Ian.., the market was tapped here in the US several years ago.., and in some places over in Europe. The company just decided to let the line die even though it was a big hit

Pitty you can't tweek the parts of the preset kit. That ALONE would open up HUGE door for creating some styles with a different flavor.

Yamaha clearly knows that even minute changes to their preset kits gave positive results! A former Yamaha PSR I owned is proof of that. Someone or one's over at Yamaha when creating styles for the PSR-550 decided that the preset Hip Hop kit just wasn't going to cut it. They did something a little sneaky.., but sneaky in a good way. The Hip Hop kit used on some styles WAS NOT available from the preset list. It was really more of a Hip Hop (variation kit--based on the preset). Someone over there did some minute tweeking to that kit (I think most of it was actually adjusting the tuning on some samples).., but it def sounded better than the preset kit.

The trick though was that this kit was not available from the panel voices. If you wanted to use that "variation kit" you had to edit a style that used the kit. Doing that gave you access to this particular kit.

Yamaha could essentially just do some tweeks of the package they're already using. If Yamaha added basic drum editing to the next model..., that'll open up a lot of wiggle room for sure. If the Korgs and Rolands do this..., then those arrangers also have HUGE possibilities. All it takes is for someone on whichever team to set a group down and say..., "for the next few weeks.., your job is to tweek these preset kits.., and then USE those variations to create a group of MODERN sounding drum/bass grooves." They could keep it simple..., and offer them as "genre specific packs".

Ian.., you may not realize this.., but there are many people out there who are into modern music who for the exact same reason arranger players buy their arrangers (being the STYLES) who themselves are looking for the same thing! Not everyone can record drum parts or even create a full backing track. That's why arrangers are so popular..., it really makes life easy for those who can't creat drum tracks and full backing tracks. There are a lot of younger players (even older players) who are on the same level on the modern arranger side and have trouble playing keyboard drums for example. No amount of quantizing can help them.., and you'll find many that are willing to admit it too An arranger keyboard that offered them a section of modern sounding drum/bass grooves would make a large untapped market very happy.

The closes thing to that today is the MM6.., but it's REALLY limited in so many areas.