E-MU Proteus/1

E-MU Proteus/1

W × H × D (mm)	482.6 x 44.45 × 215.9
Rack units	1U
Weight	2kg
Type	Fully-editable ROMpler sound module
Manufacturer	E-MU Systems
Release date	1989
Parts	16
Max polyphony	32
Normal presets	192
Expansion	4MB Expansion Board Orchestral Expansion Invision Protologic Expansion

The E-MU Proteus/1 is a 1U rackmount sound module synthesizer created by E-MU Systems in 1989, made to the likes of units like the Roland U-220, being E-MU's first foray into making a rackmount synthesizer module. And much like the U-220 takes from sampled content from the S-series samplers, the Proteus/1 takes a lot of its sampled content from the Emulator III sampler.

Presenting itself with an average 16x2 character display and uniquely being made of plastic, the Proteus/1 takes another major economical measure of having no realtime effects, but did have a notable quantity of sound contents and 16-part multi-timbrality. The Proteus/1 would be labelled the "Pop/Rock" module with later produced units, since the Proteus/1 focuses on a large range of instruments for contemporary production, and would be followed up by the Proteus/2 and Proteus/3, focusing on Orchestral and World instruments respectively.

The sounds of the Proteus/1 and the rest of the Proteus series would find themselves on later E-MU products and software. A digital version of the Proteus/1 is officially offered in Digital Sound Factory's "E-MU Proteus Legacy" Kontakt library, however the sound is often inaccurate.

Sound Generation

The Proteus/1 is fully editable ROMpler synthesizer. Presets are made up of 2 oscillators known "pri" (primary) and "sec" (secondary) that can hold one of Proteus/1's 125 instrument tones. An instrument tone can have its sound reversed. Along with a preset having its own global volume envelope/ADSR, each oscillator has pitch/tuning, panning, chorus and ADSR available.

Each oscillator also features 2 programmable LFOs with 5 waveshape options.

The two oscillators can also be split to different parts of the keyboard or interact with an editable crossfade across the keyboard range. Up to 4 presets can be linked together and split simultaneously.

Variants

Proteus/1 XR

The Proteus/1 XR features more RAM than the original module, adding an extra 192 user-programmable preset locations (with 128 of those being new presets), bringing the overall total to 384 (256 RAM; 128 ROM).

Protologic Invision Proteus/1

There was an expansion board created by Invision that would add 4 MBs of sounds to the Proteus/1, featuring 70 instrument tones and 128 presets of sounds like basses, keyboards, horns, percussion, synths, etc.

There were also Proteus/1s that had the expansion pre-installed, which had a distinctive yellow squiggle graphic to the side of the "PROTEUS/1 16 BIT MULTI-TIMBRAL DIGITAL SOUND MODULE" text on the module.

Proteus/1 Plus Orchestral

A Proteus/1 Plus Orchestral is another variant that features an extra 4 MBs of sounds, and all of the instrument tones and 128 ROM presets from the Proteus/2.

There was also an expansion board that upgraded a standard Proteus/1 to this model that was hinted at and eventually announced at an E-MU Audio Engineering Society exhibit in Los Angeles in September 1990. This was offered by E-MU for installation at their service centers.

Proteus MPS / Proteus MPS Plus Orchestral

The Proteus Master Performance System, or better known as the Proteus MPS is a keyboard version of the Proteus/1 that adds 2 effects processors with 32 effects, featuring 200 presets and is expandable to 300 with a RAM card. The piano preset from the original Proteus is also replaced with a mono version of the piano sound from the Proformance/1 piano module.

The Proteus MPS Plus Orchestral, similarly to the Proteus/1 Plus Orchestral, adds all 4 MBs from the Proteus/2 and more ROM presets utilizing them. And much like the Proteus/1 Plus Orchestral, there was an expansion board to upgrade a standard MPS to a Plus model as well.

Digidesign MacProteus

The MacProteus is a computer sound card version of the Proteus/1 produced by Digidesign for Macintosh computers in 1990.

One Stop Music Shop

The One Stop Music Shop is an Amiga sound card produced by Blue Ribbon Soundworks based on the Proteus/1 in 1992. It uniquely features GM support unlike the rest of the Proteus series.

Oddities

• The Proteus/1 responds to the standard MIDI panning message, however it is divided into 17 segments going in either a negative direction/left (-1 to -8) or a positive direction (1-8) with 0 being center and each value corresponds to an arbitrary MIDI panning number. Though, for some reason these values are slightly offset - a center panning message (0) is actually +1, or slightly right on the Proteus/1.

External Links

• Proteus Operation Manual
• Proteus/1 Demo Sequence