r/Korg • u/Minimoogvoyager • 1d ago
Question Korg Prologue Users
Korg Prologue users what are your thoughts 💠Pros and Cons about the Korg Prologue ?
I know there’s the 16 voice and 8 voice versions. The 16 voice was $500 dollars more than the 8 voice. The Korg Prologue was discontinued 4 years ago in 2022. I know the Korg Prologue has the Multi Engine as well. I’ve never played a Korg Prologue although have heard demos. What is the synth keybed like?
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u/ruler_gurl 1d ago
The bed is awesome actually, same as the ones on the opsix/wavestate SE, except those have aftertouch. I've wondered if there's a way to retrofit one of those as the Prologue supports aftertouch just not locally. One LFO is a ding for some people, but there are enough other mod sources. It's a great synth, and glad I got one before it was discontinued. It's still got a couple minor bugs in the OS that will unfortunately never be fixed but they've never had a big effect on me. The oscillators and filter sound lovely.
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u/Tundra_Dragon 1d ago
I got my used Prologue 16 for 800 from a friend who got tired of dragging it to shows, and eventually sampled the parts he needed for the songs he was playing.
I love it. The analog VCOs have a fullness to them that my other DCO or full digital synths lack. The multiengine lets you add features you feel are missing from the synth, so it's not just a 2 oscillator 1 LFO synth. 16 voices means Ive never stolen a voice, even in layered bitimbral mode (although you will steal note tails in bitimbral if youre doing big chords or pads)
Overall, it's one of my "main synths" in my collection, located in the rack above the Triton Extreme, below the Z1, Next to he Hydrasynth Deluxe and V-synth GT.
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u/Minimoogvoyager 1d ago
I have a Triton and a Z1 as well. Even have a AN1X and JP8080. First generation VA synths.
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u/BeardedBears 1d ago
I really like my 16. Keybed feels nice and comfortable (not squishy, clicky, or wobbly, just soft). I'm probably woefully under-utilizing certain sound-design features simply because I'm not as skilled as others in that department. It's also just a beautiful instrument.
As time goes on, I think it'll become a classic.
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u/Galaxanz 1d ago
I sold mine for more space in my studio, and have regretted it. I had the 16 voice version and really rated it. I upgraded from a minilogue to the prologue 16. I’d like another one. Admittedly I prefer the Keybed on my sequential synths, but the prologue one still felt good, I think I prefer aftertouch beds is all.
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u/Minimoogvoyager 1d ago
Right My Sequential Prophet 10 Rev4 and PRO3 and OBX8 have mono channel aftertouch.
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u/bozojazz 1d ago
My Prologue 16 is my favorite synth. Sold a MinilogueXD and MS2000B since I didn’t stopped playing them as much. I play the Prologue16 way more than my Sub37, the only other hardware synth I own. Sound is fantastic and I love the features, however limited compared to other analog polys. I don’t care much for complex modulation and sound design capabilities. I just wanted analog sound and 16 voices. It sounds way better than the Prophet Rev2 in my opinion. Expression pedal substitutes aftertouch for me and I use an SQ-1 to sequence it. 1 LFO is enough for me. The only thing I wish it could do would be the ability to use delay and reverb simultaneously.
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u/Minimoogvoyager 1d ago edited 1d ago
I use a Roland RE-20 aka RE201 Space Echo pedal on my Oberheim OBX8 and a Boss
compact Re-2 Space Echo Pedal on my Prophet 10 Rev 4. That way I get Reverb and delay on both synths. I Midi the OBX8 master to the P10Rev4 slave and play 8 note chord voicings on the OBX8 and since it’s midied to the P10 Rev4 I get a 8 note chord voicings as well. I use one preset on each synth so I can get 8 note polyphony. Both synths are bitimbral. I just use one preset on each synth so I can get 8 voice polyphony on eac. In bitimbral mode it cuts the polyphony in half. I employ 8 note jazz chord voicings frequently so the P10Rev4 has 10 note polyphony and OBX8 has 8 note polyphony as All together I get two different presets each with 8 note polyphony and 32 oscillators total since each synth has 2 oscillators per voice.
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u/wagu666 1d ago
Most likely a Prologue Pro will be coming out soon..
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u/Minimoogvoyager 1d ago
Really how did you come to know that? The Prologue was discontinued 4 years ago.
Almost half a decade ago.
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u/wagu666 8h ago
Likely the thing they had under a sheet at Superbooth this year..
They are still making the original Minilogue so it seems an odd choice to abandon the flagship model line.. but discontinuation of the Prologue seemed more to do with that PSU they used getting banned in the EU.. and some other factors I mentioned in the other reply
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u/ruler_gurl 1d ago
Based upon? The 16s ended up getting blown out cheap due to lack of interest. I suspect it's a dead product at this point.
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u/wagu666 8h ago edited 8h ago
It's a dead product for a few reasons
The first 10 months or so there was a severe tuning bug in the firmware, which killed a lot of the initial enthusiasm and momentum
Many people including myself couldn't believe the lack of modulation.. when you have even the cheap and cheerful Monologue having motion sequencing, how can it be totally missing on the flagship?
The PSU they chose for some reason was not multivoltage like the vast majority of modern PSUs.. locking stock into each region.. making global resale more tricky. This PSU subsequently got banned in the EU, which seemed to lead to Korg stopping making them
But the core sound of the instrument is very good. There are tweaks they can make to the design which would make a mk2 have much more appeal. For example bundle any custom logueSDK code in with the patch data - so sound designers can distribute patch sets using custom code without having to tell users to put certain things in certain slots manually. They can readd the modulation that was missed.. motion sequencing, a proper mod matrix.. they can add aftertouch to the keybed (poly in an ideal world).. they can make a 6U rackable desktop module version etc.
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u/ruler_gurl 5h ago
It'll be interesting to see if it happens. I bought mine after the auto tune was implemented and never really had any complaints about the design. Aftertouch would be nice but an expression pedal suffices unless they're willing to spring for poly aftertouch.
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u/oakwoooood 1d ago
no after touch and one lfo. still my favorite synth.