Ensnareyou, it isn't whether a SOUND is as good in a VSTi or an embedded keyboard, it is whether a brilliant style has been written for that sound...

You know perfectly well that if you perform a part on one sound, it rarely sounds as good simply switched over to another. Dynamics, timbral content, envelope times, all of these get factored into your playing, subconsciously.

Well, they get factored into the style, too. So it isn't, for me, about whether the piano sound is the ultimate best possible, or the drums, or the horns. That's all well and good for what YOU are playing, live. But it is also about the parts in the style. Without the style part and the sound being recorded together, all you EVER have, in effect, is TRANSLATED styles. Which, in my experience, rarely EVER sound as good as the original without extensive major modification.

Just take drums... Take the MIDI files that come with BFD, and use them on EZ Drummer's sound engine (or the other way round). Nowhere NEAR as good... the performance and the sound are ONE. Separate them, and you end up with something less than the sum of the parts.

So, without those VSTi's already preinstalled and the styles developed for them, you are always talking 'translated' styles. This is something the embedded arrangers do not do, much. The best of the ROM styles are developed for the very soundset they come with. The yin and the yang fit together. So, apologies, but I stand by my statement, and have the overall sound of the embedded' and MS style demos as all the proof I need.

Another thing to take into account, as you bring up the GB size of the MS's ROM (or OOTB) sounds is that, sorry, but GB does NOT express quality. Korg, Yamaha, Roland each put more money into sampling and developing sounds each year, and have done so for decades, than Lionstracs entire fiscal budget! This equates to sounds that are more coherent, and better balanced against each other, despite using a fraction of the RAM of the MS.

AND... they have styles developed by the best in the business to use them!

Dom gets it SO CLOSE, but doesn't finish the job (apparently, it's yours ) The only way to get better sounds as a whole than the embedded', you have to use VSTi's. But there are NO styles developed for those VSTi's, so back to square one.

The MS does seem to be better suited to being a WS, where the content isn't as vital to the value as an arranger, IMO, and the quality of the sounds alone reigns supreme. But this is an ARRANGER forum, and despite the embedded' lack of GB numbers for RAM, they almost undisputedly dominate the MS for overall quality of 'style and sound', which are a linked value system. Great style, lousy sound... lousy arranger. Great sound, lousy style... lousy arranger.

You MUST have both...