I still kept my Super JD 990 with vintage expansion, the 1080 was always it's poor cousin sound wise.

For example the vintage card that was made for both the JD990 and the 1080 sounds way better on the 990.

I used to have a 2080 too.

Once I compared them side by side preset for preset and decided 1080 was better, more ballsy, but it came down to the 2080's feminine reverb which made everything sound very wimpy and soft. 1080 was more raw and dry and louder sounding.

JD990 though, is far more special, those who have one know it's a very nice synth.

I am trying to simplify my setup a bit, too many cheesy and irrelevant sounds in the 1080 to flick through.

For example I had the 60s and 70's card which is completely surpassed in quality of kontakt libraries of the real keyboards.

Piano card too. Synth card, you know. Orchestra card, that too. World card, ummm, Bass and drums omg, the list goes on.

But having said that boy there is some gold in there that you will never find anywhere else!

And when you make up multi tracks with it, it sounds professional, correct and mastered.

Roland are genius that is for sure.

 

People have already stated the plugin sounds identical to the XV-5080 (recorded from it's digital outputs) - one of the best sounding engines in the whole JV line.

Some people's "digital and compressed" is another's "clean, precise and hifi", and if you like the darker, more lo-fi sound of the earlier hardware with a lower quality engine, and lower quality samples, then you can always roll off some top and grunge it up a little with your warming plugins of choice. You can't go the other way, so it works for me... ;)

 

I beg to differ please.
The JDs were meant to be mainly performance synths, whereas the JV-1080 was targeted as a studio production module, which is justified by its 16 part multi-timbral functionality. The JD-990 is a very different synth than what the JV1080 is. And it sounds very different. Comparing the two because they are both based on PCM engines, does little justice to both of them actually. For once the 990 sounds almost identical to the JD-800 but much more clean with even more definition and brilliance on the high end. The 990 can be controlled directly from a JD-800 (but since it has more parameters than its keyboard predecessor, it is not total control). The JD-990 while it's practically a JD-800 on steroids with more polyphony, parts and additional parameters and outputs, its main downside was that it lacked the digital "grit" that made the JD-800 a great performance synth. Still the Super JD is an excellent addition to any synth arsenal, because it too sounds unique but with a pristine crystal clear output which is a distinct character that may not always be what the doc ordered.
Now the JV-1080 as i mentioned in another thread has an incredibly sounding low end. No other Roland PCM synth sounds like it, no 2080, 3080, 5080, Integra etc. Dialing the same presets may appear to sound similar at first audition but start fiddling with the low pass and a simple sine and you 'll know immediatedly that the 1080 is unique and its more advanced siblings might sound better on the high end, but on the bass side the 1080 is unmatched imho. It just sounds fatter.
I 've owned each and everyone one of them (except the Integra but i 've had it in the studio one too many times, a friend of mine owns it) and i still own among others a JD-800 (sold my Super JD around 2004), an XP-50 and a JV-1080 and all expansions, including ram and rom cards as well.
Ps: The score with hardware synths -at least to me- is not what you can do by adding plugins to their sound. If you fiddle too much and you know what you are doing, possibilies are endless, you can make any "basic starting point source" sound interesting, even the "cheapest" one. The score with hardware synths is they are sought after for their unique sound character and imho the JV-1080 is one of those machines.
Cheers

 

indeed when I was learning the 1080 I reached the conclusion that it is somewhat lo fi

it never was able to completely grab and hold me like some other synths

later I found out it's waveforms are compressed to save space.

I'm off to the post office today with my 1080 and thus concludes my journey in to "JV Heaven" lol

 

Absolutely agree, I do find that the 990 is similar in that it can do a lot of the bread and butter stuff the 1080 is capable of.
But yes a different flavour altogether. The 1080 bass you mentioned was definitely something I noticed when comparing the 1080 to the 2080 so yeah. I'm going to put my S550 in the rack space that the 1080 was in. Now that is some "digital grit" right there baby!!! Oh I how I love the sound of that thing! I'm keeping hardware with stacks of character and the 1080 is gone!

Now I'm keeping my Super JX, JX-8P, JD990, D550, S550, S330, S760, TX7, TX81z

Looks like I'm still in "flavor" country

 

I don't like how much CPU the software uses.

What exactly is there to emulate “down to the circuit” -level? AFAIK the 1080 is basically just a RISC chip and some memory. I can't even begin to imagine how much more horsepower my modern multi core PC CPU has compared to a mid nineties rack unit.

 

I have 2 1080's and the 5080 and the roland cloud version. The Cloud is no where near either. Just a lifeless digital clone. can you use it, yes. But, I give it a 6 on a scale of 1-10.

 

Yeah man absolutely! I am with you there, very CPU greedy this plug, about 10% of mine, but of course in time and not too long better CPUs.

From now on I'm spending my cash with intel and solid state!

 

Well it's not going to be identical, no chance of that. It's just inspired by them.

@robocop77 said it perfectly.

Perhaps 1080 is now relevant to those who want that sound, want the nostalgia.

It will always be awesome of course but it was a good lesson for me that I can let that thing go.

I never really gelled with the 1080 as useful as it is, state of the art for 1994 ! but we are in 2017.

It does not make sense to work this way when1080 IS digital, and damn clean digital too! not like the D50 which has noise and grit of the DA! (That's why I keep my D50/D550)

I've been swearing black and blue for a long time now that hardware is better and it is but sometimes u gotta draw the line between being a martyr and getting some shit done!

Knowing that ultimately it's down to 2 things physical reality if that exists, and psychology.

Took my 1080 to the post office today $850 in pocket.

Now what bit of cool kit can I get that I will actually use ????