Akai Conventional Comparisons

Synopsis	Media	Physical	Interface	Architecture	Components	Resource

Conventional Family Picture

Typical analog subtractive synths, but surprisingly without MIDI Sysex support

Model	Released	MSRP	Synopsis	Ebay Description
	1984	$1395	Akai’s first synth, with features similar to Roland’s Juno and JX lines (e.g. sub oscillator, dual oscillator with both low and high pass filters). The AX80 also has a bar graph display for each of the parameters.	The Akai AX80 is a 61 key (velocity sensitive), 8 voice analog synthesizer, featuring dual oscillators (with sub), resonant low (24dB CEM) and high pass filters, dual envelopes, 3 LFOs, chord memory, and MIDI.
	1985	$895	Compensates for its single oscillator with chorus and unison mode. Replaces AX80 bar graph displays with dedicated sliders, osc crossmod with filter mod, chord memory with arpeggiator. Adds unison mode, external sampler audio input, waveforms, split.	The Akai AX60 is a 61 key (velocity sensitive), 6 voice, bitimbral analog synthesizer, featuring resonant low (24dB CEM) and high pass filters, dual envelopes, LFO, chorus, arpeggiator, and MIDI.
	1986	$1199	Swaps the AX60 dedicated controls for single parameter based editing. Swaps arpeggiator for more keys (keeps unison mode). Loses AX60 bitimbral mode, but can split keyboard MIDI output	The Akai AX-73 is a 73 key (velocity sensitive), 6 voice analog synthesizer, featuring resonant low (24dB CEM) and high pass filters, dual envelopes, LFO, chorus, portamento, and MIDI.
	1986	?	Rack AX73	The Akai VX-90 is a 2U rack (velocity sensitive), 6 voice analog synthesizer, featuring resonant low (24dB CEM) and high pass filters, dual envelopes, LFO, chorus, portamento, and MIDI.
	1988	$900	Similar to the AX-80 (dual oscillator, no chorus), but swaps an LFO for an extra envelope. Adds modulation matrix (10 source/destination pairs) and wind controller interface.	The Akai VX-600 is a 37 key (velocity and pressure sensitive), 6 voice, multitimbral analog synthesizer, featuring dual oscillators, resonant low (24dB CEM) and high pass filters, 3 envelopes, dual LFO, portamento, chord memory, MIDI, EWI/EVI wind interface compatibility, and extensive modulation routings.