Nord User Forum

So late last year decided to upgrade my 2nd synth (MOXF) to the modx7. My main board being the NS73 . This holiday I really got to open up the MODX7 and see what its got. Very nice patches etc etc great 2nd board to the nord. BUT.... I must say the Nord absolutely blows away the pianos and and DX type voices for the modx. I have had other musicians non keyboard players beside me when doing the comparison and they also were astonished at the sound quality difference. The biggest suprise of course is how any dx tines sound just don't have the clarity and crystal clear sound that the Nord produces. Just my 2 cents happy holidays all.

Which sounds exactly are you referring to on the Nord for the "DX-type" voices? I imagine the regular "DX7 Full Tines", but then there are others available as Synth samples.

All my tine patches for the Nord are custom made but i did use only samples from the Nord website.

That's interesting: so you didn't use the "DX 7 Full Tines" available in the "Piano" Library? I also find that the synth samples of the DX7-ish sounds are almost better than this one.

I would have to re check my sound setting I programmed those as soon as I got the board so it's been a bit.. lol

It is a little funny that the Nord crushes the MoDX for FM pianos since the MoDX, from what I understand, basically has a DX7 inside (it loads DX7 patches anyway.) The MoDX has an FM synth in it, the Nord pianos are samples. That would be a cool audio comparison.

As for the others though, that isn't a surprise. I still don't know anything that compares to the Nord acoustic pianos in hardware. For electric pianos I love the GSI Gemini (more than Nord for most,) but otherwise a lot of these other boards don't impress me. I think it is the lack of character...

I think it all depends though. I have got Modx 7, can say any Dx 7 patch a much better sound then sampled nord.Imho. Yes, Nord Pianos are superb in any case, but versatility of the synth section of Modx is something Nord needs to learn.

Even if you like the Nord's FM tines piano sound better, there's a huge difference between saying Nord is better at "DX type voices" versus what some people appear to be saying here, that Nord is somehow better at the one, terribly overplayed DX7 tine piano sound, which represents the tiniest fraction of what FM can do on a DX7 or MODX, the vast majority of which can not be obtained at all on the Nord.

anotherscott wrote:Even if you like the Nord's FM tines piano sound better, there's a huge difference between saying Nord is better at "DX type voices" versus what some people appear to be saying here, that Nord is somehow better at the one, terribly overplayed DX7 tine piano sound, which represents the tiniest fraction of what FM can do on a DX7 or MODX, the vast majority of which can not be obtained at all on the Nord.

That's fair enough, but it's also true that, just by "tradition" we may call it, the DX7 sounds that become iconic of the instrument weren't as many as the infinite ones that in theory it is capable of. So if we take this subset, we can make comparisons. I do agree that it should perhaps have been better worded from the start...

Hlaalu wrote:That's fair enough, but it's also true that, just by "tradition" we may call it, the DX7 sounds that become iconic of the instrument weren't as many as the infinite ones that in theory it is capable of. So if we take this subset, we can make comparisons. I do agree that it should perhaps have been better worded from the start...

Yes, I think the wording of the OP is misleading. Even without infinite sounds... just considering the stock FM sounds that came with the DX7, that tine piano was only one of them. Any subjectivity about the tine piano sound aside, I think there's no way the Nord is better at "FM sounds" or "DX7 sounds" than MODX. I got a lot of mileage out of my DX7 back in the day... almost entirely out of its other sounds.