I think the XS is a great choice. I still have my Motif ES and the only reason I didn't upgrade is that the XS does not host the AN150 and VL plugins that I have in the ES. I'd miss them a lot if I didn't have them. The XS is far advanced in the area of arps vs the ES.

I don't know how the SA voices work in the XS, but I can say that while I don't have any SA voices in the ES, the guitar patches sound better to me in general vs their counterparts on the Tyros2. Perhaps some of it has to do with the effects section, but even w/o much effect, in spite of the articulations, which work well enough, the guitar sounds themselves don't sound very realistic to me on the T2. Don't get me wrong, they have a "nice" sound, just not particularly close to any guitar I've played. OTOH, several of the ES sounds come pretty close. That's just my ears of course, but since I'm playing the things, it does matter to me.

AJ

[This message has been edited by Bluezplayer (edited 02-16-2009).]