How can companies be trying to catch up when Yamaha isn't even ahead of the game? "SA" is just a bunch of glorified hype for a multi sampled sound. Multi samples have been around since the early days of high end samplers and most TOTL keyboards utilize them. My old Fairlight CMI III has sounds that make Yamaha's SA and Megavoices sound like poop. For that matter I've never heard any sampler have such an organic, raw, and full sound compared to the CMI III. Bring your PSR-S900 or Tyros over and we'll put it head to head with my antiquated Fairlight, you'll be amazed how anemic and unrealistic those Yamaha sounds are in comparison.

I seriously doubt Roland is desperately trying to catch up with Yamaha. One listen to Roland's top end keyboards clearly shows their sounds are competitive with nearly every other top end arranger or workstation made (with the exception of instruments like Wersi and Lionstracs that can support VST's). No embedded workstation or arranger can come close in sound to any workstation capable of utilizing VST's. Just listen to the Miroslav, Garritan, Kontakt, or Giga sound libraries and see how well your Yammy compares. It's not even in the running!