Glenn,

I will tell you about my personal experience. As a follower of the Controller+Module route, and unlike Scott or Andrea, I never felt the disadvantage that both mention. Maybe I was lucky in finding the right placement for the module, despite my lack of experience. I have tried the one piece solution (a G1000) and currently own a Kurzweil SP76 controller+X4 module. I see no difference as far as the distance to the buttons is concerned. But it is possible that the fact that I don't "feel" the difference is due to my "less demanding" playing style (less frequent access to the buttons).

My main reason for going the module route is that I don't like the key feel of the majority of the arrangers. Another reason is that I prefer at least 76 keys, and there are a lot of arrangers with only 60 keys. When I bought my X4 I tested the keyboard version, the X1, and hated the feel of the keys. But maybe the situation will change in a near future, as manufacturers seem to be building better keys in their high-end models (in the newer Ketron models, for example, SD1 and XD9 have a better - very acceptable - key feel). By the way, I had the opportunity to test the new XD9 (I will tell you about it in a separated post). My impression is that the key feel is the same as the SD1.

-- José.