Well, folks, after months of anticipation I found out that our local music store (Keyboard City) has gotten the VA-7 in, and took an extended lunch to visit them. Indeed, they had a VA-7 set up, and after a bit of trying, I managed to wrestle it away from the salesman, who was practicing his Richard Klydermann(?) impression on it.

After playing it for an hour, I have mixed feelings about it.

Sounds - the quality is very good. I like the Roland sounds (on my G1000), and the VA-7 (SC8850) tone map is a notch better. I really liked the piano sound (A11). I only found the two upper real-time parts (Upper 1/2) and one lower part (Lower 1). Turning on Melody Intelligence appears to affect the Upper1 sound. I did not find Upper 3 part (which I have in G1000/EM2000). There is, however, a Vari-phrase part.

Vari-phrase - In my opinion, this is a total waste. Perhaps, some people would find it useful to have Oh, Baby! emanating from the keyboard while playing, but to have it done every time you press the right-hand key is too much. It may be more useful with user-recorded phrase, or some esoteric instrumental sound, but like George said in his post, the presets get really tiresome really quickly (20 seconds for me). IMHO, To make it useful, it should allow longer polyphonic samples, not just a single voice, and more than 6 part polyphony. It would be neat to sample the accompaniment groove from a CD song, and than play it back on the arranger keyboard. However, Variphrase (or maybe just the VA-7 incarnation of it) does not work well with polyphonic samples - it expects a single voice (vocal or instrumental). I don't think that Variphrase replaces the Vocal Harmonizer in any way.

Styles - I will agree with George that the styles are typical Roland styles, though for the most part, they are as good as the best Roland styles of old. Perhaps it is the quality of the speakers, or maybe the sound and drum samples, but they sound very nice. Of course, there is emphasis on soft rock/pop styles (hard rock styles are fairly poor, though better than G1000). Some of the new styles (from G1000 time) are a couple of nice techno beats, seemingly large number of Latin styles, and better waltzes (I am going by memory, having scrolled through the preset styles, one should really look at listing of styles in the manual).

Having gone through the presets, I found that the "band" was always set to largest setting. I have tried a few styles with the reduced band size, but that did not sound as good. There is a single fill in button on the front panel, which will play fill in and switch to either original or variation style of accompaniment, depending on what is playing currently. This is a bit of a shortcoming from G1000, where I could insert a fill to Variation while Variation is playing (variation fills are typically more full and colorful than fills to original), but I guess you can use FC7 foot controller (or a home-made device which mimics its function) to accomplish this. The styles have up to 8 parts, like the G1000 ones. There are 128 preset styles, which is on the low side for a high-end keyboard (Solton has 200 preset and up to 100 user styles), but there is room for 64 DiskLink styles, which is OK (though G1000 has almost twice a many disk link locations). I have not used the style-morphing feature, but I guess that it may be useful in modifying styles.

User-Friendliness - In many ways VA-7 is a very user-friendly instrument, perhaps even overly so. It seems that each instrument has a graphical icon representing it (Like Grand piano, Grand with an Open lid, Upright, etc) - I think this is a bit of an overkill. However, the One-Touch function allows to select among 4 configurable sound settings for the real-time parts. This is over and above selecting a performance. This is to me a very useful feature, too bad that you have to use a touch screen to make a change. There is also a possible bug? selecting a new OTS causes the real-time sounds to be momentarily interrupted, unlike selecting a new sound for the currently playing part on G1000 (or E70), but I am sure this will bet fixed in the software upgrades. The large touch screen is a big improvement over the miniscule screen on G1000; however, for the most part, where the lists of sounds/styles/performances/variphrases are shown, the list only displays 8 entries per page - the same as the G1000. This is in part due to the size of each list selection "button" - it has to be big enough for the finger to touch it, and for the most part, they are. Some soft-buttons are too small (for my fingers), like the ones on the tone selection screen, and several others. Even when the soft buttons are large, the touch response seems to be not very consistent - sometimes a momentary touch will be detected, and sometimes it will not be. I would prefer the tactile feel of the buttons to the touch screen anytime, at least for calling up things during the performance. I must give the Roland folks credit for including a selection keypad with separate octave/selection button sets. Would also be nice if they did not skimp on the bank (A/B/C) selection buttons and instead of one button with TWO lights the had provided three individual buttons.

The "SuperSounds" is also a nice feature, somewhat similar to Solton's OneTouch, which lets you quickly select from the short list of the sounds you use the most. There are five banks with their own selection buttons, of 8 sounds each; each bank button calls up the first sound in the bank; to select another sound in that bank you have to use touch screen (again). I did not quite understand what was the relationship between the OneTouch settings and the Super sounds (if it was possible to revert back to OTS, having called up the SuperSound, but in any case, this is quite useful.

The keyboard seems physically very large - I did not check the weight, but with the empty space to the right of the keyboard, and the joystick and ribbon to the left (which could be moved above the keyboard), the frame seems as big as that of the G1000, which has 76 keys. Unlike the G1000, which has buttons spread out all over the instrument, including the tempo controls in the almost unreachable upper right hand corner, the VA-7 panel design is rather compact, with all the buttons are either in the front, close to the keyboard, or in the center, near the display. The tempo control is a wheel, and a tap tempo button; but accellerando/ritardando (and return to default tempo when both are pressed) buttons are missing. Also, there is no Reset function, which allows you to re-sync the beat to the crowd dancing.

It is my impression that with its sound structure, some of the real-time controls missing or buried in the touch-screen menus, and over-graphical user interface, VA-7 is intended as a replacement to E-600, rather than G1000, so I would not be surprised if there is a more professional version in the works (I know, George, that Roland is categorically denying this, but my level of trust in Roland's PR machine is about as high as believing Bush after his "Read my lips" statement).

Finally, before leaving the store, I wanted to inquire about the price (I know that our European friends have seen a published price of $4300). The salesman told me "It's retail at about $6000", than after brief exchange in front of me with the store manager, he confirmed, that "yes, the retail is $6995, but for a good customer like you we will give a 25% discount, so it's about $5300"

Isn't that funny?

I guess the PA-80 will blow the VA-7 in usa.

We won't know that until we hear PA-80. But chances are that for people looking for a high-end instrument this will be a very cost-effective alternative.

Hi friends,

I am a KORG i30 user and I got a good deal on it for AUS$2500 which is about US$1600, which has 12 months waranty and etc with it. Afriend of us here posted an extended message on the pros/cons of the the new great VA7. Wow it sounds like a great keyboard, I have't heard it, but I am sure it isheart breaking. But I also read here that it is price is $5000+, oh that is too much, is that supposed to be US dollars? if it is US dollars, it is way too much, this unit here in australia might cost around $10 000 if it arrives, and not even John Farnham can afford such a keyboard. I mean for a price like that, no matter how good an arranger is, it is not worthed.

HOpe to see some replies

with regards

Tamim Naseer

Alex,
First, let me say your evaluaion is pretty close to mine. There is a tempo reset icon but it's not on the front panel it is in the screen. I don't remember off hand where, but I've found it several times when demoing the keyboard. Did you try the jazz voices and there variations? These are great sounds! I called Roland today to ask many questions of their tech department, and they have only had a very few minutes to play with this keyboard. I will be expecting answers to my questions shortly I'm sure. Remember that this keyboard has 128 note polyphony and 48 Meg of sound memory and that's why these sounds are so good.
George Kaye

Uncle Dave, Tamim,

I was not about to pay anywhere close to $5000 for anything from Roland - having had their stuff for ten years, I don't think that it has the inherent value to justify these prices. (Some people would pay extra for the name like a Rolls-Royce, but IMHO, Roland does not fall in the same category).

Aside from the fact that VA-7 does not have some of the features I would want, I think the market value of a good full-featured arranger keyboard (from Solton or Yamaha) is under $3000. The large number of high-quality sounds is certainly worth some extra money, but the prices they are asking are ridiculous. What bothers me even more, is their sales techniques, stolen from a used-car lot, when the salesman makes a show of asking the manager "it retail for $6995, but can we give a discount for this good customer?", and the manager replies "yes, 25% if you buy today" - this is worse than buying a car.

I am sure that there are dealers who do not subject their clients to this crap, but every time I ask our local Keyboard City for a price, it is pretty much the same story. If I had to go on what they tell me, every new instrument seems to have a retail price of $6995. That's why I don't want to deal with them, and I would not think of buying any instrument which Roland offers through the CK division.

Regards

Its great reading all these posts about the VA7, it almost makes me not bother listening to one (you've said it all!!)...

But there is certainly one thing I dont see people agree on and thats with the price of the thing. In the UK, the price of the VA7 is around £2100 which is a little less than the PSR9000. So what everybody should be seeing as a fair price is around the PSR9000 price mark or less (whatever that is in the stores you go to). If it does not tie in with that, then you know its farily overpriced and not worth paying that money. I think that the KN6000 is around the same price range too, the only keyboard thats 'over priced' is still the X1 as its around £2499 still and has not taken a price drop of any sort.

DannyUK

Danny,

it's good to know that all my writing is not for nothing... -)

Here in Phoenix, Arizona, the KN6000 is sold exclusively through the same chain as Roland's CK instruments. when I asked them about KN6000 price, they gave me a very similar story - "list $6995, but if you buy today, we'll knock $1000 off".

I suppose, with these prices, they are open to offers and negotiations, which goes a long way to make our keyboard-buying experience even more like visiting a car lot.

I agree with you , though, that the PSR9000 and Solton X1 set the benchmark for pricing a top of the line instrument, and BTW, here they can be had for about the same price. Sure, some of the competition offerings have some extra features (like larger sound ROM, or touchscreen), but at the same time they also miss out on a few (like vocal harmony, hard drive option, multi-pads), so overall this is a wash.

Regards

In Holland the VA-7 is positioned between the PSR9000 and the Solton X1. The Solton is around $3200 and the PSR9000 around $2200. So DO NOT pay anything more than this. The KN6000 also is around $2600. The Korg i30HD is around $2000. The G1000 is around $2100.

Well that was Humble Holland...!



Ilija

What I forgot to write about the VA-7 is that many of you complained about my description some months earlier regarding some feautures. It turned out that now almost EVERYBODY mention the same lacks. So playing short moments doesnt mean the machine will improve after playing some hours.

The VA-7 had, has and will have some BIG shortcomings in LIVE playing.

Ilija