Roland SP-808

The SP-808 Groove Sampler is the first product of its kind—a sampling and recording workstation which is one part professional-quality phrase sampler; one part hard disk audio recorder. Developed to meet the needs of a growing "remix" and sampling-based music market, the SP-808 provides everything DJs, sampling musicians and remix artists need to lay down fat grooves and create professional-quality remixes.

• Professional remix-oriented phrase sampler/hard disk audio recorder with 8 tracks (4 stereo audio tracks) and 16 assignable sample pads per bank (64 banks total)
• Built-in Zip drive records all audio tracks and stores all samples on removable 100MB Zip disks; 64 minutes/1024 samples can be stored on a single disk, ready for instant access
• Remix-oriented features include automatic tempo calculation and display, resampling functions and time stretch functions
• Onboard dance-music oriented effects include high-quality Roland reverb, chorus and delay effects as well as "Lo-fi," "Wah," "Isolator" and synth effects
• Onboard Step Modulator effect simulates a classic Roland analog synth, modulating pitch, LFO, etc. in sequential steps
• Revolutionary Dual D-Beam Controller allows for effects and sample control via hand and body movement over infrared light beam
• Three assignable control knobs for realtime effects control
• Can be used as a basic digital multi-track recorder
• Optional I/O board transfers all audio in the digital domain and provides 6 additional analog outputs
• Note that this product is no longer in production. Similar capabilties can be found in the SP-808EX e-Mix Studio.