tj,
I have the su-700, and it's an okay sampler. It has onbaords effects ( most of which suck) and other features. I am pretty much indifferent about this sampler, but if I had the choice to buy it again, I would not. It has three types of samples, loops, composed loops (these are loops which you make by hitting the pad in some rhythm during a measure and it loops that rhythm) and free. This can be annoying at times. The sequencer is not the greatest, because it doesn't allow step recording. I use it along side of an
RM1x, I prefer that sequencer better because it's better than
the su-700's. I only use the 700 as a drum module/machine. Oh yeah, the loops can be sliced so that you can speed up or slow down samples without having the pitch change, but don't get it twisted. When you slow samples down you can hear the difference. Speeding them up is actually not that bad.
The effects are okay, but they sound really metallic, at least on drums they do. You can edit the effects, high/low pass filters, reverb time/length. It's an okay sampler, but I am new to the world of samplers. It can not be used like rackmounts, and when you control it with MIDI, every sample that is to be controlled must be routed to a midi channel, and not a note. As I said before, I am indifferent about this sampler. Some days I hate it and others I love it. I know it's tempting to try to get one, because it's kind of cheap, but it's cheap for a reason. If you can I would say save up and get
the mpc 2000, or look into rack mount samplers. I hope this helped
peace,
da muzicman