First Things First. Fantastic sounds, reliable performance,
musical expressiveness, ease of use; these are the things we believe
are essential to the design of an affordable keyboard instrument. Kurzweil's new PC3LE8
combines the amazing sound quality and performance control features of
our enormously successful PC3 with a new streamlined, intelligent user
interface, providing an interactive experience that is bound to inspire
creativity.
It's The Sound Under
the hood, the PC3LE features the same groundbreaking chip technology
that has made the PC3 the most talked about keyboard in recent years.
All of the PC3's sounds are included - the famous Kurzweil grand piano,
vintage electric pianos, Clavinets and Mellotrons, dazzling Orchestral
and Strings collections, stunning VA virtual analog synths, KB3 organs,
realistic basses, drums, guitars, percussion and horns, General MIDI,
plus nearly 200 new programs developed specifically for the LE; over
1050 programs in all. We've improved the method for navigating through
such a massive sound set; programs in the LE can be viewed and selected
with a new set of Category buttons. Select "Leads" and you'll see a
list of all the synth leads in the machine, grouped together. Same goes
for the other 20 categories, everything from Synth Bass to Mallets to
Guitars.
These programs take advantage of our V.A.S.T. synthesis
engine, using pristine samples paired with detailed programming of
literally hundreds of synth and effects parameters. Whether it's the
rosin of a bowed string instrument, the resonant harmonics of a piano's
damper pedal, or the thumps and squeaks of an electromechanical
keyboard, we've done our homework and provided a level of detail and
realism that can only be found in a Kurzweil. Which means you can focus
on the important business of making music.
The PC3LE6 comes
equipped with over 700 onboard effects chains from which to choose, all
with real-time controllers already assigned to relevant parameters.
With world class reverbs that decay into complete silence, warm,
classic sounding phasers, flangers and choruses, and burning, saturated
distortions, you'll have everything you need to make your music sound
like a polished, finished product from the outset. The PC3LE8's
architecture provides up to 10 insert effects, which can be distributed
among 10 channels, with an available auxiliary effect as well.
Interactive In
the PC3, we introduced the "INFO" feature, a soft button-press that
allows the user to see which controllers have been assigned to
parameters within a program. For the LE, we've taken this to the next
level, with an interactive user interface that communicates directly
with you whenever you move a real-time controller. Turn a knob, hit a
button or move a wheel and the LE's screen will display the controller,
its real-time value and the parameter being affected. An example would
be moving the modwheel on an organ program - you would see the
following: "Modwheel 79 Distortion Drive". This system never breaks
down - you can change effect chains freely and all of this info remains
intact, updated to reflect the new chain you've selected. Also, this
info is transferred seamlessly to Setup Mode - you can see whatever
controllers have been assigned to programs used in any zone of a setup.
Customizing Your Sound We
wanted to give users the quickest, easiest possible way to adjust the
PC3LE8's sounds to suit individual tastes and needs. In any given
program or effects chain, the relevant parameters, the ones that you'd
want to tweak and adjust, have been assigned real-time controllers.
Move a controller and hit the SAVE button - no menus, no pages with
endless parameters - and you get one touch sound customization. Also,
we understand that flexibility is important when it comes to
customizing your sound. Don't want filter frequency control on a knob?
Prefer to have it assigned to the modwheel? No problem. The PARAMETERS
page allows you to re-assign any controller to any available parameter.
You can save your custom sounds to the user bank, with over 1000 ID
slots.
A Different Drummer With
the PC3LE8, we're introducing a new set of dynamic physical controllers
- 8 backlit, velocity-sensitive drum pads that can be used to trigger
sounds, sequences, chords and arpeggiations. Every program in the
machine has a drum kit assigned to the pads, so you'll always have
access to a rhythm track when you need it. As a bonus, we've included a
set of over 100 new drum programs, with acoustic brush kits, slammin'
rock kits and a number of heavily effected techno/electronic kits, in
addition to the 24 existing kits from the PC3. Just as we put a great
deal of effort into making sure that our keyboard action feels just
right, the drum pads were implemented with precision and care, with
utmost attention given to how they feel when played. After all, this is
a musical instrument and not just a piece of technology.
Everything Else You'd Expect Complimenting
the LE's new features are a few old familiar Kurzweil favorites; Setup
Mode, Quick Access Mode and Song Mode, all taken directly from the PC3.
Setup
Mode enables the LE to act as a powerful MIDI controller as well as
providing 16 simultaneous, independent, fully programmable
arpeggiators, with factory and user-programmable patterns. On top of
that, each setup can have up to 16 simultaneous Riffs - sequences that
can be triggered by buttons, drum pads or notes on the keyboard. While
Setup Mode, with up to 16 zones each with its own program, is still as
powerful as ever, we've added a Split/Layer button to make the creation
of simple setups quick and easy.
Quick Access Mode allows you to
create custom banks of 10 sounds that can be accessed by a single
button-press. And Song Mode delivers a full-featured 16 track sequencer
with all of the powerful editing features that you'd find in a high end
workstation - event editing, swing, controller scaling, input quantize,
input filter, and chasing controls. User memory provides over 1000 ID
slots each for your own QA banks, Setups and Songs.
Connectivity Saving,
loading and updating the OS are all made easy on the LE with the
inclusion of both USB Host and Device ports. You can save your user
programs, setups and songs to a USB thumb-drive or directly to a
computer. OS updates can be loaded from a thumb-drive or directly from
your computer, and of course the LE sends and receives MIDI over USB.
Standard MIDI jacks are also included for In, Out and Thru. For audio,
the PC3LE8 features high-quality, hum-cancelling, stereo balanced
analog outputs, with 24-bit DACs as well as a 24-bit stereo S/PDIF
digital output at 48K.
