More from the YPKO forum.....

"I agree with your comments re Updates above. This is the sensible approach that virtually all manufacturers take...doesn't matter what the product is.. Yamaha is building incrementally on the technology they developed for T1 and T2.....adding new features/capabilites as the technology improves/evolves. The Operating system and User Interface is remaining quite consistent and familiar...just extensions for the new capabilities. That makes sense..you don't want your customers to have to completely relearn a new User Interface with every product. That is the Challenge...to retain a consistent,intuitive user interface while adding new underlying technology/hardware /software.
Sometimes the new technology is so radically different that the complete architecture of the OS might have to change(rewrite required) and the User Interface may have to change as well. This often results in the New Generation products being incompatible with the previous ones.

I am happy that with the T3, Yamaha has been able to add new technology SA2 (new sound engine), improved DSP and other new features while retaining the Same basic User Interface.

Most importantly, the Production Model T3 which I played never once froze or hung up unlike many other newly introduced computer products. While much more real world experience is needed to tell for sure, this augurs well for the Reliability of the T3.

By the way I've used the Korg PA800 arranger ( latest generation) quite a bit and in my
humble opinion...Out of the Box , the Sounds and Preset capabilities of the T3 ( and even the T2) are far better. The T3 sounds are so much more Lively, Bright , Dynamic and the numerous styles are so immediately usable....with the PA800 a lot of tweaking/customizing has to be done to make many of the Sounds/Styles approach what you get out of the Box with the T3.
Mind you, the Korg PA800 is a good arranger with nice capabilities for Pros/Live playing( Dual Sequencers, Sampling, change key/tempo of Mp3 files, Guitar mode for Style Creation, etc) but it takes a lot of tweaking to get exactly what you want. I am blown away by how good T3 (and even T2) sounds out of the Box. Much better User Group/Forum support as well. Just my two cents."

Allan