You're asking the wrong person to ask me. But I bought a Tascam Pocketstudio and took it back and got the Fostex and am far happier. I paid $280 I think. Now they have ones for $350 that have drum machines in them. I really am not a good person to ask. One thing I'll say, I _hate_ the way the screen is on the MR8. It is not tilted and you can't read it without lifting the damn thing up to get an angle on it. Horrible engineering there.

The machine works fine. Except I can only record one song or one song and maybe one track on another. I gave up. Now, I record one, then upload (USB) to the computer. I have been shopping for bigger compact flash than the 128mb that came with it. 512mb would do it.