>Like why do they even need DSP chips, might as well just run a VST softsynth with a MIDI keyboard
When your analog synth has presets, it's because there's a DSP chip in there that's helping to record, store, and replay voltage values for the knobs and sliders and switches in the analog signal path. If your analog synthesizer has a sequencer, there's a pretty solid chance that's done on a chip. If your analog synthesizer has a modern modulation matrix, you need a DSP chip for that. If your analog synthesizer has a method for self-calibration, you need a DSP for that.
The signal path stays analog in any of these situations, but the DSP helps you manufacture things that aren't feasible with simple components.
There's a lot of cool stuff you can do with VSTs. There's a lot of weird-ass gain staging/overdrive stuff I can do with boxes on my desk that plug into each other, or even within a singular synthesizer, which cannot currently be replicated effectively with code. One day it'll catch up. Roland's ACB is a few years old now, but it's pretty good at mimicking 40 year old technology. It took a long time for a Windows machine to run an SNES emulator at a decent enough rate to play what was already at the time very old technology.
I've got a mixing console from 1978 that I prefer to VSTs. The Poly Evolver Keyboard I have is as old as YouTube... nothing else sounds like it, there is no emulation of it, and I'm glad I don't need a 2005-era computer kicking around to keep it running.
This is not to discount that there are amazing VSTs, and that physical controller options are amazing today (and amazingly inexpensive), but these are different options, not better options.
> When your analog synth has presets, it's because there's a DSP chip in there that's helping to record, store, and replay voltage values for the knobs and sliders and switches in the analog signal path. If your analog synthesizer has a sequencer, there's a pretty solid chance that's done on a chip. If your analog synthesizer has a modern modulation matrix, you need a DSP chip for that. If your analog synthesizer has a method for self-calibration, you need a DSP for that.
None of these things are done with a DSP chip. They're done with a microcontroller roughly equivalent to an early-80s home computer.
When your analog synth has presets, it's because there's a DSP chip in there that's helping to record, store, and replay voltage values for the knobs and sliders and switches in the analog signal path. If your analog synthesizer has a sequencer, there's a pretty solid chance that's done on a chip. If your analog synthesizer has a modern modulation matrix, you need a DSP chip for that. If your analog synthesizer has a method for self-calibration, you need a DSP for that.
The signal path stays analog in any of these situations, but the DSP helps you manufacture things that aren't feasible with simple components.
There's a lot of cool stuff you can do with VSTs. There's a lot of weird-ass gain staging/overdrive stuff I can do with boxes on my desk that plug into each other, or even within a singular synthesizer, which cannot currently be replicated effectively with code. One day it'll catch up. Roland's ACB is a few years old now, but it's pretty good at mimicking 40 year old technology. It took a long time for a Windows machine to run an SNES emulator at a decent enough rate to play what was already at the time very old technology.
I've got a mixing console from 1978 that I prefer to VSTs. The Poly Evolver Keyboard I have is as old as YouTube... nothing else sounds like it, there is no emulation of it, and I'm glad I don't need a 2005-era computer kicking around to keep it running.
This is not to discount that there are amazing VSTs, and that physical controller options are amazing today (and amazingly inexpensive), but these are different options, not better options.