This S950, as far as I can remember, is the first Yamaha to introduce a totally new, important feature on a mid-priced arranger. Usually, everything groundbreaking has been introduced on the Tyros (or what was TOTL for its day) and then trickled down to the MOTL a couple of years later (with some restrictions compared to the TOTL).

Not so, audio drums. Perhaps the code for this was ready to go LONG before Yamaha were ready to make a new TOTL, who knows. But there seems to be a glaring error. Yamaha would never have DREAMED of introducing this feature in its current, almost unusable form on an arranger costing up to $4000. The backlash would have been immense. A tiny handful of styles, no way to load your own, no additional content of any size, and a reboot just to load the few in that you can..! Tyros owners would have been up in arms.

So, breaking with precedent, Yamaha roll it out in its almost unusable form on the MOTL... Maybe this is genius marketing, but I am utterly hard pressed to figure out how..! TBH, if this is Yamaha's idea of beta-testing the feature, they have failed miserably. In fact, I'd have to say, from reading so many of the diehard Yamaha user's comments, that this is the first PSR MOTL to take some backward steps (buttons, displays, etc) and introduce a feature that no-one requested, no-one needs, and no-one uses much (little to be used!).

Maybe Yamaha are human, after all.

Yamaha need to step up their game when this makes it to the Tyros line. Bigtime! The content had better MOSTLY be audio drums. The library of extra styles to purchase had better be extensive. The time taken to load those extra styles in on the gig had better be minimal. The drum reverb levels had better be tamed, or MUCH better room reverbs available in the effects section, so other style parts could be made to match. The multipads MUST allow audio looping. And VERY fine tuning, to match tempos over 32 bars or so (contrary to popular belief, not all MIDI gear runs at PRECISELY the tempo it says - 90.01bpm, when played against a 90.00bpm loop, will go noticeably out of sync after 32 bars or so). If this isn't possible, there needs to be a MIDI trigger for the loop every x# of bars.

Without this, the inclusion in the Tyros line is going to upset a LOT of people with a LOT of money to spend. Maybe, if audio loops are what they have their heart set on, they'll start taking a closer look at the Audya's, who at least HAVE got this feature down cold...

Personally, I am still hoping Yamaha find this experiment a failure, and choose to fix the drum problem the simple way... MUCH better kits!