I'm convinced that it's a combination of the effects section and the speaker response.

Yamaha is no dummy - they design these things to sound good out of the box, but as soona s we begin to customize and tweak ..... the shortcoming are more noticable. Maybe I'm in the minority of buyers, but I need to hear more sizzle out of their drum kits and as a Rhodes lover - I rely on the EPs way more than the acoustic piano sounds ... they need to clean upo the effects section so that the noice floor is reduced.

The effects section is very versatile and practical, but it's pretty noisy compared to other gear. In the unaltered state - the psr3k sounds great ...... a little dull in the high end, but great. As soon as you add some high end EQ ..... the "hissing of summer lawns" all over again.
(Thanx, Joni)