UGH..... Cloud subscription .... Fuck that. I'd rather pay $400 per plugin than to pay for a cloud subscription ...

Alright, after listening to this demo several times through, some notes: First, the hardware clearly has a level difference between the left and right channels (left is louder). This will contribute greatly to the "spaciousness" people keep describing in the hardware sound. It's unbalanced; of course the VST will sound more mono, it's perfectly centered! Second, there is a bit of a difference in the reverb. Hardware is a little more grainy and shimmery. Roland may have done a little smoothing on the algo, or maybe it's just the lack of DAC. I always disable the built-in effects on synths and use dedicated reverb FX so that's a non-issue for me. Third, the hardware does have a little more bite and edge. Again, likely from the DAC. That's something I would have no trouble adding in post with a combination of bit/samplerate-reduction and saturation (TAL-DAC is great for this). So the question becomes, what's your priority? Do you need 100% of the sound of the real thing? Are you creating minimalist solo synth masterpieces? Go hardware. Does working in the box sap your creative energy? Does having your hands on a piece of music history inspire you to greater heights? Go hardware! Do you want the reliability, convenience, and easier programmability of a VST? Do you want to be able to sequence and layer multiple instances of the synth in real time? Go software. Are you comfortable having 95% of the sound ITB and making up the difference in the mix? Are you going to be EQ'ing, compressing, and heavily processing your tracks anyways? Go software! No right or wrong answers here, just a matter of what's most important to you. Me, I've had a bedroom full of vintage synths for the past five years, and after spending thousands of dollars getting them repaired and serviced (and dealing with months of lost time while they're in the shop), I'm willing to trade that last 5% for something that won't break down and doesn't need a rat's nest of cables to pipe into my workflow. But that's just my answer, and thanks to Woody for making this awesome demo and letting us make our choices from there!

This bad boy never dies! I can see people using it in the year 2074.

Wow. What a pristine D-50. Nice to see these machines in loving hands!

thanks Woody! excellent as always. 4:50 start of actual comparison

Woooaaaauw. Have been was waiting for this one! First of all thanks to the piano shack man, for taking this comparison as seriously as he did! Next a great plus for Roland. They did a better job here than I dared to imagine. The D50 has been my main synth since 1990 and still is. The sounds of the VST come really, really close. On the Arco strings they even managed to get the weird overtone ring (which I always filter out as much as possible in my mod of that preset). Cool! There are, at least to me, some tiny audible differences in a few of the patches, most noticeable in Intruder FX, but in a mix they will be insignificant if audible at all. Impressive, and a big thank you to the Piano Shack. :)

Great work man. Thanks for taking this effort! Really appreciated!!

Thanks for taking the time explaining this The Roland D50 incredible synthesiser And each one sounds incredible

Hey Woody thank you so much for this outstanding, time-and-labor-intensive video! Great job at doing the A/B split testing, and thank you for showing us your process. I would say they sound pretty damn close! Some patches are pretty identical, others are fairly close. But it sure will be better than trying to take my D-50 on tour! This is my first time here on your channel - you did a great job, and I'm subscribing. Keep up the good work!

Brilliant!! I think now it's time for a JD-800/990 plugin :D

Thanks Woody! I really enjoy your comparison videos.

Hooray for Roland FINALLY releasing a proper software recreation of the D50!

Ah this video answers what i was looking for about the vsti. It is possible to edit the sounds, that's great! I'm not a real big fan of the other vsti's, but this one is very interesting. I must say the iPG800 ipad app changed my life, it finally allowed me to finally edit the sounds, but i'm checking this out soon!

Great work! Sounds a lot closer than I thought it would!

I would get a D50 VST just for the Staccato Heaven patch alone. The MIDI lag and problems on the D50 keyboard are well known, so if you want hardware, get the D550 as the MIDI implementation is far better. (I have owned both.)

Thanks for doing this. I expected them to be closer in sound, but the D50 sounded a lot better to be ears. The polysynth sound especially.

That was really really close. Agree that sometimes the "life" ( spread , maybe? ) was not there - presumably Roland could easily tweak that in a software update. I'd probably struggle with a blind A/B in the mix. Oh, and excellent video as always. You really do have a voice for TV/radio!

Thanks Woody for the comparison. I do not regret totally ignoring Roland's subscription model for distributing their emulations.

Nice demo.. and for my ears there's a clear difference in power and quality - especially on the 'Soundtrack' patch where modulation is considerably weaker on the computer version. As both emanate from Roland.. with probably the same code used this difference might be in the amplification and effects sections of the hardware instrument. My own D50 died many years ago and after hearing this demo if a decent one wafts under my nose anytime soon it will certainly get snapped up sharpish!

great work, thank you. I have both, the vst sound thinner, liveless and with less stereo separation but the timbre is very near d50.

Listening on Genelecs. The hardware D-50 has way more warmth. Not going to ditch it anytime soon.

Obviously the real one sounds more well real I guess, but for those of us who don't have room for another keyboard this is a nice alternative. Thanks for uploading these laborious a/b vids Woody!

Hi Woody, 1st thanks for the awesome demo. 2nd not sure if you are aware but when you do these demos, if you Right Click on the wave form there is a normalize audio feature that will make both waves the same volume. This would also be helpful in physically seeing the differences in the two audios.

Thanks, and well done for being the first to do a proper comparison here on You tube Woody. Roland have done a decent job with this vst, though it still lacks something compared to the original hardware. But it does make the classic synth available to everyone. One thing it does prove is the fact that people are still craving the sound of the D50 even after all these years. Which makes an owner of the original synth like me smile :) One thing I am curious about is how the creation of new patches compares to the original synth. Does it still use the old architecture of 2 parts per tone and 2 tones per patch and does it come with those original sample partials ?

it's pretty good and if it was for sale i'd have it..RENTAL though?...no way ever

wow wow wow. great job and lovely playing

Hi Woody! I love your channel! I am curious about the test, the D50 I played in our school musical in 1988, it was so complicated to edit it but the patches were soooo spacey and luscious.

Excellent Demo. It sounds like the software is extremely accurate to the actual hardware. There is of course a difference in sound, but I would think it is due to the digital to analog to digital conversion of the hardware synth, and the straight signal path of the software from digital to analog.

Love the D-50 - would buy one today!

Nice vst synth, but at 8:48 the difference between the vst and the hw synth is really enormous.. I wonder if that indicates a shortcoming on the vst synth, or whether it's programming.. then again, it should be the same preset with the same parameters right?

It sounds imho thinner and less detailed or in other words like a not so great MP3 vs. a master CD... You did everything right buying the real thing, Woody, thanks awesome test, very helpfu!l

Nice Video Woody! I love my D50

Great song choices and some great playing Woody! To my (amateurish) ears the VST sounded a little muted and thinner than the real thing, it might just be my old school/keep it real bias though! :)

I’d love to see a blind shootout with this sort of thing. Knowing what version is playing affects things so much.

If anyone has a D-50 in which you need to just about stand on the keys to get the After-touch to work, it's an easy fix if you, or someone you know, are comfortable taking the keyboard apart. The After-touch is a strip that runs the length of the keyboard comprising of a few layers, one being a copper strip and a conductive rubber strip. The oxidises over time and looses conductivity, clean it up with Brasso and clean the rubber with Acetone, your After-touch will work better than new. I have needed to do this two times to mine since 1984.copper

the plugin version appears to have a layer of ambiance /reverb over it. and the seems to be a slight lift in the upper mids which I'm sure could be eqed out for a flawless copy.

As a formner owner of 3 D50's all of which developed some issues at some point, I can honestly say that this plugin is all you need to get that sound.

Very informative ! You are really good explorer of classic synths. I hope IOS version of the same software modulation would be soon available.

You get a like for playing Bittersweet Symphony! The VST is close enough when it's in the mix of track it would be fine.

Nice shootout. You can hear clearly how the real D-50 has a certain "openness" to it that the VST doesn't have. Also, some of the VST sounds are definitely thinner than the real D-50. The patch that exhibits this the most in this video, and IMO suffers the most is soundtrack, where you can hear how thin the VST is in comparison.

The one that stood out to me was the Polysynth sound, sounded much more dynamic on the real deal

If you have a MS20, Polysix, Mono/Poly, Wavestation or M1, Korg has plugin versions of those as well.

Oh so close, but not quite. I have a D550 myself and it's a pain to program even after all these years (and I have the PG-1000). What would be awesome is if you could program on the VST and then import the patch parameters into the D50/550.

AMAZING. I watch your videos on the main tv instead of watching tv

The Real D-50 still sounded a bit hot on the Left channel, but other the stereo polysynth patch which sounded completely different on the vst than on the real D-50, the vst was very close to the real hardware and is very usable.

Hey, what synth was used on the Jodeci song "Forever My Lady" synth solo towards the end of the song?

Great. Only flaw is that it seems that L/R chanels are swapped on hardware, so it sounds slightly different in stereo field.

Thanks for the cool comparison. What's the last song called (starting at 9:58 with future pad)?

Yes, much work in this video, thank you very much Woody! I would like the new D-05, but wish to program and not use the presets, trying to get information on LA synthesis. Where are the amp envelops, are there amp envelops???

Thanks for this,Woody. i picked up the m1 for 25 €.Love it!

I love your channel!

Very close, but not identical. The most significant discrepency I noticed in these examples was the difference in sound on the Stereo Polysynth sound between the hardware and VST. These almost sounded like different patches. On the rest of these examples the emulation is very good. I recently purchased an original D-50 but unfortunately, due to damage which seemingly occurred in transit, it sadly arrived broken and unusable. I had no option but to return it, but the good news is I have since reinvested in a Juno-X which I find to be absolutely fantastic. Great comparison video in any case.

hello thanks for your video . I have a problem with my garageband with my D50 vst : I cAn play only 4 notes at the same time . DO you know this problem? I can't more than 4 ..

There is is something to be said about electrons hitting a DAC and then being recorded, opposed to sound generated in the box - But. They sound pretty close. I’d say the plugin is 80-90% there, in terms of depth. For space and cost, I think it’s a decent trade off.. I would still love an original physical unit tho!! Great vid, thanks for the comparison!

Thanks for this demo, imho the software is lacking that special magic that made the real D50 so classic & so beautiful.

That bass sound at 11:05 - what synth is that from?

Thanks for doing this. Actually really liking the synths on offer with the Roland Cloud. Still though, why no JX3p yet?!

Thank's for doing this video! I have a question, will the vsti work as a editor and librarian for the keyboard? I have it in hw and would like to edit my own sounds, but programming the d50 is hopeless

Great comparison. The VST comes pretty close to my ears, but the D50 has something - I am biased as a have a D50 and the PG1000 and the combination is a joy - I've created some amazing patches using them over the years, and I have to say both have been rock solid reliable - no issues with either unit!

this might sound weird but i'd like to hear a comparison also between the boutique mini hardware reissue and the plugin :)

You can hear a tiny bit of difference in some sounds, but overall, Roland did a splendid job! I just hear the Hardware D50 has a tiny bit more spread and depth, but you can only hear that with a good set of headphones or studio monitors :). Although they kinda didn't get the "Stereo Polysynth" patch right.. The hardware D50 seems to have a slower attack on the envelope on that patch. But I think by having that VST system where you can edit the sounds really easily, helps and can easily fix that. Great video as always, Woody! Keep it up!

There is a significant difference between the hardware synth and the soft one. Something in the attack of the soft synth is less sharp and the hardware sounds a little hasher generally, but also there are a couple of presets in there that seems that they are not the same. I wonder if it might be something about the response curve used for velocity? For example. maybe the vst is responding linearly to the midi event, while the hardware synth was responding non lineary to the playing

That is a nice comparison dear Woody! Nostalgia comes back again ^_^! Too bad, I’m not a fan of the cloud thing…

Now finally I know what was behind all of the beautiful background music from Star Trek: The Next Generation...the early seasons, that is.

Realistically, the VST will suffice for most of us at a fraction of the cost.

D50 wins, only just. Another great video woody!

i recognize some gm2 sounds and names. amazing plugin and synth

That was GREAT..!!! Thank You,

Fantastic work. I own a Roland D-50 which I absolutely love, but I have to say that most of the VST-sounds of the software sound identical to the original. An exception is the polysynth. It differs, although it doesn’t sound bad. I just wish Roland could release these emulators as purchesable software instead of subsription based. Korg offers both individual instruments and kits for purchase and they are awesome.

Disculpa sabes samplear el Roland d50, si me puedes hacer uno sonidos para kontakt 5 y que quede igual al original y cuanto cobras?

most of the daw supported apps are so slow to the touch vs the hardwares? regardless of fast computers or not? Is this normal? maybe malfunctioning keyboard?

I just picked up a XP-10 and it has some great D-50 patches.

is there any way to adjust the attack or release on this vst?

A month or so ago i picked up an orig D50 and i'm getting to know it pretty well, been playing it and recording it a lot. The software sounds close, but to my ears it's only 90% there.. the 10% it's missing is the depth and magic the orig has. Im not a snob, ive relied on software for many years and will continue to do so but recently it became very obvious that whilst software technology has many many benefits ie reliability / convenience etc, most of the stuff that tries to recreate the older classic gear simply isnt quite there. For the price of hiring this plugin, you'd be mad to not buy an orig D50 and come to the same conclusion.

A lot of studio computers aren't connected to internet, how would we use these could based vsti ?

So this has no dll file to launch as a vst. So how does this plug in work?

kept waiting and waiting for "Staccato Heaven" ..... how dare you not to demo it ;-)

Can I send my patches from my D-50 Hardware synth to Roland's D-50 VST version to have vst versions too?

Not at all bad software and pretty close-matching sounds (to my untrained ears), except for “Spacious Sweep” which to me sounded blown out in comparison. I’ll keep my hardware D-50. :-) A good video demonstration!

either hardware or software, it sounds incredible

I hear a different sound when you play the stereo polysynth preset. The original d50 sounds a lot better than the vst version.

Thank you for the nice video production! How about the CPU load of the VST on the PC. When I tried out the Jupiter and Juno before it just did not work for My old 2011 i5 MacBook, but ok on a 8 core AMD Vishera gaming PC (not preferred for music production). Roland Support just told me it was a known problem with the sound engine in the Roland Cloud VSTs early this year...and told me to lower the number of voices to 2 or max 4...I decided to drop them for a while...maybe time to try again? Can you run many multiple instances of this plug in your vst host?

8:47 the first is a VELO BRASS no STEREO POLYSYNTH

Hello Woody. The sound of the VST seems more stifled, less ample than the real D50. That is what my ears tell me. Thank you so much for your very good work. A blue thumb for you. Phil from France.

I’ve watched these experiments previously but they make for excellent Lockdown TV 😀... Ah good old Fantasia!! 😂😂🎶👍

Sounds very good. I'd sell my d50 if they did a d50 boutique based on this. Nice video

As nice as original hardware is, it becomes a liability from a maintenance perspective. A VSTi this good is surely the way to go provided it is supported properly. No wires, no added noise, full integration and saved space. On saying that, I cannot get the Korg Polysix plugin to sound like my actual Polysix although it's good. The D50 plugin sounds damn close though. Hard pressed to distinguish between the two really.

Does the vst also include the drums?

No idea if it's the recording, D-50 settings or the emulation but the panning width is not the same!

Does this VST have a librarian to export custom sysex banks to a real D-50?

Amigo descarge el vst pero el pich no funciona solo funciona la modulación. ¿que se puede hacer para solucionar esto?

In this video, the D-50 software sounds ever so slightly duller than the original in direct comparison. To be fair, however; the youtube shootout of BOTH versions sound slightly duller than the D-50 software. My personal opinion -- both sound pretty damn good!

Is It what the sound puch ''Digital Native Dance''?

Don't know if the question has already been asked, but..... CAN YOU TRANSFER PATCHES FROM THE VST-D50 TO THE REAL D50?? Since I have a D50 and no PG1000, programming sounds on the software emulation and then transferring them to the real thing would be the perfect solution.

Even if the same midi-parts are used to trigger notes from both instruments (presumably recorded first on the D-50), maybe it still could be that they reacted slightly differently to velocity, aftertouch and so on. On some patches there were a quite big differences. Like in the bottom end and also stereo width and reverb. Often sound fuller on the D50 without losing the details. And on some patches it sounded like a totally different sound, like the "Stereo Polysynth" for example. That sounds totally dead and thin on the VS, but I wonder what it is there, because it sounds quiter and is very much panned to the right. Many of the compensations that he did to the volume also seems to be too low for the VS compared to the D-50, which puts it in a bad light too. But some of the more "digital sounds" (non warmish pads) sounds almost spot on!

great video thx. do you know how to transfer a patch from the original d50 into the vst one?

Good job!

Is it me or does that "stereo polysynth" patch sound REALLY different?

The plug in doesnt seem to have as much bass and the stereo placement is quite different to the keyboard, might just be EQ and programming though that would make it sound even closer.

I agree, paying "rent" monthly is not an option!