Cass..I am doing my part to keep the economy strong...I only wish that dude in Washington would send me a stimulus package too..

Diki..the 88 Stage Grand piano is very close to the Best piano on the G70...The Juno Stage..It does have an adjustable lid and Resonance control that can be applied to any piano you choose in Piano Mode..

The E series Classic piano is the closest to the Juno 88 Stage Grand..

But....to my ears using the same quality headphones..I hear more harmonics with the G70 Grand X...The next choice would be the 88 Stage Grand on the Juno...and for the E..the Classic piano comes in 3rd..The E is hard to explain..it seems to lack the quality of the G70...less harmonics, maybe even less sample content..

I believe the Juno is also slightly compromised with sample content..although it is pretty good...


Another couple of things to mention about the Juno Stage...
Without a USB thumb drive..It boots up in a few seconds....Using the USB drive the System goes into load process (I don't know what it is loading..I think it just scans the thumb drive..although it says loading on the screen..).

The more content the longer boot time...300 MP3's ..it scanned (loaded) in 20 seconds..as I used the Playlist editor to add more playlist..boot up time was extended....I have loaded up my 8 gig thumb drive with several playlist...and now it takes about 3 minutes to boot up...This is fine with me..Just turn the Juno on while you are setting up..

I adjusted the mic and effects..and it is Super...phantom power if you need it...There is a nice option to adjust your SMF level, audio levels differently in song play..It is easy to get the right balance of Keyboard, mic, seq play, and audio play....The main volume controls all including the EXT audio input (This volume has to be set by the external device..I tried the ext input with a laptop, Zune, E-50, and a mixer...all worked well..via this 1/8 inch stereo jack..

There is one problem I needed to work around...I had this problem with my Juno G too..actually any unit that is only 16 midi..
When you play back a seq (SMF) on the Juno..it will transmit one of the 16 seq tracks (channels) to the keyboard..this will change the tone depending on the seq..If you change it to your selection ..it will change in the seq play too...You can select "part select" and use "minus one"..and play that part or even change the tone..it won't have a bearing on the seq since you removed it from seq play..

What Roland needs to do...Do what they have been doing with the G70, E80, E60 and E50...Add addition parts for real time keyboard parts...as in 20 to 32 midi channels..To me this is a big boo boo..

It is very interesting to me..that although the Juno does not have a sequencer..You can edit the SMF's and save the change in the "playlist"..This is done within the Juno..no need to use the PC playlist software...

The drivers for Juno to PC worked great with my Vista laptop..but I did not have success with my desktop XP....I had this problem in the past..I need to go and reduce the number of drivers..XP has a limit to the drivers allowed...No big problem..just delete the driver or 2 that I no longer use...Like my EMU driver (sold yesterday)..

For you guys that like synth workstations..You will love the Juno...You have all the edits that we had on the XP80...very deep in patch editing...Juno Stage adds the arpeggios, D beam etc..that we did not have on the XP80..XP80 did have a sequencer though..

I owned the Fantom X6..and never liked it..It was too much "work" to use ..I never used or needed sampling..No one can sample like the factory..People sample nonsense stuff.. and I never sequenced on the Fantom..both my G1000 and G70 were better sequencers for me......So,,the Juno cut out a couple useless things...and made the Juno more affordable...

Another thing I didn't/don't like about the Fantoms...several sound categories just don't have it (same with the competition workstations)..when it comes to choirs, scats or any real sounding vocal patches..they don't exists....This is where the G70 and E series shines...They are unmatched in vocal sounds....I will have to consider loading up the 2 SRX slots..

The Juno has a lot of modern music patches with a lot of movement and effects..so you guys that like this stuff..the Juno Stage will light your fire..(but totally not me)..

The drum kits are great..and the preset drum patterns are great too..very modern presets...You can make your own patterns from scratch too..

There is a lot to play around with on the Juno (interesting)..I haven't had the TV on since UPS showed up.. ..

And yet, I got the Juno Stage set up in a couple hours to use with the band...Now I only need to set up a couple work arounds..edit some sequences and save to the playlist...and complete my "favorite" tones....

I will post more as I get a chance...