The thing about buying to try is that with restocking fees being 15-20%, do you really want to pay that for a demo?

We bitch and moan enough about how expensive these things are, then risk paying 30%+ MORE for them (try three arrangers, buy the last one) than store price.

I'm kind of completely against Zuki's premise that you HAVE to gamble. I'm afraid that, unless you have not bought a new arranger for ten years or so, at best you are only getting an incremental improvement. You really want to gamble whether THAT is worth risking 15%+ of a $3000+ price, just to get a few more sounds, a few more styles, and other than that, not a whole lot else?

If you spend most of your efforts tracking down new styles, converting older styles or cross-platform styles, and getting intimately familiar with your current arranger, you will often find that the need or desire for a brand new one goes away. Unfortunately, of course, this forum, with it's rabid focus on perpetual upgrading, rather than on MUSIC (which you would think is the actual POINT of using an arranger!) might tend to make you think that, unless you are trading up for the latest thing the second it hits the market, you are falling behind.

Nothing could be further from the truth! You should merely regaining your sanity, and perhaps finally focusing on MUSIC rather than technology. A ten year old arranger, in the hands of someone that lives breathes and dreams MUSIC, will sound better than the latest TOTL arranger in the hands of someone more obsessed about specs than changes.

Every one of us has had the experience of hearing someone GREAT play a POS keyboard we wouldn't have bought in a million years. Ask yourself whether THAT guy obsesses about the latest keyboard as much as you do. Then perhaps reassess your priorities...