First of all, sorry if this topic has already been covered somewhere else. Let me know and I’ll delete this and repost it in the appropriate thread.
I have a GT-1B I’m learning to use, and I have a question about the saw and square waves on the synth. Can someone explain to me how each effects the tone?
Hello there, I’m new to bass, but I did alot of electronic music in my younger years, and got to know a bit about this stuff back then.
there are 3 main types of pulses used in synths, sine wave, sawtooth wave, and square wave.
sine wave is the smoothest wave, and gives a smoother tone looks like this
sawtooth wave has a sharper form, instead of swooping round the transition it goes hard looks like this
And a square wave, is just brute forcing it, no slope just going straight from min to max like this
so in your bass synth, the sawtooth wave will give you more smooth sound, while the square wave is much harsher sound.
Hope this longwinded answer helps you at all 
dont know what more to say about it, just have good times experimenting
Okay, that makes sense. Thanks for explaining that!
Actually to me they sound the opposite.
Sine wave is indeed the smoothest sound and if pure has no harmonics.
Sawtooth wave sounds more “harsh” but a strong, clear tone and has all harmonics, both even and odd.
Square wave depends on the pulse width. If it’s actually a pure square wave, it sounds more mellow than a sawtooth, kind of hollow and “boopy”, though not as pure as a sine wave. As you narrow the pulse width it gets harsher and more thin/buzzy. Square waves contain only odd harmonics and so can get that distortion effect though, yeah.
Here’s some examples:
(I am a synth player as well, mainly.)
awesome thanks for correcting my error, keep adding to the knowledge
I wouldn’t say it was a mistake as sound is so subjective
That’s why I said “to me it sounds…” as different people can hear different things.
I am glad you asked this- I was pondering exactly the same and thinking about posting that question myself
