I am always hoping an ADULT conversation might break out about arrangers... I'm always trying to point out that these things are MACHINES, not family. I am as critical about aspects of my G70 as I am about things like the PSR's keybed, the Korg's paltry two fills (and a B/F), the Audya's lack of complete chord vocabulary for audio loops, the MS's lack of content and complexity... etc., etc., etc.. (imagine all this in a Yul Brynner accent )

These are all faults that are commented on consistently. Can you play on a PSR and get used to it? Of course... but does that negate the 'general' opinion? IMO, no it doesn't. Can you get by without six or seven fills? Yes, you can. But would you WANT to? Could the G70 give you a hernia? If you lift it wrong, sure!

The whole POINT of discussing these things should NOT be a desire to denigrate others' choice of tool for making music, but to get a frank and honest discussion about improving the breed. And the only way that happens is if owners and potential owners alike are candid about things that COULD be improved in their choice of arranger. The manufacturers DO come here. They DO pay attention. But while they see actual OWNERS of their products conduct a campaign of denial of flaws, and laud them as the best thing since sliced bread, where is the knowledge that things could change for the better going to come from..?

Just like yourselves, it is all too easy to confuse fanboy gushing for actual FACTS...

Let's take Ian's keybed, as an example. Ian likes it, has gotten used to it, but i GUARANTEE that if they replaced it with the keybed that is on a MoXS6, he would love it just as much (and if it had started out with as good a keybed, Ian would be dismissing other keyboards with as flimsy a keybed as vehemently as most do here) and start to gush as enthusiastically about it as he does with what he has. If Korg suddenly added another four fills or more, who here would actually COMPLAIN? If the MS came out with a style and sound set that rivaled the best of YK&R, would anyone mind? If Audya added sus4 chords, augs and dims, 7#9's, etc., would their owners bitch about it?

Not on your life!

But TALK about the issues now, before those things happen, and you would think so...

We either step up to the plate, and start to discuss these things as if it IS possible to improve them, or we go back to this playground mentality, and potentially lose the changes for our own arrangers that we (secretly) WOULD like to see.

Me... well, I'd LOVE 10 lbs. shaved off my G70! I'd LOVE some multipads, a Break/Fill (or three!), some SA sounds and a guitar mode that works with the style, I'd love a lyric display in style mode (E series has that), I'd love renamable ROM style presets (you can change the ROM styles, but you can't rename them ), I'd love a USB stick port (only got 'to computer'), and I'D LIKE MY BLOODY CHORD SEQUENCER BACK....

Anyone that has ever surfed the Roland-arranger forum, particularly the Suggest New Features forum knows I am one of the BIGGEST critics of the arranger. There is SO much that could be improved... And, if you were honest with yourselves and us here, if you have a brain in your head, you could probably come here with a list nearly as long of things YOU would like improved and changed. But instead, many of you grasp your pens (figuratively) and leap to the defense of your chosen tool. And that isn't going to help ANYTHING...

Yes, for all its' flaws, whatever we have chosen is the best for us that could be gotten, right now. But that does NOT mean it couldn't be improved, that flaws we have got used to couldn't be improved, and good ideas from other lines ought NOT to be added to our own OS's...

But that is NEVER going to happen while you all are so publicly uncritical of your choice. Man up, and start to TALK about it. It's the only way things are going to change...

[This message has been edited by Diki (edited 02-19-2010).]