Sorry, my bad. I didn't look at the controls closely enough, as I didn't see the additional knob til just now lol. I was describing what Unison Detune does, not Unison Spread. I'm not 100% sure what Unison Spread is..!? Maybe how spread apart the 2 or 4 layers are from left to right in the stereo field perhaps!? I'm curious to know this now. The DX7II had Unison Mono and Unison Poly with Unison Detune. I thought they had just renamed Detune to Spread, but apparently not and they added a further enhancement to Unison from the 35 years ago lol

Korg describes Unison Spread this way:

Spread (Unison Spread)
The spread (UNISON SPREAD) controls how widely the sounds are
spread over the stereo field in Unison mode.

I think it's worth looking at how the AN1x worked:

UNISON
This mode is great for getting those “fat” analog-type
sounds of the legendary vintage synths. In Unison
mode, the data of the currently selected Scene is
multiplied. Polyphony is determined by the Poly mode
setting (see page 72). For example, if Poly mode is set
to “mono” or “legato”, then one Note On message will
use five notes of polyphony; if it is set to “poly”, then
one Note On message will use two notes of polyphony.
The Unison Detune function (see page 76) lets you decide the detuning for the
Unison in order to fatten the sound.

Separate
The Separate parameter adjusts the amount of
amplitude between left and right outputs. The result
depends on Pan type setting (see above).
Settings: 0 (no effect) ~ 32
If Pan setting = “off”:
• When Layer mode (see page 22) is set to SINGLE, the
panning will have no effect.
• When Layer mode is set to UNISON, higher values create
a wider stereo dimension by separating the two to up to
five sounds. (Poly mode generates two sounds with each
key pressed, and Mono/Legato mode generates five
sounds with each key pressed.)
• When Layer mode is set to DUAL/DUAL UNISON, or
SPLIT/SPLIT UNISON, higher values create a wider stereo
dimension by separating Scene 1 and Scene 2 sounds.

The fatness you can get from just one Oscillator using AN-X (without even using effects) is amazing. Then you have 3 of those oscillators available in one voice. I don't think I'll be using unison mode very often with what AN-X offers in one voice.

Then you have 3 of those oscillators available in one voice

Not up to speed yet on the M8X AN-X stuff.

But it looks like Oscillators 1 and 2 operate in parallel (ala FM-X carriers).

And Oscillator can feed the inputs of Oscillators 1 and 2 and modulate them as well as be inputs
for the two ring modulators that the outputs of Oscillators 1 and 2 also feed with the resulting pair of signals joining Oscillator 3 and the Noise maker going to either Filter 1 or directly to the Amp.

Lots of options.

Even so - that is a LOT of horsepower.

Interesting, so as I kinda suspected Unison Spread "controls how widely the sounds are
spread over the stereo field in Unison mode" as @Jason mentioned.

The 'Symphonic' insert effect basically is 4 or 6 Poly Unison, but with Unison Spread set to FULL, and there's no way to dial it down. The issue with Unison spread is that the Unison 'thickness' becomes reduced as you spread the layers across the stereo field. When it's Unison 4 (mono) with no spread, it is at it's peak 'thickness'. I experimented quite a bit with the 'Symphonic' and 'Pitch Change' Insert effects. With 'Pitch Change' you can adjust everything to pan to the center with no Unison spread. If you want 'Symphonic' with less spread, adding it as the first Insert effect and then 'Pitch Change' as the second insert effect allows you to control the stereo field...

I guess the upside of using 'Symphonic' and 'Pitch Change' Insert effects vs Poly 'Unison', is that you don't lose any polyphony on the respective engine. The down sides are that (a) you use up both Insert effects if you want the 4 Unison Poly, and (b) if there is a subtle wave in the sound/voice, then 'Symphonic' and/or 'Pitch Change' don't smooth it out & actually make it more prevalent, whereas Unison does smooth it out!

AN-X polyphony was not a topic of the recent ANX tech talk.

Still learned some generic things about what the monochrome sub display is showing. Not necessarily the subject of the talk but useful in its own right.

On the AN-X side it was good to see Blake dig into most all parameters you can reach with the sub display. The more or less end-to-end approach was appreciated. Other presenters had a more narrow focus due to time constraints vs. the depth of items they would have had to cover to be as comprehensive. Good overviews.

On the AN-X side it was good to see Blake dig into most all parameters you can reach with the sub display.

Generally speaking the sub display gives you access to most all of the upper level parameters in each area but you then need to use PAGE JUMP to be able to edit the details.

One example is tha you can see/modify element level and ON/OFF switch for elements 1-8 but for any other element level parms you need to use the main display.

And you can't do anything at all with elements 9-128 on the sub display. Nor can you mute or solo them at all.

The sub and main displays are NOT 'synced' except when you 'jump' one way or the other to sync them.

One MAJOR thing that Blake demo'd but didn't specifically state is that all of those parameter changes affect the sound in real-time. That is, they affect the notes you are currently playing and not just new notes that you play.

That infuses that same 'NOW" ability to motion sequences and embedded controller movements within arpeggios and MIDI data.

And it may have impacts on SSS - seamless sound switching. If you switch performances twice the sounds immediately cuts off with the 2nd switch

1. load CFX Concert - a one part performance - stay on the performance home screen
2. press and hold F major triad
3. turn the data dial one step clockwise to load CFX Stage - another one part perf
4. F major still sounding
5. turn the data dial clockwise to load CFX Pop/Rick - another one part perf
6. sound immeditaly cuts off

Several things I don't know about the above:

1. whether SSS has always worked that way
2. whether SSS is 'supposed' to work that way
3. whether this is something new, possibly related to the ability to change parms in real-time. Of course we aren't really making any parm changes in that test.

One more thing to be aware of.