An 8-voice polyphonic analog synthesizer with a 61-note keyboard. The flagship of the Jupiter line, manufactured between 1980 and 1984.

The JP-8 features 2 syncable VCOs per voice. VCO1 has a 4 octave range and is switchable between sawtooth, triangle, pulse and square waveforms. VCO2 replaces square wave with a noise generator. The oscillators can be modulated by either or both of the LFO and ENV1.
A simple mixer is available for adjusting the oscillator levels, with a slider for cross-modulation. PWM has its own slider for modulation level, and it can be switched between LFO, ENV1 and manual.

The filter section offers a low-pass resonant VCF switchable between 12 and 24dB/octave (2-/4-pole). It has controls for frequency & resonance, and can be modulated by one of the envelope generators, LFO or keyboard tracking. Sliders for controlling modulation amount are available for all the sources.
A non-resonant high-pass VCF is also included, but it can't be modulated and only has a single slider for adjustment.

The LFO features sine, sawtooth, square and random (sample/hold) waveforms. There are typical controls for rate and delay, as well as modulation amount for the VCO and VCF.
Two ADSR envelope generator are included. The polarity of ENV1 can be inverted, and ENV2 controls the VCA.

The keyboard can be split and layered. In the dual mode, the polyphony is dropped to 4 voices, allowing two instruments to be played at once.
4 modes of play are available. Solo is a monophonic mode with 2 oscillators. Unison uses all the VCOs dividing them between all played voices, which means whopping 8 VCOs at once when playing a single note! Poly 1 is the normal 8-voice polyphonic mode, while Poly 2 cuts off the release of all playing notes as the user lifts their hands off the keyboard.

64 user patches can be stored in JP-8's internal memory. It can also hold up to 8 "patch presets", which can contain keyboard splits and modulation settings.
Other features include an arpeggiator * with external sync, a bender with an exceptionally wide range and flexible modulation routings, a programmable hold function and external input to the VCF and VCA.
No MIDI is featured on the JP-8, but third party retrofit kits are widely available and relatively easy to install.

* can be heard set to the sample/hold in the 80s hit Rio by Duran Duran


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