Smart Flute from Musiclab might be something to look at as well. If it is anywhere near the quality of their multisampled "Real Guitar", my guess is that it will surely at least match if not exceed any hardware based sounds you can find.

For my ears, B4 does some of the best organ sounds on the planet, that don't actually come from a real B3 or C3. There are some decent alternatives though. ZR3 is a freeware that does some pretty cool organ w/ leslie simulations. Linplug "daOrgan" does a good job too, at less than half the cost of B4.

Then there is the NI Express kb package. If you dont need to tweak, you can probably get it for less than B4. It's a scaled down version of B4, Pro53 ( Prophet 5 emulator ) and FM7 ( DX7 emulator ) all in one package. A friend of mine has this and it's very good. Scaled down means far less parameters that can be tweaked, and less preset voices, but not at a reduction in quality of staple sounds for each instrument. I know because I have both B4 and Pro53, but if I didn't, I oould be happy with Xpress.

BTW, when I play "neutral" styles in OMB ( those not made specifically for Korg ), I find that the free soundfont sgm128 sounds better than my PA80 in almost all cases.

I did an A/B comparison using SD1 and KN7000 styles ( converted to Yamaha .sty with both the PA80 and Live synth pro with sgm128 as my sound modules for OMB through the same soundsystem. Of course I added some chorus and reverb effect to the sgm128 soundfont in order to make it a fair comparison.

Frank makes an excellent point. I think in many cases people listen to soundfonts "dry", and then think that they can't compare to hardware modules. Try this.. Turn off all of the effects in your favoriite hardware arranger or synth / module. Now how does it sound when you play a style ? Not so good is my guess.

AJ



[This message has been edited by Bluezplayer (edited 03-16-2005).]