I have an XF at the moment but I’m looking for a rack synth to use with Roland guitar synth gear and possibly a small portable keyboard. Basically I don’t want to have to drag the XF/stand etc around to gigs as well as guitar stuff.

How similar is the XS rack to the XF sound-wise. I’m not too worried about the control knobs/sliders/switches etc, just how the sound/architecture compares between the two

Comments/opinions please!

Mike

I don’t have XF, but MOXF which is 100% sound compatible with XF and I have Rack XS.
I know that there were posts here at Motifator about sound comparisons between XF and MOXF, but
let’s say that sound is the same or almost the same.
Both Rack XS and MOXF sounds are laying on the same 8 element architecture with expanded articulation and VCM effects. MOXF has more arpeggios than XS and some more sounds due to the larger waveform ROM capacity, but 6600 arpeggios in Rack XS is quite enough, esp. for the purpose that you have planned.
When I checked the same performances both in MOXF and in Rack XS where it is called Multi (with Layer 1-4 parts switch on), I couldn’t hear the difference. Maybe it should take longer time and careful listening, but I couldn’t find any difference the first time when I tried MOXF. Examples are “Chilltronika”, “Double Dip the Funk”. Even on MOXF there is performance that is specifically made for Rack XS “2 Guitars for Mrs R”.

Alex