Roland VK8 Combo Organ

Feature:
Layout of controls is perfect, on the left are the drawbars. Top panel is similar to B3, on the left is vibrato/chorus control, in the middle leakage, overdrive and reverb, and on the right percussion. It's built to recreate B3, and match Jon Lord's style of play, so if you are Deep Purple fan, you must get this. There is no display, but the B3 doesn't have display, and theres realy no need for one, exept maybe for editing and patch browsing... It's has good midi capabilities, and ballanced stereo output's as well as leslie speaker output.

Quality:
This product is well-made and built to last for decades, sturdy and robust. The wood finish is nice but can be easily damaged, so flight case IS A MUST! Key's are great, watterfall key's perfectly recreate B3's keys, and are built for organ style plaing. They even recreate double-trigger, THIS IS NOT FAULTY MANUFACTURE, B3 has indentical reaction, and double-trigger is crutial for some organ playng styles. Key's have very fast triger and sound at the slightest touch, making fast-play styles easy.

Value:
This product is worth every penny, you get an decent organ for your money.

Desirability:
Im proud of it, it's one mean machine.

Sound:
Sound is very expressive, and very very close to B3, almoust perfect. Chorus/Vibrato is identical, very good stuff. It has killer overdrive effects, and drawbars are nice and smooth. Only thing that could be better is leslie simulator, it's a little thin, lacks that wrooompf on low's and scatering on high's, but haves nice doppler efect and it can be bypassed if you have real leslie. Other tones are not good, they are not useable at all, they sound cheap, i don't know why did they put them there, it's better to put nothing than crap... But generaly speaking this is an organ, you dont need other tones, you can use them only for emergency :)

Ease of Use:
Well besides presented controlls on the panel, that are realy easy to use, and you can set sound you want in a flash, advanced tweaking is not possible without manual. Roland supplies a quick editing refference, and i suggest that you allways have it with you. Manual covers everything else.

Support:
Never had any problems with roland devices

Overall:
If your locking for a real hammong, buy real hammond there's no substitute. If you want to save, money space, this is exelent alternative.

I've been playing blues and jazz for 30 years, live and in the studio, and its the best combo I've heard. I bought this for the B-3 funtions only. I have a motion sound leslie set-up, but the effect in the VK8 sounds just as good live, so I quit lugging it around. The other sounds are good enough for rehersal, but thats it. Changing internal parameters is painful, so keep the book handy at all times.