Roland System-8 Manual

Roland System-8 – historic turning point?
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Short and to the point
Roland veterans probably won’t break out in a dance of joy when they meet the Roland System-8. A true classic
would have better hardware (heavy and stable chassis, internal power supply, 5- to 6-octave keyboard) and would
put more polyphony at your fingertips (at least 16 voices should be possible in this digital age). On the other hand,
those same veterans already have a Juno-60, a Juno-106 or even a Jupiter-8, meaning they are in no way dependent
on the System-8 for analog synth sounds in any way.
Which brings us to the target group of today: the modern smartphone-generation, those guys with a limited budget
and a weakness for blinking lights. The System-8 will offer them proper sounds, some of which even have their own
characteristics, pretty, green-light orgies and – a very fair price. Its comprehensive performance department finally
qualifies this instrument as an extremely useful VA-synthesizer, one that could have come from almost any producer,
and which just happens to sport that glorious ROLAND logo.

Roland System-8 Specifications

General

Product type	Digital synthesizer
Product color	Black
Keyboard number of keys	49
Maximum polyphony (notes)	8
Display type	LCD
Built-in display	Yes
Display number of characters	16
USB ports quantity	1
Compatible memory cards	SD, SDHC
Power source type	DC

Weight and Dimensions

Depth	364 mm
Width	881 mm
Height	109 mm
Weight	5900 g