I had a OB-8 in the past and I have a Xpander and Matrix 1000 up today. An old friend I worked with had a OBX, so I know it too.
If you don´t have/know a SEM based polyphonic Oberheim,- the OBX w/ it´s SSM chips is basically the fattest sounding Oberheim synth, but also the one w/ the simplest voice architecture.
The OB-8 is a great synth, sounds very good and surpasses his ancestor OBXa because of more memory and a more complex voice architecture w/ more modulation capabilities, especially w/ the page 2 upgrade and midi upgrade. The OB-8 has cheap trimpots for the VCA offset, I replaced these in the past w/ better ones because I had significant loudness differences of the voices from time to time. Better trimmers fixed that.
The Xpander is able to sound like a OB-8 if you program patches, you programmed on an OB-8 before, on the Xpander manually, using your ears and experience and having a OB-8 beside your Xpander for direct comparison. I did that w/ my own patches and both of the synths,- and I used headphones. I doesn´t sound 100% the same w/ every patch, but you get the characteristics. Some patches come very close or better too.
The Xpanders advantages are the modulations, the multimode filters and it´s semi modular design,- the disadvantage is its software generated slow envelopes, so it´s nothing for fast attack leads, basses or percussive sounds. This is what other synths do better, especially a Minimoog D or Jupiter 8 /MKS80.
But if you´d ask me what I would buy today, a OB-8 or a Xpander, - I´d buy a Xpander.
It´s definitely more versatile and more service friendly.
Have in mind how many CEM chips are in a OB-8,- it will cost you a kingdom one day to replace these,- see the prices for 3340 and 3360 chips today ...
And what I didn´t like w/ a OB-8 is the keyboard ( not velocity sensitive) and the levers (which I don´t like on a Matrix12 too).
All the functionality of a OB-8 is also inside a Xpander or Matrix, - even in a Matrix1000 !
Jeremy Smith schrieb:
Hi,
I know the KLF used a OB-8 to create some great textures (along with an
S900 for samples).
Is the Xpander capable of sounding as good? Even if we don't say it's
got a greater variety of sounds.
There are definitely time when I flip through the Xpander's banks and it
doesn't quite satisfy me.
Thanks,
Jeremy.