The Roland ProMars Compuphonic Synthesizer

This video, via perfectcircuitaudio, is an audio demo of the vintage Roland ProMars Compuphonic synthesizer. 

The Roland ProMars (1979) is a two-vco monophonic analog synthesizer that was one of the first synth to offer patch memory – thus the ‘Compuphonic’ moniker. It offered 10 presets and could save 10 additional user presets.

The ProMars has been recreated by Roland for the System-1 platform.

If you’ve used the Roland ProMars synthesizer, leave a comment and share your thoughts on it!

8 thoughts on “The Roland ProMars Compuphonic Synthesizer

  1. While I haven’t used the Promars, I do own a Jupiter-4. Very similar machines other than polyphony.
    They have a sound unlike anything.

  2. Great demo for a thin, semi-craptastic synth… until you add just a little bit of effecting. I got to play with this and a few others like the SH-2 and etc. That Roland neo-thinness has the plus of being downright clean, so I found that the merest delay or reverb made a profound difference in how full it suddenly became. Real analog is linear where digital shares processing cores and other such arcana. Totally different beasts. Frankly, this synth is so vintage, its a bit cheesy, as those sounds are very easy to replicate on most instruments, with a little programming effort. Considering how much I loved my Juno-1 and 2, though, I’d suggest usually blending something with the Aira. The Junos were only occasionally the most up-front sound, but in a layered patch mix, they really brought the beef. The Aira line is almost like Depeche Mode on a stick, but who says it can’t become your 2nd-best pal in the mix, no matter what you’re doing? That Juno-1 became my unsung hero, like a roadie who always gets the organ power or a Kontakt reboot up to speed right before a show. No lie!

  3. I would love to see Roland releasing plugins for all their classic synths (AIRA line), since we can no longer see, nowadays, analog synths like the old ones.

    Jupiter 80, for example, is a pretty synth. But Jupiter 8 is much more attractive, and I would rather turn knobs than looking for a screen, for example, like nowadays synths. Since they won’t do synths like the past, at least release all the classics in plugin format.

      1. I really don’t like being the “analogue-is-better” guy (I consider Monark a 1:1 of the Moog Mini), but after seeing videos of the plug-out it just doesn’t even seem to compare

  4. Welll… the minimoog can also sound like crap without fx.. no problem there. It’s just a simple analog synthesizer… like the Promars, albeit a tad more musical. The Promars can do quite a lot of the old classic patches with confidence. This vid was good. Very good in fact. Showing what the thing can do… and nothing more. Well done!

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