I agree about the comparisons, because today's hardware boards just don't have the sample rom capabilities of a soft synth. I have embraced soft synth technology and use it a lot, but I still like having one good workstation available for live play and for studio work as well. Sometimes using soft stuff, especially when one wants to do something instantly and "on the fly", can be a little more complicated than I like. Still, nothing currently available in hardware ( without having the actual boards they emulate ) compares sound wise to some of my favorite soft synths, such as the new Mini Moog V from Arturia and the B4 from NI for example.

Currently, my workstation is the Motif ES. It has great sounds ( for me ), but it isn't very user friendly in some areas. I'd miss a few things from it, like the VL acoustic modeling plug in and the way the user arps are set up ( very easy to make my own ), but I can get around the first one if I use my Windows ME computer and my SY-xg100 synth module, as it includes the VL acoustic softsynth, but does not work on XP.

The arps are less important, since I often prefer making my own stuff anyway. The tool that has become invaluable here is Fruity Loops studio. At first I thought of it as merely a glorifed drum machine that was best for techno and synth based music, but it really is much more than that.

So, that leaves me free to part with the ES if I choose to and possibly get the 'X' if I like it better. The Triton Extreme might also be a very good choice for me, as it appears ( atr least from the demo I heard ) that korg has put more effort into some of it's acoustic sounds. I am looking forward to the release of both of these boards.

AJ