via this auction"These monophonic synths came with a collection of new and interesting features, but also retain solid analog synth sound... Think SH-101 in terms of sound. The filter is also somewhat Moog-y, real smooth. The SH3 combines subtractive and additive synthesis, using a 5-octave mixable source oscillator. I've never seen anything quite like it. There is also a pink/white noise generator. This routes into the envelope and amplifier sections, each can be enveloped with the ADSR section, or with preset envelopes. These can also all be modded by 2 LFOs with 3 possible wave forms! And finally, add to this the craziest feature of them all, the "Sampler" Section. I'm still not entirely sure how this works, but it's roughly like an arpeggiator. In any case it can do some craaaazy sounds!"
Update via fanwander in the comments: "This is a long living misinformation:
The SH3 has a diode based ladder filter with five stages.
The SH3a has Ladder Filter with four transistor stages (more moogish than the SH-3).
The rumours that the version change of the SH-3a were caused by a law suit with moog, are wrong. In fact the SH-2000 is the only Roland synth which used a quite complete clone of the moog cascade filter. According to several knwoledged people on Analogue Heaven maillist the SH-2000 was the instrument that caused infringment of Robert Moogs patent.
Btw: I made a webpage with an overview on most of the filters of analogue roland synths including filter schematics. http://fa.utfs.org/diy/roland_filters/index.html"
