Hi guys! I know they are different prices, but in terms of sound, if having Polybrute, will UBxA bring enough to the table to be bought?
Just your oppinions. Thanks!

I listened to the polybrute and didn’t like it at all. Sounds harsh and 6 voices are not enough for me. Looking at the OB-X8 and the UB-Xa now.

Did you try it yourself? Youtube not always the best..
In reality can sound warm too the Polybrute.

The polybrute is pretty amazing on paper, but I’ve never been into the core sound. The OBXa is in the top 2 of my favourite synths - probably first - I just love it’s sound although it’s pretty simple. Totally subjective of course.

Ubxa is pretty far from a obxa though.. I bet a rev2 would sound closer honestly.

Anyone owning both Pro 800 and Ubxa?

I have both the OB6 (instant gratification) and Polybrute (took me a long time until I loved it).
(Let’s assume the UBxA is the same as OB6.)

Core sound wise, the OB6 sounds amazing, the Polyburte generally does not sound that good from the get go.

Modulation & sounddesign wise, the OB6 will get you somewhere, but the Polybrute goes SO much further.

So here’s the thing: OB6 sounds good for bread & butter sounds, I assume the UBxA will do too.
The Polybrute will sound good too, if you’re into sound design, going much MUCH further than your basic analog poly sounds.

Ps: Yes, UBxA has more modulation options than the OB6, but still a lot less than the massive Matrix / A-B / Stack / Expression / ... options on the Polybrute.

Just my take
Take care.

This is GS. Get both.

Haha. Joking right?

I've always found the core sound heard on YT lines up with the core sound in real life. YT can easily get you ~80% of the way "there" on sound, but rarely on the breadth of sound possible since people focus on specific things.

The PB sounds similar in real life to on YT, for example. I didn't like either. I don't really like the Oberheim Xa sound, either, so have no interest in things sounding like it. My answer is: don't get either :-)

I wasn't a fan of the Polybrute's sound when trying it in person. I have not yet tried the UB-Xa, so cannot comment.

I think it’s the warmest synth and most expressive synth I’ve ever used. It’s a matter of how you program it. Can it sound harsh. Of course. It can be whatever you want it to be. I like warm so mind sounds warm.

What’s your experience with it? In my experience, you get out of it what you put into it. The range of timbres you can extract from it is, imo, just not possible with other analog polys, and it’s not even close.

After spending a day with the polybrute and experimenting with various settings, I found the sound to be unsatisfying and the 6 voices insufficient for my needs as a performer. As I play on stage, I require a minimum of 8 voices. Therefore, I am currently considering the ObX8, Prophet 10 and UB-Xa as alternative options. The UB-Xa has particularly impressed me, especially considering its unprecedented price point. I hope to have the opportunity to play it next week.

What does trying it in person mean?

Can’t answer that as I only had the P5 Rev 3 and the OBXa … but since the P5 is generally regarded as ‘better’ than the Pro 600 … it still might be relevant that ‘for me’ … the Prophet went and the OBXa is unlikely ever to leave … except for maintenance and repairs!

A6 andromeda?

Yeah, that’s the only other one I could think of. Was talking mainly about the ones that have come out in the last 6-8 years. The only ones that come close are the Rev2 and the Take 5, and they are not that close, both in terms of features and front panel accessibility of those features. 70+ knobs and sliders on the PB front panel is a huge deal, but there are so many other ways to set the PB up to your taste. Basically, there are dozens of ways to customize the Polybrute that go way beyond what you get from an init patch. I don’t think I’ve used the stock init patch since I got it 2 1/2 years ago. I also don’t think the presets show it off very well. Too much modulation and too much modulation that you don’t hear unless you used the ribbon or the Morphee, so you’re gonna hear something kind of bland until you move them. And very few of the presets have the PB set up like I have mine set up. It’s that customization that I love about it, but it also means that you won’t like what you hear unless the sound designer has a setup that gels with your tastes. For me, that’s not often.

In hand, at length, on a retail demo unit (at Sweetwater), rather than simply scrolling through YouTube links. I had the money burning a hole in my pocket, and had the space, but there were other devices that simply sounded better in terms of tone.

I generally start with a few initialized patches and work my way through a few patch scenarios, rather than relying on the factory patch sets to make a determination. As always, your mileage may vary.

People are so "love it, or blah on the core sound" with the Polybrute because the presets go all over the place, but never really focus on anything familiar, and it goes so much further "out there" so much more quickly than a lot of other synths (because 70 knobs, huge ranges and deep modular patching). Arturia seem to want sound designers to show off odd and new things that can be done with the architecture, but then lose sales to people who just "want instant 80s".

But frankly, it's not fast. It's a 6 voice modular that can save a preset, with expressive controls, but absolutely CAN sound like this comparison to a Jupiter 8 where it holds its own. I have made many killer presets like this that just breathe, and am very thankful as I'd never be able to afford or maintain a classic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DK3Phm-7O_c

But it's going to be more expensive and potentially harder to wrap your head around with the 2 mixable filters and myriad options for gain staging. Once you do, then it becomes a true chameleon, able to imitate many other sounds from Roland, Yamaha and Oberheim. If you have a strong background in the subtleties of real analog synthesis and how to use mixing and saturation to affect the filters, then it will take less time to get moving with it.

I'm more into the sound exploration aspect of it though, and want to go beyond the simple, whereas others might find this a waste of time, especially if they are using it in a context where time spent matters and they just need a classic synth to detune-and-rip-it during a synthwave session. UB-Xa is something that should have a signal flow pre-baked in that sounds "like that synth". You know what you're getting and it's easier to compartmentalize in your mind.

Although UB-Xa was the synth I was waiting for release before I decided to just go ahead with Polybrute about a year and a half ago, I won't be adding one now, as I know how to exercise the restraint needed to get vintage poly sounds with the Brute. Glad I did though, as I've been on quite a sonic journey outside that area ever since and feel like it has almost endless possibilities yet to be discovered!

Do you need both and is there overlap? Well, the Polybrute's sound tends to be more luxurious, warm and deep but can do anything with potentially a lot of time put in if you aren't already a good analog programmer, but if you are just playing straight-forward awesome classic sounds and would prefer more than 6 voices for that, I can see how hard the decision has become, especially with the price on the UB-Xa, but I'd probably wait to hear more on that when it is finally released to end-users who can discuss it here once they've actually tried it in person.

closer than ob-x8

I did, and returned the UB-Xa. The UB-Xa sounded superb, but didnt have audio rate poly mod like the Pro 800 and cost 3x more.

I did not find the sound to be inspiring or enjoyable in my personal experience. I also noticed that the Polybrute has a very low sales ranking of 40 on Thomann, while the UB-Xa is currently ranked number 1. Hopefully, I will have the opportunity to test the UB-Xa for a few days next week before making a purchase decision. It's important for me to personally evaluate the unit before committing to it. According to my own preferences and the opinions of some of my friends, the Polybrute is not well-liked. However, taste in music equipment can vary greatly from person to person. I just find it unacceptable for a 61-key synthesizer to only have 6 voices.

Synths like the UBXA have a specific character baked in so work great for less experienced sound designers, or people who just don’t enjoy getting into the details or just want to move quickly.

The Polybrute doesn’t have a ‘core sound’ in the way a synth like the UBXA does, It’s got such a flexible architecture you can make it sound like completely different synths. It’s something of a chameleon. I suspect if they’d stuffed the presets with mainly big warm and soft vintage pads then that’s what people who had a quick play would think the core sound is. Same for if they’d focused on hard edged dubstep wubs or spaced out evolving soundscapes. But it can do all this and more and does it extremely well. It has earned its spot in the poly synth heavyweight category.

The downside of such a flexible synth is that you have to work to dial the character in, it can sound a little bland until you start adding a little nudge of drive here, some vintage mode envelope and tuning variation there, maybe some stereo spread, a touch of saturation and eq boost on the stereo bus, maybe select a different envelope curve, a hint of noise, maybe some noise to the filter cut off, then perhaps some lfo and controller assignments to add some movement and animation and so on.

Sometimes it’s nice to work on a more basic synth that sounds exactly like you want it to from the moment you init a patch and twist the cutoff. Or maybe you are mainly a preset user and you find the UBXA presets more suited to your style, or to at least have them available. It can be nice to have both types of synth, I have an OB6 sat underneath my Polybrute.

The UBXA has very limited scope for nonlinear sounds, like audio rate FM, filter FM, AM (using a fast looping envelope), Waveshaping (via metalizer) and all that weird sync stuff.

This might not worry you, if you’re making vanilla music, buy the vanilla synth ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I don't own both, but I'm thinking of buying PB (behr synths are no buy for me).

I really don't believe the opinions that PB sound is lacking something. I think that one must be aware of gain staging when playing with PB (every synth really), i.e. don't overdrive it. I can bet that oscillators into filters at 9 o'clock sounds way better than say at past noon. Don't kill the sound with the brute/drive on the filters. Play safe with VCA sustain. Then you get clean and nuanced sound at the outputs.
Next thing is simplicity. Think about it - how simple are analog Prophets/Oberheims. Try to use less of PB features to get sounds in the same ballpark (if this is what you want).

plexiglass has a very important point here for those who get a chance to demo. The PolyBrute's versatility is its greatest strength and also weakness for a lot of would-be purchasers, and the VCA sustain slider is just one excellent example.

It saturates and crushes the sound dynamics, often rolling off the high end at the last couple marks of its travel, and this has nothing to do with OSC into filter, for example, which is about all you can often do on a simpler synth.

This tip opens up a world of sound possibilities alone, but it is also a warning as most of the presets Polybrute comes with have this slider maxed. I lower it slightly and compensate for overall volume in a number of different places and I can get it to sizzle and punch dynamically as hard as I'd want an Oberheim to do. Then on top of this, you have an EQ effect setting that will now sound extra good with a clean signal.

Polybrute is so special with how "open" it is for analog.

I have an 08 and it sounds very Oberheimer-y. It’s usually people who never owned one or that can’t program that make your type of comment.

The REV2 sounds Oberheim-y but it's a different Oberheim in this case, the Matrix 1000.

I can't say it sounds like a OBXa or that it sounds more like an OBXa than the UBXa.

I have one, it's good, but not quite in the same league.

Honestly haven’t heard anything special with the obxa that I can’t easily do with my 08 and at most a tiny bit of EQ. People are willing to spend thousands on an EQ bump or cut, it’s crazy. The obxa is a very basic synth for basic sounds. Maybe I should stay out of this as I never understood the appeal of such synths or even the minimoog. Basic boring sounds for the most money.