I still haven't heard back from the guy you spoke with yesterday.. Also Yamaha just sent me something saying they are getting so many emails now that people have to call the long distance number for help.

Oh yeah! I thought we were supposed to have free online support.. Now I have to pay long distance charges for a simple answer to something....??????

Squeak,
I just had a really nice 30 minute conversation on the phone with the head of tech. support at Yamaha located in Buena Park, California. I hadn't been on line all day, so I didn't see this post until my friend called me this afternoon. First let me explain some of the things we spoke about.
Yamaha receives approx. 1000 emails a day from all over the world. Even though a large number of these need to be handled by other distributors around the world, Yamaha US tech support still have to respond to each of these and direct the person asking for help to their proper tech support areas. This takes up time! Next, because Yamaha front office people handle the response back to you regarding calling Yamaha instead of having your email responded to is because there are fewer phone calls coming into them right now and they know they can respond by phone in less than 24 hours. Now, because of the long weekend, Yamaha sent this message out to notify customers that if they call, they will get a faster answer then waiting for all these emails to be looked at.
Now, Squeak, my friend at Yamaha doesn't have a phone number for you or even a name so he called me because he would love to respond to you immediately but couldn't find data from you with right now over 2000 emails in the Yamaha system. Because I am a dealer who knows so many people working at these companies and because of my long term commitment to this discussion forum, I just want to assure you that Yamaha does care and that they are very understaffed right now in having enough bodies to handle all the email and tech calls coming in. I for one will be talking to the powers that be at Yamaha to try to encourage them to higher more able tech people in the future. My friend at Yamaha says that in reading the posts today, he see's that some of the responses to your needs seem to be the right ones, but without seing your questions on his end, he can't be sure what it is you want to know. Please, if you would like to send me your phone number and information I will have my friend contact you first thing Tuesday morning.
Regards,
George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California
818-881-5566

Please Squeak and George keep us informed on drum machine/arranger subject. We dont want to bug Yamaha on the same issue.

Thank you.