Topic: Notes on new Studiologic SL88 Grand - pretty impressed.
Hey guys,
I had some trouble finding in depth information on the SL88, and since you guys seem to be pretty serious about controllers around here, I thought I'd post a few things I'd been wondering about, now that I have one. This is the first week, and I'll try to update if as I find out more or anything changes;
• It feels great. I hadn't been able to try one before buying (no one in CA seems to stock them) and the closest I'd been able to get was going back and forth between an A-88 and VPC1 at one of the big box stores. I'm not all that impressed by the wood since it seems more like slabs on top of the normal TP40 action (thus all the mechanical parts are plastic and metal - and they don't line up with the keycaps in the rear) but the end result feels nice enough me to call it a noticeable tactile improvement over the TP100LR in the Acuna I'm replacing...which did at least make up in accuracy what it lacked in raw feel.
• Triple sensors are noticeable. I had my doubts here, but there are grace notes in Lizst and repetitions in Shostakovich pieces I (sorta) know that are markedly more reliable for me on this than anything i've owned prior
• The action is pretty quiet. Few people mention this...and I think the Acuna was particularly bad (lots of thump, resonating loudly from the metal bottom) but this is MUCH better and at least on par with if not better than other boards I've had.
• There is indeed note-off / release velocity. Another hard bit of info to find.
• The 'Ivory Touch' keycaps are a lot better than I expected. It's not a molded-in texture like Roland's but a nice matte finished, dense-feeling plastic/composite with very subtle mottling. Much nicer under hand than shiny plastic; I hadn't payed it a second thought after reading product info but I'm admittedly rather glad to have it.
• The main damper jack does not seem capable of continuous input (at least not with the pedal I have) but any of the jacks can ben assigned to any controller output, so I was easily able to use one of the expression jacks. There are a 5 inputs in total, so it seems pretty flexible.
• The control sticks (pitch mod, etc) are very flexible in capability but seem likely to be problematic in use. They are small, with precious little travel and a pronounced dead spot in the center for the spring-loaded axes (nearly impossible to sweep through it without pause). I haven't gotten into tuning or calibration yet so that may be fixable.
• It is surprisingly compact. Shallower front-to-back than my Acuna, and with less rise behind the keys (even with the sticks and control knob). The end caps are the thinnest i've seen on any 88
• I think I can confirm the temporal aftertouch separation (values will not register within some number of milliseconds following a key strike) which I'm sure will bother some, but I've never been able to use AT gracefully anyway.
• Importantly, I have no QC issues. Keys all seem uniform, quiet, and stable. No rattles, clunks, stickiness, slow or irregular spots. There's a fair bit of negative feedback floating around for this model and I'm pleased to say mine shows no signs of corroborating any of it. As far as I can tell, it's built like a tank.
So... I'm quite happy thus far. My plan is to use it for a few weeks at least to make sure the action is one I can live with for a while, then build it into studio desk 2.0 (the current one is due for serious upgrading), at which point I'll likely open it up (plans are ambitious) and will try to post some pics. I held off getting one of these for a while due to the mixed reviews, finally jumping in because I found a cheap one. I wish I hadn't waited; it slides easily into the top spot among the boards I've owned. Any questions let me know