Bad Gear - E-MU Orbit 9090

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Welcome to Bad Gear, the show about the world's most hated audio tools. Today we are going to talk about the E-MU Orbit 9090. Is this 90s dance version of the classic E-MU Proteus rompler rack synth vintage now? Is this still a dance planet?

Chapters:
00:00 Intro tune
01:06 Overview E-MU Orbit 9090
01:22 This synth is DISGUSTING!!!
01:52 Samples/Waveforms (Instruments)
02:41 Internal Structure, Presets, Envelopes
03:01 Start point, Reverse
03:09 Z-plane Filter
03:19 Filter tweak comparison (low pass, Vowel, Bat-Phaser)
03:38 Modulators (LFO, Aux Envelope)
03:55 Primary/Secondary
04:10 Modulation Matrix, Midi Controllers, Pro Features
04:36 Multiple Outputs, Effect Inserts
05:03 Multitimbrality, Program Changes
05:14 Chorus Effect
05:21 Beat Mode
05:32 Product Family, Upgrades, Pricing
06:04 Hate
06:29 Jam 1
07:21 Jam 2
08:14 Finale
08:45 Verdict

[EppuJoloZ]

This machine is so 90s it's included TWICE in the name!

[derickjoy]

Hey Pilz, I love your show. I love your delivery! If I’m taking this correctly, you liked the graphics. I’ll take that as a compliment, as I designed the front panel. I was one of the sample engineers as well. I will take credit for naming the box too, as after designing the little orbiting fireball, I put Orbit The Dance Planet only as place holder for the real name that marketing hadn’t come up with yet. Oops, I accidentally named the product. Oh, and the 9090 was not supposed to be there, but the marketing guys liked it, so it stayed.

Anyway thanks for a really fun blast from my past!

[TheCALMInstitute]

This unit really shines when it's used with the intended signal path - slammed into the red on a 90s Mackie mixer. I absolutely adore mine - if you're out there wanting this, but don't have the COURAGE to buy a rack for your smelly ROMplers, you should know that a company called Digital Sound Factory bought the rights to all the E-MU sounds, and you can buy them as soundfonts for cheap. You don't get the presets or the shitty DAC, so it's not QUITE the same, but it is useful.

[citizenscientist]

Your videos have the best production values within the YouTube synth community. The time and effort you put into this show is appreciated! Thanks and keep up the great work

[bencarding]

I love the E-mu z-plane filter diagram. I had no bloody clue what it meant in the 90s, and watching this made me realise I'm still totally baffled by it 25 years later.

[alankelly]

I have the Morpheus (released at the head of this module series) and the later Proteus 2500 based PX-7 Command Station (with its default Protean Drums ROM and the XL ROM that was a followup to this Orbit module), and the architecture is insanely powerful... but a pain to program through the little letter-box LCD display. The problem was trying to explain how Z-Plane filters worked to people who only understood regular low-pass faux analog filters from their virtual analog synths.

The filters were limited by the hardware of the day, and could only follow one parameter in real-time, two others being fixed at note on. Today, it could be implemented with all three Z-plane filter axis being able to modulate in real-time (as in E-mu founder Dave Rossum's Rossum Electro-Music Morpheus eurorack module)

Creative Labs did a huge disservice when they run E-mu Systems into the ground.

[SameAsAnyOtherStranger]

The EMU Proteus 2500 doesn't belong on a channel about the "most hated gear" but it had four slots for optional 32 MB ROM sound cards, one of which was the Beat Garden from the Orbit 3. I don't care to know the prices of the 2500 these days, but in the mid/late 2000s I saw one cheap enough, I didn't give a second thought to getting one off of Ebay. I used to drool over the ads for those in Electronic Musician magazine in the early 90s. The 2500 made deep diving way better with a bank of 16 knobs that control 32 parameters and a sequencer. It even has a USB port for uploading sysex information.

Anyway, if you're gonna go the cost for an Emu Orbit, you might want to consider the 2500.

I'm not sure I get the Jordan Rudess high pass / low pass filter reference at 5:14.

[CKT]

This thing can't be that bad! It's responsible for ~70% of the sounds in the Metroid Prime OST

[djlocodoc]

I have the 9090 V2 and the launch pad controller it is my go to for my drum and bass sounds. NEVER giving this up! Great episode sir!!!

[povkilla]

This was an amazing one!! The E-MU racks had their "issues" but damn did you make this one slap!! Great job as always making "bad gear" sound fantastic!

[Willigrow]

Man I just fond your channel... I'm a mixing and mastering engineer, not that much into synths, but your presentation, editing and well placed memes caught me straight away!

[libra]

Would love to see the other E-MU rack synths on the channel as well. Amazing as always!

[JonathanMLParker]

By far my favourite YouTube channel. Such a great concept, and so beautifully executed. Thank you so much.

[secretelitemusic]

I ran across all of the flavours of Emu romplerstiltskins, and they sounded ok if you had a desk with 6 aux sends to season the crap out of the basic sounds. The Carnaval module was my favourite, because it came from a weird US corporate idea of what latin and carribean music sounded like, and ended up sounding like it fell off a passing asteroid. There was a a fairly notorious London tekno dub crew from that era who rinsed it to death on all their records. They had it running through all manner of bbds and Lovetone filter pedals.
The Morpheus was the gem in the Proteus rack range, because it could morph between multiple z-plane filters, and you could save banks in RAM. It also had a properjob spaced out default factory bank.

[AutodafeSynths]

I have fallen in love with these late 90’s emu and bought a emu audity, the orbit and the planet platt 😄😄😄

[antondhondt]

I have several "Future Music" magazines from 1990s and they are somewhat over-peppered with ads of this E-MU romplers: Mo Phatt, Orbit, Carnival and etc. The prices for these romplers were cosmic in 1990s. This Orbit 9090 sounds very good - reminds of "Underworld" from "Born Slippy" era and 90s underground jungle/drumfunk.

[mikelazarev]

Stumbled here after digging out my E-mu Xtreme Lead-1, which has been in the box for 20+ years. Back in 2000, it was just a rompler, as you said, and I mostly used it to re-sample pads, hits, and percussion to be used later in tracking (yes, that 32-channel multitracker, ala Renoise these days). Lockdown revitalized my interest in synthesis, and I plunged deep into modular, but now am enjoying combining the two - using external modulation converted to MIDI to drive my older digital synths. I was absolutely impressed by what E-mu has packed into their units so many years ago. Perhaps it cannot generate its own waveforms and is not even close to morphing between wavetables of the modern synths, but with numerous layers of sampled and perfectly looped forms (the XL-1 has 4 layers), 50+ filters, multi-stage looping envelopes, variable velocity curves, unique LFO shapes (what is Hemi-quaver?) and even arithmetic modulation processors, and tons of effects, this thing is absolutely blowing my mind! Yes, a ton of menu diving, but with enough patience, I've squeezed out more than just retro-sounding stabs - the ambient pads this thing can create are delicious! Thanks for the video! Not the first one I've watched by you!

[georgegeez]

Wow the Orbit finally made it to Bad Gears. I have 2 of these in my collection along with the Proteus 2000, Mo' Phatt and Carnaval. These romplers were essential to studios in NY back in the late 90s to early 2000s. I would never get rid of them.

[kareljanda]

The best music channel really! Learn a bit of electronic music history, get inspiration for different workflows, have a good laugh and enjoy the music! Never stop please!

[DrJRK]

Absolutely love your videos. I just started watching them last week, and I was definitely missing out. Your sense of humor is spot on, and I agree with much of your commentary! Also, I had an Emu Extreme Lead rack module. I was only able to use it on one track, because I felt if I used it on any more they'd all sound the same. :D However, for that one track, I actually enjoyed it. :P This module actually seems like it would be a bit more useful. And, if you see your mom this weekend, be sure to tell her SATAN! SATAN! SATAN!