No deep, heavy duty, philosophical thinking here. Just odds and ends.

I went to Guitar Center to audition a Yamaha digital piano and they had a PA1000 also. Spent an hour on it. I was mistaken about Donny's new Korg I thought that's what HE bought (but I just figured out he bought a 700).

Odds and ends comments: there were no "fill' buttons on it. I saw intro, endings, break, etc but....no fill buttons. Isn't that a little odd for a $2k keyboard?

Ease of use (for me)...changing instruments easily during a song. Styles seemed to be a step up from my PA3x in this way. The "variations" sound like variations. i.e as I went 1 through to 4, the styles changed enough to actually sound like a variation. On the PA3x, each one only adds an instrument or two to the preceding one. So you really don't hear a change, just an embellishment.

I didn't notice anything outstanding about this keyboard that would make me want to spend $2K.

Then again, though I spent an hour playing with it, I was only listening through the onboard speakers. Asked for some amplification, and they gave me their standard bass amplifier they use for demo's. I sounded better through the onboards.

Flutes and violins and strings were atrocious. They can't be that bad because they sound good on my 3x. I must have been doing something wrong.

But out of curiosity, aside from the 4x which of the other Korg arrangers do any of you like and is good value for the buck, I really need a knock-about, carry under your arm new arranger.

Oh, and I tried the QSC powered speakers and the EV ZLX 12P. I thought the QSC sounded muddy and the EV's don't sound as good as my old EV's I'm using now. I've only ever used EV's so I'm quite familiar with the EV sound. The salesperson was kind enough to advise me that speaker manufacturers are cutting down on the quality of the components. No different from any other company. Anyone else notice a difference in sound between new and old?

Almost forgot. Anyone familiar with the Yamaha CP73 stage piano? Yamaha CP73

Actually, Korg is the ONLY arranger that still has fill buttons, and that is on the 4x. The fills are integrated into the style variation buttons, and there are a couple of modes you can use to control how they work.
Yamaha, Roland, Ketron, all work the same way.

Thats definately where korg shines on the pa4x...
Hope they will add the performance memmory which makes Genos shine back in the pa5x..

Won’t be long now before korg announces a new pa5x..

Don (or anyone), is this "fake news" or "factual news?" I looked at the PA4x. Yes there are fill buttons there. But none on the PA1000. "Fill buttons" are my life support. I play them as much as I play the rhythm.

You're saying most keyboards come out now with "auto-fill?" If so, this is a major game-changer for me!

Mark, the Pa4x is better in many ways. Fill buttons are one of them. But, the Pa1000 is not Korg’s flag ship model. Also, there is a big difference in price.
The Pa1000 will do a good job, but never as good as the pa4x. But it weighs less. A pa5x might be something to wait for???
John C.
aaaaaah, decisions, decisions – (smile)

Maybe I am wrong, but I don't see a separate fill section a major element in choosing a keyboard. As Don said, the fills are integrated in the variation button. I suppose if you wanted a 2 fill while in var 4, but didn't want to go there, it would be a small advantage. Otherwise, press the var button you are on . or go with auto fill and proceed to the next.

Completely fail to see this issue (and more mentioned here) as about a year ago there was a minor update for the PA1000 which enables the user to use the fill of his choice ( in whichever variation he is currently playing) by simultaneously hitting the autofill button and the fill ( 1,2,3,4,) that you want.....
No, this is not ideal and does not match the seperate buttons on the PA4X but it does provide independent use of the four fill-ins at your discretion.
While I agree that for obvious reasons the PA4X is superior to a PA1000 I am under the impression that very few here are well familiar with the ins and outs of the PA1000.
As Donny would say you first have to customize the keyboard to your personal liking which involves a lot of programming and tweaking. Another aspect that gets little or no attention here is the actual use of filling up the RAM memory with external samples. Mine is filled up to the hilt with samples from Dynamix, Mister Music,Reuben, and the "musikant" extension.
The result is quite impressive and still leaves me with money in hand so to speak compared to a PA4X +speakers......
Just saying......

regards,
John

I would miss having the fill buttons on a Korg. The great part about the korg fill button they could be used as an additional variation even an intro. You’re not confined to 1 bar, they can be programmed up to 32 bars long .

Did a lot of experimenting back with the pa800, medley styles with different time signatures for each variation, all sorts of weird stuff that could be done on a Korg . The fill buttons definitely played a role.

Please note the question.....is this "fake news" or "factual news?"

That is a fact! At least Ketron, Roland, Yamaha and Casio don't have them. As a matter of fact they never have, as far as I know. And I've been around since before arrangers existed.
You can do many of the functions using the style part buttons, but not everything.

Don...so let me understand this because this is instrumental in my style of playing. I've only ever known keyboards with "fill buttons." Now manufacturers are still generating fills in some way, but no more actual "fill" buttons to hit (like in the PA1000 I looked at)?

Hi Rikki...I just noticed what you wrote here. That's exactly what happened to me. One day I noticed that you have two more "fills" if you loop the intro or endings. Many of the songs I posted utilized this unconventional method. If you play them right they sound as good, or, in some cases even better that the actual "fill" pattern.

That's the way to do it. "play around" on an instrument looking for ways to do things that are not in the manual. It's called "creativity!"

Some arrangers, including the E-A7, Genos, etc., have assignable switches that might also be assigned to trigger fills.

If your arranger doesn't have this, there might be another option... A company called MIDI Solutions makes an electronic module called a Footswitch controller. The module has a 1/4" jack and a MIDI din jack.

A footswitch is nothing more than a momentary, normally open switch. You can buy push-buttons just like this from online electronics suppliers.

With a little soldering, you would wire the push-buttons to the 1/4" jacks on the MIDI Footswitch controllers. Now comes the brilliant part... At least Roland and Korg have MIDI implementations that are complete enough to trigger any of the fills with MIDI messages. So you push a button, it completes the circuit, and the MIDI Solutions module tells your arranger to play a fill. Using this method you can add "fill buttons" to an arranger that doesn't have them.

The only remaining problem is the ergonomic considerations of mounting the push-buttons. The front fascia below the keys puts them in reach of your thumb (i think.)

Sometimes as an end user we have to get a little imaginative to make these marvelous musical tools do our bidding!

Hi Mark, it really is quite amazing what can be done.

The main difference between the various style parts is variations have 6 cv’s, fills , intro’s / endings only have 2.
Any of them can be up to 32 bars long, and be programmed to have a chord progression, like intro/ending 1
Main difference is where you end up after the loop finishes , ending your styles stops, intro/ fill , your style moves onto a variation, unless you tap it twice and then it keeps looping.

It’s great being able to set up custom styles. I would definitely miss not having the fill buttons, even though on factory styles I normally have the auto fill button engaged.