PX7 or FM4?

[lzap]

I want one just for fun. I personally like PX7 more beacause of enormous amount of patches from The Original, I am more like browser guy than patch creator. That it's a go right?

[joeyluck]

PX7 is more powerful and uses much less CPU. Certainly gets my vote

[strangers]

I was looking at these two synths, as well. Does either have any strength in creating modern sounds or mainly for retro sounds?

[KirkMarkarian]

FM4 will give you odd sounds quicker than the PX7, and it has more audio possibilities in the waveform dept. at the cost of CPU. Both are good, both are strong, PX7 is better for bread and butter FM sounds, and the FM4 is better at "weird" sounds.

[Kalm]

I have FM4 and you can definitely get some textures out of FM4. Will be picking up PX7 real soon to try and make some rhody EP DX patches. FM4 is also really good for bass stuff.

[Heater]

There's a free VST that does a great emulation of the DX7. I think it's called Dexed.

[theshoemaker]

I prefere PX7 over FM4. Gave FM4 a trial, but never clicked with me. Also Lectric Panda generated some random patches for PX7, which can be quite inspirational. Depends all on what you are looking for. I love the bleepy, FM sound. I'd also have a look at Zero. I'd say zero can do even more.

[strangers]

I'll have to trial both as quickly as possible. I'm running 8.3 and not sure when I'll upgrade, otherwise I'd be all over Zero and/or Expanse. The demo tracks for PX7 and FM4 both sound promising, even though modern sounds don't seem to be their focus.

[FLVZ]

PX7 is more powerful and uses much less CPU. Certainly gets my vote

Pretty much this, I've always felt this way. I feel FM4 has a bit of a cult following, its quirky in its appeal. This isn't neccesarily a bad thing, but more a taste thing...

[TritoneAddiction]

I like FM4. Very easy to use and get cool sounds from. Just fun to work with.
Maybe it's more CPU hungry compared to PX7, but I wouldn't call it a CPU hungry synth.

[RequiemMachine]

Px7 is closer to "classic" fm. FM4 is more of a modern FM synth kinda like FM8's little brother. They have completely different workflows for sound design...so you may want to trial them both and see which feels better for you.

[lowpryo]

if I'm picking presets, I'll usually go to PX7 presets first for some classic sounds. but if I'm designing a patch from scratch, FM4 is way more intuitive.

[Arrant]

I find PX7 utterly boring, just a million different variants of mallets. FM4 all day long.

[lzap]

Ok thanks got PX7. I hope it will not be added into Reason 10 for free

[electrofux]

Bought the NEO DX Refill for PX7 yesterday and i can highly recommend it.

[OverneathTheSkyBridg]

Also, if you decide to go the PX7 route, there's a refill out there that's free by Koshdukai that has all the original DX7 presets and several hundred thousand more!

[TritoneAddiction]

I'll have to trial both as quickly as possible. I'm running 8.3 and not sure when I'll upgrade, otherwise I'd be all over Zero and/or Expanse. The demo tracks for PX7 and FM4 both sound promising, even though modern sounds don't seem to be their focus.

I don't know if this is any help but I recently made 3 tracks with only FM4 for all synth sounds. Basically everything except the drums and a few subtle sound FX in "Little Goblin" is FM4.
View it as 3 demo tracks for the synth. The tracks are all very different sonically and in terms of style.




The low "guitar" riffing sound in "Hero" is FM4 played through Kuassas Creme Amp. The melodic lead is all FM4, no distortion added even though it sounds like it.
The "guitar" solo in "No Way Out" is FM4 played through Scream4.

[joeyluck]

Bought the NEO DX Refill for PX7 yesterday and i can highly recommend it.

Agreed. This is one of my favorite ReFills. I'm not sure what folks consider to be modern, but I feel this is modern sound. Very cool sounds!

[scratchnsnifff]

Bought the NEO DX Refill for PX7 yesterday and i can highly recommend it.

Agreed. This is one of my favorite ReFills. I'm not sure what folks consider to be modern, but I feel this is modern sound. Very cool sounds!

I assume modern in terms of FM being a sine modulated by a triangle with a few octaves or ratios from one another resulting in the vocal type basses, or just listen to knife party, rob swires ep's seem to use a lot of FM sounds in his bass design

[strangers]

I'll have to trial both as quickly as possible. I'm running 8.3 and not sure when I'll upgrade, otherwise I'd be all over Zero and/or Expanse. The demo tracks for PX7 and FM4 both sound promising, even though modern sounds don't seem to be their focus.

I don't know if this is any help but I recently made 3 tracks with only FM4 for all synth sounds. Basically everything except the drums and a few subtle sound FX in "Little Goblin" is FM4.
View it as 3 demo tracks for the synth. The tracks are all very different sonically and in terms of style.

The low "guitar" riffing sound in "Hero" is FM4 played through Kuassas Creme Amp. The melodic lead is all FM4, no distortion added even though it sounds like it.
The "guitar" solo in "No Way Out" is FM4 played through Scream4.

Those tracks won me over, thanks for posting those and including some insight on what you did and didn't use to make the sounds. The sale price is less than most Prop Shop refill prices, so I'm snagging the FM4. PX7 sounds really good, too, but the number of patches will have me sitting for hours trying and analyzing every one of them. I've bought tons of refills lately as a learning tool to see/hear what it takes to get better at my own sound design. PX7 would have me completely buried in patches.

I know I sort of hijacked the OP's thread, but a huge thanks to everyone who replied. The amount of knowledge on this forum is a fast pass for newbies of the synth world.

[TritoneAddiction]

I'll have to trial both as quickly as possible. I'm running 8.3 and not sure when I'll upgrade, otherwise I'd be all over Zero and/or Expanse. The demo tracks for PX7 and FM4 both sound promising, even though modern sounds don't seem to be their focus.

I don't know if this is any help but I recently made 3 tracks with only FM4 for all synth sounds. Basically everything except the drums and a few subtle sound FX in "Little Goblin" is FM4.
View it as 3 demo tracks for the synth. The tracks are all very different sonically and in terms of style.

The low "guitar" riffing sound in "Hero" is FM4 played through Kuassas Creme Amp. The melodic lead is all FM4, no distortion added even though it sounds like it.
The "guitar" solo in "No Way Out" is FM4 played through Scream4.

Those tracks won me over, thanks for posting those and including some insight on what you did and didn't use to make the sounds. The sale price is less than most Prop Shop refill prices, so I'm snagging the FM4. PX7 sounds really good, too, but the number of patches will have me sitting for hours trying and analyzing every one of them. I've bought tons of refills lately as a learning tool to see/hear what it takes to get better at my own sound design. PX7 would have me completely buried in patches.

I know I sort of hijacked the OP's thread, but a huge thanks to everyone who replied. The amount of knowledge on this forum is a fast pass for newbies of the synth world.

Thanks, glad the tracks won you over, or at least I hope so. Perhaps you won't like FM4 and you'll end up cursing my name for months for convincing you to buy it
I find FM4 very user friendly. 25 bucks for it is nothing imo. I hope you'll like it.

[stratatonic]

There's a free VST that does a great emulation of the DX7. I think it's called Dexed.

It is Dexed. You can load all the DX7 patches out there as well.

https://www.kvraudio.com/product/dexed- ... l-suburban

I find PX7 utterly boring, just a million different variants of mallets.

[Karim]

I own both but Fm4 seems more wild, gritty with a more modern sound. Feel Px7 a bit hard to tweak it. I bought for thr massive sound collections availables on Internet..

Inviato dal mio SM-G925F utilizzando Tapatalk

[strangers]

Thanks, glad the tracks won you over, or at least I hope so. Perhaps you won't like FM4 and you'll end up cursing my name for months for convincing you to buy it
I find FM4 very user friendly. 25 bucks for it is nothing imo. I hope you'll like it.

I downloaded the trial for both FM4 and PX7 last night when I had some free time. PX7 wasn't my cup of tea. FM4's interface was a little confusing at first but made sense once I started messing with everything. With May madness, I bought Antidote and a select handful of effects. Not sure FM4 will get much use from me since I'm getting along really well with Antidote. I'm still gonna give FM4 a full demo test run.

[tiker01]

I recommend Zero especially with its new harmonics editor.
https://shop.propellerheads.se/product/ ... nthesizer/

New in version 1.3

• Alt-click menu in the harmonics display with powerful editing tools
• Waveform button allows you to load Yamaha DX11/TX81Z and Sequential Circuits Prophet VS waveforms
• Global and operator fine tune are available as Mod Matrix destinations
• Envelope settings utilize popup menus

Now it also has the same waves as FM4 if I am not mistaken.