From: dcampbel@timshel.austin.ibm.com (David L. Campbell)
Subject: Re: Gibson Widget MIDI Guitar Converter
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 16:20:53 GMT
	<1993Jan21.040516.22754@panix.com>
Organization: IBM Austin, TX

In article <1993Jan21.040516.22754@panix.com> kmorton@panix.com (Ken Morton) writes:
>
>>I bought one through Musicians Friend mail order.  The tracking was
>>poor...the interface boxes/cables were clunky and cumbersome to mount.
>>Needless to say, I returned it for a full refund.
>
>        I agree.  The Widget is lame.

And I'll disagree.  At the Widget's price point ($600) its fantastic.  I
started with a Kramer Pitchrider; the Widget's tracking was a godsend compared
to that beast.  I've no doubt however that its tracking doesn't compare to the
GR1.  But at half the price, it *better* not for Roland's sake.

>>Everyone has their own conception of 'poor tracking', in my case, I also
>>returned the new Roland GR1 for poor tracking.  Your requirements may not
>>be as mine but I would HIGHLY recommend purshasing it through a store/mail 
>>order house that offers a full refund if you don't like it.
>
>        I disagree.  The GR-1 is not lame.  In fact, if you don't use
>any external sound sources via MIDI, and just stick to the built in 
>generator, I'd say the GR-1 is amazing.

Right, and that's the problem.  The sound generation capabilities of the GR1
are fine if what you want is the latest sampled acoustic simulations or if the
extent of your sound programming is relatively minor tweaks.  But its synth
engine isn't very flexible from a sound programmers point of view.  Its samples
are well done, but you just don't have very much control over the sound
compared to a more hardcore programmer's synth (like the K2000, the
Wavestation, or the VFX).

Of course, once again I must consider the price -- at ~$1200, I really can't
expect too much.  My wish would be that Roland would tie the tracking
capabilities of the GR1 with the synth engine of the JD800.  Now, *that* I'd go
into debt for.  (Actually the JD800 isn't all that impressive either, but its
about the best thing that Roland has.)  But in the meantime, the
SoundCanvas-based synth in the GR1 is just extra baggage for me; I'm only
interested in the GR1 as a MIDI controller for external synth modules.  And
since it doesn't perform this task nearly as well, I'd save the extra bucks and
get the Widget, which I found quite satisfactory since my technique had cleaned
up quite a bit in using the Pitchrider.  Note however, I'm not knocking the
GR1; its perfect for the majority of folks.  It just doesn't meet my needs.

>My friend swears by it, and I've
>spent alot of time with it - the thing works great.  You have to set it up
>properly of course, which isn't difficult.

Same is true of the Widget.  Proper setup helps immensely.  I've heard bad
reports by others on the Widget.  Maybe I just got a particularly good one.
Incidently, I read a Guitar Player interview with Steve Morse and at that time
he was using a Widget and he was quite pleased with it.  (Actually he had the
original German version called a Shadow; Gibson just imports them from
Germany.)

David.
--
+----==== opinions expressed do not represent those of my employer ====----+
| David L. Campbell, IBM AWSD Austin      | "The comfort you have demanded |
| INET: dcampbel@ajones.austin.ibm.com    |       is now mandatory!"       |
| IBM TR: dcampbel@timshel.austin.ibm.com |               Jello Biafra     |
Newsgroups: rec.music.makers