its bonce. You can run another synth from the rear panel of the 700 and the hold button will work only on the electronics within the 700s case, so you could solo with a second synth sound on top. Is big. So big, in fact, that if youre already blessed (cursed?) with a keyboard player in the band, youll have to come to some arrangement as to who does what. The obvious division would be for the synth guitarists to handle the thick backdrops of sound, while the keys man shoves in the snappy staccato material. Because however accurate and speedy the pitch to voltage conversion may be, it cannot react as rapidly as fingers on keys. There will always be staccato keyboard techniques that the synth guitarist cannot master but theres no need to sulk. Just do it in your own way. There are certain details of realism that the 700 will take care of for you. For example, if you bend a guitar string, then the pitch of the oscillators will stay matched to you. Funnily enough, Hammond organs dont work that way. So theres a button on the front panel marked Chromatix. In this case, when you bend a string, the pitch jumps upwards in semitones, missing out the travelogue in between. Just try finger vibrato or the tremolo arm in this mode.adventurous isnt the word. There is a method of introducing vibrato from the onboard LFO. The plastic surround to the tail, humbucking pickup holds a small metal stud. Touch this and the conductivity of your skin will turn on the LFO. Lift your finger and it stops. And thats a small, concise example of what the 700 is about familiar guitar techniques made available in an electronic way and with a new mind behind them. Face up to the facts. It will not make you sound like your favourite keyboard player, no guitar synth ever can. But it will make you sound like a very different guitarist.

RC-1324-pdl-V3

13 to 24 Pin Bus Converter OWNERS MANUAL _______________________________________

DESCRIPTION

The RC-1324-PDL is a unique processor designed to convert modern, 13-pin Roland guitar synthesizer signals to the 24-pin format used by vintage Roland and Roland-compatible guitar synthesizers. Because the vintage Roland guitars featured more controls than modern systems, the RC1324-PDLs control panel recreates the essential controls for a vintage system. To replace the LFO touch pads on a vintage guitar controller, the RC-1324-PDL has a front panel foot switch and a CV pedal input on the back for hands free control over vibrato/LFO depth. New Version 3 now adds hex fuzz with brightness, mix/blend pedal input and bass input. The RC-1324-PDL incorporates circuitry concepts designed by Mark Smart. and
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IMPORTANT NOTES

When connecting a guitar and synthesizer to the RC-1324-PDL, be sure that power to the synthesizer(s) is switched off. The 13-pin connector used with the RC1324-PDL is a locking style connector, and therefore cables cannot be disconnected unless the locking pin is released. Using the 1/4 output on the guitar while at the same time using the 13-pin output may create a ground loop or signal hum.
1. FILTER Preset Controls: Generally, these knobs control the filter cutoff on the Roland GR-100, GR-300, and GR-700. With the Roland GM-70 and Ibanez MC-1, this knob can be assigned various functions. The foot switch located below the two preset knobs selects between preset 1 and preset 2. The red and green LEDs indicate which preset is active. 2. RESONANCE Control: This knob controls the filter resonance, or emphasis, on the Roland GR-100 and GR-300. On the Roland GR-700, this is the EDIT knob. 3. MODE Switch: This switch reproduces the function of the MODE Switch. Like the MODE Switch on a vintage guitar, Mode I is selected when the switch is in the up position. Mode II is selected when the switch is in the middle position, and Mode III is selected when the switch is in the down position. 4. LFO Control: This knob controls the LFO or vibrato depth on the Roland GR100, GR-300, and GR-700. With the Roland GM-70 and Ibanez MC-1, this knob can be assigned various functions, though the default value is modulation depth. With a CV pedal plugged into the LFO Pedal jack on the back of the RC-1324-PDL, the LFO Control works together with the pedal. The front panel LFO Control always controls the maximum amount of LFO depth. For example, with the front panel control at 50%, or in the 12 oclock position, the maximum LFO depth will be 50%. Plugging a Yamaha/Korg pedal into the rear LFO jack and pressing the pedal all the way to the floor will still only result in a maximum LFO depth of 50%. The foot switch below the LFO knob is used to turn the LFO on and off, and the yellow LED above the switch will glow when the LFO is on. 5. MIX Control: This knob controls the balance between the Synthesizer output and the Guitar output. By turning the knob in a clockwise direction, the output will blend from 100% guitar to 100% synthesizer. The 12 oclock position will result in an approximate 50/50 blend of guitar and synthesizer. The knob in a fully clockwise position results in a synthesizer only output. To use this feature, it is important to turn the guitar volume knob to maximum. If you are using an external GK1, GK-2 or GK-3 equipped guitar, be sure to have the guitar plugged into the GK controller module, and turn the regular guitar volume to maximum. If no guitar is plugged into the GK module, or if the volume is turned down on the guitar, the Balance Knob will simply work like a regular volume knob. You can also use an external Yamaha/Korg pedal to control the synthesizer/guitar blend. Plugging a pedal into the rear Balance jack will over ride the front panel Mix control. With the pedal back, in the heel position, the mix is all guitar. As you move the pedal forward, there will be more synthesizer sound. In the toe position will result is synthesizer only output. IF YOUR GUITAR HAS A

GTR/GTR+SYNTH/SYNTH SWITCH, SET THE POSITION TO GTR+SYNTH

FRONT PANEL

6. Hex Fuzz Level and Filter Cut: Version 3 now adds a hex fuzz circuit based on the G-303/808 circuit. The hex fuzz level adjusts the hex fuzz output, and the foot switch below the hex fuzz controls engages a low-pass filter, designed to reduce the high frequencies and make the individual hex fuzz output more pleasing. Version 3 also has a multifunction, tip-ringsleeve hex fuzz rear panel output. There are three possible ways to use this out. If you plug in a basic, tip-sleeve cable, the hex fuzz sound will be removed from the synthesizer output, and will only be available via the output jack. If you use a TRS tip-ring-sleeve cable, you can use insert effects with the hex fuzz sound. The the tip is the output-send, and the ring as the input-return, and specific effects or processing can be applied to the hex fuzz sound only, and the hex fuzz sound is added back to the GR-300 input for further processing by the -24 dB filtering section of the GR-300. The top panel fuzz knob controls the amount of send from the hex fuzz circuit to the external device. Finally, you can plug in a Korg/Yamaha type CV pedal to control the level of the hex fuzz sound mixed in with the GR-300 VCO synthesizer section. The creates new, musically useful tones that are not available with a GR-300 on its own. Like the LFO depth pedal input, the external pedal works in conjunction with the top panel hex fuzz control. So if the top panel fuzz control is set to 50%, even pressing the external pedal all the way down will still result in a maximum output of 50%.
7. Top Panel String Level Adjustment Controls: Use these knobs to adjust the output level of each string. Start with the knobs in the 50%, or 12-oclock position, and play each string and adjust for sensitivity. Each Roland synthesizer responds differently to string level. Some synthesizers will have trouble tracking a string with the output turned up too high. 8. Bass or Guitar Input Switch: The final addition to Version 3 is a Bass or Guitar input switch located on the rear panel, above the 13-pin input. The has been designed and tested with the Roland GK3B bass pickup and GR-33B Bass Synthesizer. When using the GK-3B bass pickup put the switch in the bass input position. This switch is designed to work with a GK-3B pickup that has been mounted in the center of a bass, with the pickup guide marked centered between the A and D strings. Even if you are using a five or six string bass, the GR-33B only works with four strings, E, A, D and G.

1. 24-Pin Output: This is the guitar synthesizer output. Connect a Roland C24D or similar 24-pin cable from this connector to a vintage Roland, or Roland compatible guitar synthesizer. 2. 13-Pin Input: Input for Modern, GK or RMC equipped guitar. 3. LFO Pedal: This is the input for a Korg/Yamaha style CV pedal to control LFO depth. A Roland or EV-5 style pedal will not work. The maximum depth of the LFO pedal is set by the Front Panel LFO Knob. To get maximum control from the LFO Pedal, set the front panel LFO Knob to 100% (fully clockwise). 4. Balance Pedal: This is the input for a Korg/Yamaha style CV pedal to control Mix/Blend of guitar and synthesizer. Plugging a pedal in over rides the top panel control. See above notes. 5. Hex Fuzz: This jack provides a direct output of the hex fuzz circuit. The top panel hex fuzz level adjust controls the output level as well. See above notes.

REAR PANEL

ADDITIONAL NOTES
The RC-1324-PDL Bus Converter is powered by the connected 24-pin synthesizer. The unit will not work unless the attached guitar synthesizer is turned on. The RC-1324-PDL uses special circuitry to adapt the volume knob on the 13-pin guitar to control the vintage, 24-pin synthesizer. The RC-1324-PDL has been tested with the Roland US-20 Unit Selector. In this case the volume knob on the guitar will control the volume of both the vintage, 24-pin synthesizer and the modern, 13-pin synthesizer.

SPECIFICATIONS

RC-1324-PDL-V3 Bus Converter:
Connectors: One 24-pin output connector, one 13-pin input connector, and one 1/4 input for LFO pedal. Dimensions: 8 (W) x 11(D) x 4.25(H) inches Weight: 2 lbs 15 oz v3.0 07.01.2009 copyright July 2009 www.gr300.com