Just got in my first 4 EXR-5 keyboards and I'm really happy with these new boards!
First, they are easy as can be to use and I really like the sounds for a keyboard at this price. It has the good Roland stereo grand piano found in the VA7 and it uses catagory buttons and families of sound to get around. No longer is Roland using the system of choosing a sound and then pushing the variation button if there are more than 1 sound. Now, you can find every sound by changing numbers or using the + and - keys. The polyphony is 64 voice and the sequencer is an easy to use 16 track with your choice of first recording the style and melody and then going back and recording more tracks or doing it one track at a time.
The styles are all very nicely done with a choise of bass + drum, small combo and full band. Each has original and variation.

There are 510 original roland panel sounds +542 XG sounds +256 GM2 sounds. There are 20 Drum kits +11XG drum kits + 9 GM2 drum kits.
The Keyboard is compatible with GM2, GS and XG lite.
There are 103 styles in flash memory (84 factory + 19 changeable which come loaded from the factory and then I can load more styles into flash until I use up all the memory from floppy disks or via USB. I loaded in a few middle eastern styles and they are now inside the keyboard for quick recall.
There is a cool feature from the discover 5 which is called "Cover" function. There are 5 of them. Acoustic, Pop, Rock, Dance and Ethnic. It's cool because when playing styles or smf files you can change the voice selections to fit different genres by just pushing one of these 5 buttons and if you turn them off, you are back to the original. Also, when playing midi files there is a music minus one function button and all 5 "cover" lights come on and by turning one or all off you mute certain tracks quickly of the playing midi file.
You get 10 user program buttons to store your favorite settings.
There is a music assistant button which has 126 different one touch registrations stored for quickly finding a song and playing with a correct style, sound, effects, tempo, etc.
You can split and layer any sounds and there are 18 types of Melody Intelligence (harmony) selections.
The speakers are 10 watts each and there is also a "digital bass enhancer". This keyboard is loud! without external speakers. A set of stereo line out jacks are on the back along with USB and Midi In and Out. It weighs 8kg (sorry I don't know the lb conversion but it is very light).
I see this as a great new product which will sell in the $600 to $700 range. There is nothing else in my store quite like this in this price range. It's what I thought the EM55 should have been. This keyboard is much easier to use then the EM55 which had a list price of $995.00.
There is also a EXR-3 which lists at $595.00 but does not have the floppy disk drive and the speaker system is 1/2 the power at 5watts per side instead of 10watts.
This is the first "price right" Roland I've seen in a long time.
If I were rating a keyboard like Keyboard Magazine does I would give this a "best buy" rating. Check it out if you get a chance and tell me if you agree with me.
George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California
818-881-5566