Simple synthesizer VS PSYN II

Hello Moocsters!

I am David Sabalete from Barcelona in Spain. This post is for week 6 of Introduction To Music Production at Coursera.org. Today I will write about the differences and similarities between the single synthesizer used in the course and the synthesizer "PSYN II" included in Sonar X2.


When we open PSYN II synthesizer we find the first difference from the simple synthesizer used in the course. The PSYN II has much more controls than the simple synth has.

Simple Synthesizer

PSYN II

While the simple synthesizer has one oscillator, the PSYN II has four oscillators with up to four waveforms each plus noise. They are accesible via two buttons labeled "1/2" and "3/4". This feature let user see the configuration of two of them at the same time.

The PSYN II also has a sub oscillator, several modulation capabilities, two filters, five envelope generators, three low frequency oscillators and a very flexible modulation array, combined with full automation.

Basically, both synthsizer have the same funtionalities. However, the PSYN II has extra features.
In the next picture, you can see that both synths have controls for Cuttoff frequency and Resonance, but the PSYN II has a couple more.

While the simple synthesizer only has one Low Frequency Oscillator, the PSYN II has three of them and it has a lot of controls like knobs and sliders. It is more complex.

At the end, the simple synthesizer is too "simple" :-) although its graphic displays are good at showing concepts about working with frequency. Once you are capable to understand those concepts it is more useful to use de PSYN II in your creations.

On the other hand, my knowledge of the PSYN II are very limited and if you plan to use it, I would recommend you to refer to the documentation.

I hope this brief comparison will help you get closer to this powerful tool.

Please, feel free to leave a comment.