Since the recent resurrection of the Juno line in 2005, Roland has been busy honing and updating the range to keep it fresh. The Gi is the latest addition to the seemingly ever-expanding Juno range. To quickly put things into context, the Juno-D was the first of the new digital Juno’s followed by the Di. Then came the G (the D’s bigger brother with more sounds and features) and now the Gi. After the release of Roland’s step-in-the-right-direction Gaia earlier this year, we were hoping that the ‘new Juno’ would be a call-back to the brand’s celebrated 6, 60 and 106 past. Perhaps a high-end version of the Gaia? Maybe with some analogue chorus to boot? Maybe next time. “We can see the Roland Gi getting a lot of love from cruise ship and hotel entertainers.” So what’s different about the G and the Gi? Well, quite a bit it. First off, the Gi has double the waveform ROM (128MB vs 64MB in the G, so there are plenty of new sounds onboard (over 1,300 in fact). Secondly, Roland have done away with the sequencing and sampling and instead added a powerful eight-track digital recorder which can record to high capacity SDHC cards for quick and easy access. On top of this, sounds are now called ‘live sets’ and allow stacking of up to four tones/layers and the option for battery power has also been added. Lightweight Out of the box, we’re still amazed by how light these Juno boards are. So light in fact, that it can easily be picked up with one hand. Obviously with this lack of mass comes our first concern – build quality. Overall, it’s not bad but at a list price of £999 (street price £849) we were expecting something a little sturdier than a thin plastic case. In particular the sliders for the new digital recorder are too flimsy for our liking, though the dials and switchgear feel pretty solid. The keyboard is a five-octave affair (why no aftertouch?) but it’s not the best action in the world being a bit too stiffly sprung which impedes its playability. Certainly some sounds that have velocity layers react a little unpredictably – we were really expecting something more responsive and expensive-feeling at this price point. Front-panel wise there’s a lot crammed in with all available space used up. On the left is a door concealing the USB slot for a memory stick and from which you can also play MIDI files (SMF) or MP3/WAV/AIFF files for jamming along to. This is a handy feature particularly for solo performers (though the DiGital Recorder will not record to USB memory, only to the SDHC card/slot) though you could just take the Juno, a memory stick and microphone and perform a full-sounding gig on your own regardless. We can see the Gi getting a lot of love from cruise ship and hotel entertainers. We’ll let you decide whether that’s a good thing or not. Next is the D-Beam for air control of sounds, the volume control and then a section labelled keyboard that deals with MIDI control (this button puts the Gi in MIDI controller mode for controlling other MIDI equipment using the front panel switches, dials and sliders). Then there’s a split button (the Gi can have a up to two sounds layered each side of a user definable split point), a tempo button for controlling tempo of the arpeggiator and recorder independently (or you can sync them together), plus octave up and down and transpose. Finally, there’s the chord memory and arpeggiator section. Arpeggiator and Chord Memory Functions Everyone loves an arpeggiator and despite their clich