Mike,

I am glad to hear that the SM card capacity is not limited to 128 MB. Even if it was, one could use several cards, as they are quite cheap these days.

I am not sure you are correct about the USB storage devices - these are designed to connect into the USB Master port, like the one on the computer. Most KBs, (I am sure Motif falls into that category) have only a USB slave port. The USB storage devices can not be plugged into the slave port - you can only connect it to the master device.

Vic,

Indeed, comparisons of the keyboards is a very subjective matter. I am glad you are happy with your Fantom.

It's interesting you should mention the expansion slots. The four expansion cards you chose will cost about $900 - almost the price of another keyboard. All it is is memory expansion, and by constricting you to using their proprietary memory cards (of only 64 MB capacity), they force you to pay for the media, and not for the sounds themselves. Wouldn't you rather buy the sounds on a CD (even at $50 each set, would run you $200) and load them into non-volatile memory card (about $50) yourself, for a quarter of the price?

The idea of using proprietary memory cards is at least 10 years old - ancient in electronic terms. At least when you get a plug-in board from a Yamaha, you get a whole sound engine, with added polyphony. You get none of that from Roland.

I am not saying that Roland instruments are all bad, and the competition is all good. Each has their own strong points. However, I feel that Roland has lost its competitive edge, at least with the current product lineup.

Alex