What is the best Roland Boutique?

SH01A for me followed closely by SE-02.

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S-1 but it is not boutique :slight_smile:
Feature and size wise, it is obvous that the best is JX-08.

BTW, topic title should be: ā€œWhich Roland Boutique you have/had or wish to have?ā€ :wink:

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It’s easier to bring anywhere and tweak.
With waveshaper and FX it extends the sound design capacities of SH-01a.
I don’t think it misses any of its brother’s features. Haven’t missed one anyway.
The sequencer is better.
The two octave keyboard is handy.
USB-C connector.
It is basically the best M8’s mate.
And it’s cheap.

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Had a bunch of them, but eventually sold them all.

I really liked the JX-03, except for the sequencer (why didn’t they implement the original one?).

TR08 and 09 sound great too, but they lack single out jacks or at least some decent onboard FX.

So yeah, I think the SH-01a is the best package, good synth engine and sequencer, and controls are okay (Looking at you JP-08!).

I’m pretty annoyed by the model82 not really having the envelopes ( super finnicky to tweak) and then tal bassline is a lot different in many ways to sh101 in terms of architecture. I just want that fat, rubbery bass sound and some nice dub chords.

The sh01-a seems more tweakable than the s1 due to the same slider layout so I lean towards that one. But it’s also a lot more money. I believe it’s polyphonic as well so that’s another bonus.

Don’t care about sequencing as I have that taken care of already. So I’m trying to decide. I just spent way too long trying to get a simple fat bass sound out of my plugins and it’s not getting there. Meanwhile I see people fire up the Roland cloud app and get there right away so the hardware has me intrigued.

The faders are tiny, I find pots more precise even if I generally like faders more.
S-1 FTW!

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The JX-03 was such a vibe. The few patch slots were irritating though

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as plugins they are all fine but the boxes … i was dissapointed. too small for performance, too weak in the studio. analog roland poly synth in decent size with similar plugin to prototype sounds. hopefully some day…

You are right. I just listened to a demo again and I’m going for the s-1. It’s such an amazing sound for that price.

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The size of the faders put me off the JD. I’m all for compact gear but Boutique was the wrong format for this synth.

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Surprised to say I’m yet to own any of them!

Funny enough the 01a sliders are a tad longer than those on the MC-202, IMHO perfectly usable - unlike the JP-08 sliders :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

Fave for me would either be SH-01a, JX-08, JX-03, TB-03, TR-06, or TR-08 as those are the ones I use most and depending on what I’m doing.

I have not tried SE-02 or JD-08 or JU-06a. Sold the D-05 as was never that mad on LA synthesis and editing was way too tedious.

As a synth I prefer SH-01a to S-1 due to immediacy, much simpler, sounds for the most part the same (chop and draw aside) but the S-1 is the better portable, and I’m quite fond of the Aira mini form factor.

I think overall Roland did a good job with the boutique range, some sound very close, others nearly but not quite, like everyone else I think the silly ribbons were a bad idea and I’m glad to see them no longer used on later models.

Main gripes are only USB or AA battery power - dedicated power jack and lithium ion battery would be better, the dock is included with some but not others and is way overpriced when bought separately, some of them have fiddly operation.

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I only have SH-01a and I like it al lot, but faders are small for live tweaking, although ok for programming. It might help if they had a bit more resistance. Also touch strips are waste of space.

From others I like the most JX-08 and SE-02, JP-08 is cool too but those faders are really small. TB-03 is sort of interesting as a 303 with full midi control over it’s parameters, which is missing in Behringer clones and T-8 (they should really bring T-8 to S-1 level with some update).

Hoping for JP-8080 boutique, but please no zencore - we need authentic sounding supersaw, feedback, filters, vocoder etc., otherwise I might just use my MC-707. And keep the bi-timbrality!

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This is the reason I keep coming back to it. I don’t think it’s the most authentic sounding, but it’s unique in this regard.

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SE-02 does sound great, but sold it 'cos of the UI etc limitations/annoyances. Kept the TR-06 which also has those but the trigger in/random combo is too cool.

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It’s interesting to me that the TR-08 is less beloved than the TR-09, yet that’s the one they have kept in production. Has anyone from Roland ever said why they discontinued the 09? I’ve been wanting a battery-powered 09 for ages and keep waiting for them to produce an 09a, but I’m beginning to think I’ll have to bite the bullet on a used one, if that’s what I want.

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I’ve wondered the same thing often. But is it more beloved mainly because of scarcity?

I wonder if it’s because the TR-6S and TR-8S are so universally loved ahd can do a good impression of a 909 that they don’t think there is space for them.

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I ended up buying a TR-6S instead of a used TR-09.

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yeah, perhaps…the main thing for me is the physical controls, combined with the battery power. I did try out a TR-6s for a few weeks but I really longed for more tracks…