The following is a list of the instruments available on each CD: This is particularly welcome, since getting your hands on an instrument such as the highly collectable Roland CR78 isn't at all easy their owners tend to keep them locked away, out of reach of prying microphones!

The sounds themselves are largely digital recordings of sample playback machines, although there are a number of 'older' instruments in the collection, such as an Oberheim Xpander and Linn 9000 drum machine. There are (currently) three CDs in the Masterbits collection and each features samples taken from a wide variety of modern instruments. Consequently, I've developed a desperate need for a collection of high quality synthesizer sounds - if only to keep the amount of synthesizer equipment down to a size which will fit in my studio, and which the national grid can support! So when the Masterbits CD collection dropped through my letterbox, I greeted them with some enthusiasm. My sampler, an Akai S950, is rapidly becoming one of the real workhorses in my studio, ranking in importance alongside my trusty Atari ST and the coffee pot.

What I'd recently discovered was yet another fundamental rule of the studio - a sample library is never big enough to satisfy every potential customer! This is a problem which, sooner or later, confronts every owner of a sampling machine. The arrival of the Masterbits CD sample collection came as something of an answer to this reviewer's prayers.

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