Alesis Andromeda A6

Hi, 

New member here - I just recently acquired an Andromeda. At the moment I have mixed feelings about it. For such an expensive synth, I'm fairly appalled at the obvious cost-cutting that went into the hardware design - cheap, wobbly pcb mounted pots/knobs (also the silver finish is different on the different sized knobs, very strange, anyone else have this?), cheap laminated control panel, cheap and fragile end cheeks etc. But the one thing I find most annoying is the screen - it is very low contrast, with poor backlight and poor angle of visibility. I want to replace this with a nice blue/white or black/white LED screen. Has anyone done this? does it use a standard T6963C controller screen, or something more exotic?

Another thing that bothers me greatly is the amount of digital noise/hash that is present in the audio signal, it is very obvious on some bass sounds - a kind of halo of noise that surrounds the signal. I've heard this type of noise before on other equipment and it is very noticable to me (though I find some people are totally oblivious to it) I believe it is caused by low resolution digital processing used in some areas (envelopes, lfos, modulation etc) It is nothing to do with the effects (and don't get me started on that bloody awful reverb - its on every preset practically, including the bass sounds, why!). What bothers me most about this is that I know it will never be fixed, even if it was fixable in an os update this will never happen now.

On the plus side though, I do like the basic sound of this synth, very solid, very American, very different from everything else I own. Also the complexity of the voice architecture, the individual outputs for each voice, The possibilities are obvious. The keyboard and ribbon controller are very good. I have heard some demos on youtube and elsewhere that showcase some fantastic sounds, world-class pads, an amazing theremin sound etc. Does anyone know if these sounds are available anywhere, as the sounds in my A6 are very poor in general (I think they are the original factory sounds, lots of utterly crap arpeggios and 'tekno' sounds all drowning in reverb).

Anyway, sorry for the first post rant! I'm sure that once I learn a bit more about this synth I will hopefully grow to like it a bit more and overlook its deficiencies. I'm just wondering if anyone else had the same feelings when they first got their Andromeda.

cheers, vout