Overview – Dave Smith Instruments PROPHET 12 KEYBOARD User Manual

Page 11

Prophet 12 Operation Manual

Overview

Overview

This is a brief overview of the Prophet 12’s capabilities and its operation.

More in-depth information about specific parameters can be found in the

reference section of the manual. However, don’t let a lack of familiarity

with either the instrument or synthesis prevent you from turning knobs

and pressing buttons. That’s what they’re there for! You won’t break

anything and you can always get back to where you started, even if you

have no idea what you’re doing. Great things can occur with synthesizers

when you don’t quite know what to expect, so start twiddling and keep

your ears—and mind—open.

Getting Started

The Prophet 12 is a twelve-voice, polyphonic synthesizer. That means

up to twelve distinct notes can play simultaneously. The Prophet 12 is a

hybrid synthesizer. That is, it uses a combination of digital and analog

audio electronics to generate its sounds, called programs.

The Prophet 12 contains 792 programs organized into eight banks of 99.

Half the programs are in four Factory banks and the rest are in four User

banks. When a Prophet 12 leaves the factory, the User banks are an exact

copy of the Factory banks. Program 1 in bank 1 of the User banks is the

same as program 1 in bank 1 of the Factory banks, User program 2 is the

same as Factory program 2, and so on. All programs in either the Factory

or User banks can be edited using the front panel controls, but the edits

cannot be saved to the Factory banks, only the User banks. The Factory

banks are read only, permanent.

Choosing programs is simple. Choose U

ser

anks

or F

actory

anks

use B

ank

elect

to choose bank 1, 2, 3, or 4, and then use the numeric

keypad to enter the program number, 01 through 99. Or use P

and

own

to step though consecutive programs.

While auditioning programs, it should become obvious that some

programs are split—two different sounds can be played from different

zones of the keyboard—and some are stacked—one sound is layered on

another. The Prophet 12 is bi-timbral. That is, it can play two different

sounds simultaneously and each of those sounds can be routed to its own

stereo outputs, if desired. Each of the Prophet 12’s program memory

locations is capable of saving and recalling two different programmed