Summary - Audio quality is excellent. There is no hint of noise or artefacts in the recording process anywhere. A lot of the samples do sound rather dry as they have been recorded without any effects straight from the synthesisers in question without much, if any, in the way of additional processing. Many of the sounds certainly come to life a little more with the addition of some effects, even just a touch of reverb. The later digital synth samples suffer less from this as they have effects built in.

Production wise this is an excellent sample CD, in one CD you have the sounds from 15 years or so of the Korg Family of synthesisers and one realises how quickly sonic manipulation has progressed within that period and onwards ever more since. I have to say I spent hours more playing around with these sounds than writing !, and a most enjoyable experience it was too.

There are a lot of classic analogue and digital synthesiser sounds here from some great Korg machines, certainly if your looking for some synth sounds you'll find some here for sure. Mixed in though are some rather blander sounds, through no fault of the producers mind, it's just the machines that they were sampled from. When one takes off the "rose tinted glasses" view of some analogue synths of years gone by they really do sound a bit thin and weak.

The multi-sampling allows the producers to provide a very accurate representation of the machines being sampled, and this being a CD-ROM release does make it quick and easy to load up a sound. One advantage also for many of the sounds from analogue machines is that one can play them polyphonically as well.

My only real concern is to who the release will appeal to most, if your just after classical "analogue" sounds then yes they are here, but also mixed in with more latter day sounds. If your looking for more complex sounds,original ideas or inspiration then again the there are some here but again mixed in with simple analogue tones and sounds that have been heard before. Perhaps it could best be summarised is that everyone can find sounds here that they can use but maybe how many is an issue.

Anyone though who is interested in the "synthesiser sound" if there is such a thing, would be well advised to put this release on their wanted list. It's an accurate snapshot of a range of Korg machines and you'll get a lot of enjoyment as well as use from "playing" these vintage and not so vintage machines.

Overall - History of the synth on one CD - 8/10