I know I already said good things about the MOtif ES but I just have to ad that I so totally agree with you. ES series win hands down over any XV and even Phantom synths.

Even though I'm not a workstation buff I find that I use the ROm sounds of the ES quite often. It's a very well designed instrument with excellent sound set and features. Don't really want to bag Roland but their expansion boards are a big disappointment. Couple of nice sounds here and there but *none* work together in the mix and sound dead terrible when compared to the sounds on the MOtif ES workstations. Plug-in boards is another winner. Roland sort of tapped into this relm with their V-synth Vari OS cards but the V-Synth is a totally different beast. We're talking workstations here and to sum it up one more time I prefer the MOtif ES series - period.

cheers,

-ED-