No Shakil, I did not know this.. But....

The Fantom S/88 is able to use a Smart Media Card (up to 128Mb card) and you CAN store edited voices onto the Smart Media card and call them up any time you want. Plus I found out you can also store changed voices to the Sample RAM "32Mb included" and up to 288Mb. So theoretically you could edit and store each and every Voice on the Fantom S if a person wanted to and store them in the Sample RAM. So instead of making a whole new voice as with the Triton Studio, you would have the best of both worlds by keeping the Original Patch and also having access to your edited Patch on the Smart Media Card or the Sample RAM. Note: Most people won't be using the Sample RAM to store edited Voices though. They would most likely use the Smart Media Card for that. With a 128Mb Smart Media Card a person could store many, many, edited Voices on it if they wanted to.

Yes, I knew about the 2 track HDR on the Triton Studio 2. Way Cool!! They have really transformed the Triton Studio 2 into an awesome Workstation Keyboard. It would be a worthy contender on any Keyboardist's Gear list imho. A truly fantastic Keyboard!

Best regards,
Mike

Yamaha introduces the new Motif ES at the Summer NAMM show. This new model has more knobs, a larger screen, a ribbon controller and here's the best. 175MB of sounds including the mega voices from Tyros, 128 note polyphony and a sampler with up to 512MB of sample memory. The price of the new models, including a 61, 76 and 88 model will be about $100.00 more than the current models. The 61 key Motif will continue at a new low price map price of $1495.00
George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California

Whoa!! Thanks for the news George. It looks like Yammie just made the Fantom S/88 obsolete. Kudos to Yamaha for responding so fast with the introduction of the new Motif ES's. Definitely a serious threat not only to the Fantom S/88 but they will probably also put a sizable dent in the Korg Triton's sales too.

Don't you just love competition?

Best regards,
Mike

It will be interesting to see how they incorporate the Mega Voices in the Motif ES. Since the Motif is not an Arranger and it doesn't have Styles. Maybe they will be incorporated with the Arpeggiator or maybe different Sampled RAM sets already Sampled into it from the factory.

[This message has been edited by Idatrod (edited 06-30-2003).]

That's nice but at the same time I'm not thrilled, as the only options the current Motif user has is to add the xg board for more poly ( with sounds I don't want ) or add the rack ( and spend the big bucks ) . I wish Yamaha could find a way for me to add the polyphony to the internal sounds on the board I already own and spent good money for. I'd be willing to pay for it.. not asking for a freebie.. but I know I'm wishing for something that won't happen.

Well, it looks like another game of wait and see, and then maybe sell the one I have, take it on the chin, and get the new model, or maybe not. I'm not even sure that 128 polyphony is enough though, in the way Yamaha allocates it..
That TS2 looks better every day....

AJ

I also forgot to mention that there are 8 insert effects, two global effects and two mastering effects on the Motif ES.
George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California

I hear ya' AJ. Yamaha's boards seem to allocate Polyphony to where it doesn't add up to true specifications, ie., 64, 128, etc. In other words it doesn't translate into true 64, 128, etc., Polyphony. Compare that to GEM boards where Paul D says the Genesys Pro, which he owns, has 64 note Polyphony and he has NEVER run out of Polyphony. Go figure. Here are some specs on the Triton Studio that may be of interest to some:

Korg Triton Studio

2 master effects (mono in, stereo out),
5 insert effects (stereo in/out),and
1 master EQ (3 band stereo) simultaneously

102 (insert effects/89 for master effects

16 timbres, 16 tracks, 1/192 resolution,
150 preset/100 user patterns per song,
200 songs, 20 cue lists, 200,000 notes maximum,

Polyphony
60 Oscillators to play PCM samples from the internal ROM bank or RAM (user sampling), and 60 oscillators to play PCM samples from the internal Piano bank or an EXB-PCM expansion board
http://www.korg.com/downloads/mp3/TRITONSTUDIO/S004PROG.MP3
http://www.korg.com/downloads/mp3/TRITONSTUDIO/S000BULL.MP3

Note: As you can see the Midi Timing Resolution is only 192 PPQ but there is a whopping 200,000 note recording max. for the Sequencer. That is huge. The Midi Timing Resolution of the Motif is 1920 PPQ I believe, so the Motif is the clear winner there. The Motif has 1728 more PPQ "Parts Per Quarter Note" timing resolution than the Triton Studio.

Interesting comparisons. The true gravy will be in hands on playing of the Motif ES to get a accurate comparison between to two.

Best regards,
Mike

PS: Also of interest is the Triton Studio has only 120 note Polyphony and only 60 can be used with the User ROM/Sample RAM. The other 60 is allocated to the Piano Bank.

While we are talking about MOTIF and TRITON... there is a huge difference in how YAMAHA and KORG deals with the insert effects.

On KORG's side, Insert effects are more like insert effect buss... you can patch more than one tracks to the same insert effect.

While on yamaha synths, you can patch an insert effect to only one track.

This is a major difference.

I also know that there are 8 insert effects on MOTIF rack, but it's like this:
You can have 2 insert effects on a track. And can have 4 tracks which have insert effects ON. So, in other words, only 4 tracks can have one of the insert effects at a time.

On TRITON, even there are only 5 insert effects, but all tracks can be routed to one of the 5 insert effects.

On the other hand, IF Yamaha WOKE up and moved the element EQs to Part EQ, and it's like on the MOTIF rack, where you have 3 band EQ on each of the 16 part, it will not be that bad.