You're right about the timing issue Rikki, but on the T2 I only notice it when no style is playing, ie I use two or more pads at the same time. When a style plays, the pads seem to pick up the cadence fine. Then again maybe I've just gotten used to deploying them at the right time when I'm playing.

I agree with those who are from the school of thought that no one arranger is the right choice for everyone. I also agree with the folks who say that we see little discussion about folks digging in and using some of the power that all of these boards have. It would seem that we tend to want to look to what might happen a year from now instead of using what we already have. I still, however, have my 2 dinosaurs and use them often.

The PA80's multipads are good for use as on / off controllers, not much else, but the styles sound great, and I made adjustments to some of the fills and they seam together with the main variations much better. Some of the panel voices are excellent, unfortuantely for me, the guitars and pianos aren't ( so subjective tho.. ). I've spent a good deal of time customizing the board for me, and have dug deep into it, and probably because of this, I didn't feel the need to run out and get it's successor.

The MZ2000 has no multipads, and it's styles could be better ( a lot better in some cases ), but it does have a great synth engine onboard and some surprisngly good panel voices, ( nice synths, guitars, saxes, and organs w/ sliders for the drwbars )given the amount of sampling rom, along with a chord sequencer that other folks would love to have on their modern boards. It also has an onboard style conversion utility ( Roland and Technics format ) that works pretty well. Mine has quite a few good sounding converts in it.

Still, both boards were approaching 6-7 years old last year, and it really WAS time for something new. When I went looking and ultimately chose the T2, I had a few specific thoughts in mind. Multipads that I could actually create and modify, and use in real time, and excellent panel voices so I didn't feel compelled to use VST's for live play. For me, the T2 satisfies both needs, and I'm gonna stick with it for quite a while. Also a key factor was all of the third party stuff provided by very generous folks like Michael P Bedesem and Jorgen Sorenson, along with many other resources. These utilities were among the past positive experiences I had with my earlier PSR's that led me toward a Yamaha, but this is the first TOTL Yamaha arranger I've ever owned ( I did have a PSR 9k for a brief time in the studio on loan ).


I'll also admit that I do get some kind of a gear lust thing going on every time I see the G70 and E80 at my local music shop. For the current year though, my gear lust hasn't cost me quite so much. My main purchases were a relatively inexpensive acoustic guitar and soon to be the Software RealStrat app from Musiclabs. The latter sounds ( and looks ) awesome on the video demos and I hope I can master it enough to get the same sounds.

I think the old cliche is true though, about one man's junk being another's treasure, although none of the current boards are junk, but I guess some might perceive them that way. Because of the priorities I stated above, neither the PA800 and the G70 would have worked as well for me, but that's an individual thing because of what I felt I needed in a board. Everyone else's priorities will differ, so I think it's best to keep an open mind to that when we ( sometimes so rigorously )explain our purchases here.

Regards,

AJ




[This message has been edited by Bluezplayer (edited 09-17-2007).]