As a recently 'new' XGWorks 3 owner myself, I hope Yamaha will offer some kind of 'price discount' for current XGWorks 3 owners to upgrade to their 'new' XGWorks 5 equivilent. Of course with the way Yamaha handled the whole PSR2000 flash ROM fiasco, I won't be holding my breath.

Here is a quote from yamahasynth site(address below):

"Yamaha's first product to support this new system (OPT) will be the SQ01 sequencer, which is bundled free with the Yamaha S08 synthesiser and will be included with future hardware from Yamaha."

So XGWorks 5.0 will be called SQ01.....
the link is http://www.yamahasynth.com/pro/opt/index.html

DudeManCentral

What a grizzzzzle !!!
From reading the site and the FAQs, it looks like Yamaha are trying to re-define the middleware for the world of midi sequencing etc. Whether they will succeed depends on the acceptance and support of third party developers. Remember IBM and OS2? Yuk! Here we go again folks.

As for a cross grade from XGWorks to what ever the Yamaha brave new world is - don't hold your breath. From reading all the waffle it sounds like our beloved XGWorks is dead - long live son of XGWorks! It's all very well trying to create one brave new grand standard but from experience, that takes years for acceptance and implementation, even if it succeeds. In the meantime Yamaha MUST take care of its installed base through support and necessary upgrades, and then provide a seemless migration path to the new product set (whenever that is ready). Does this sound like the Yamaha we have become to know and "love"? If they are serious about software development and their reputation in this area not to mention third party acceptance of their new standard, then they will.

I just hope that the management that was "in charge" of the PSR2000 flash ROM fiasco are nowhere near this project. Please, KEEP THEM AWAY!!!
Jon.

Does XG Works support custom scales
that will allow quarter tones(like in
the PSR-550, 1000, and 2000)?
Also will the Sonar plug-in (that you
say Yamaha is working on) be able to
do this?

I can't find nor have I ever seen a utility inside of XG Works that specifically allows you to pre-define custom scales. You can in the XG edit mode edit any existing track down to 1 /24th semitones. You can also insert a new semitone parameter at the beginning of any track and play from there with the exact pitches you like, but you would have to insert any semitone changes that you want at the specific interval that you want it to occur, much like doing a CC change or any other edit in a standard midi file. Also, you will need an XG synth or module because none of the XG functions work with non XG devices.

I don't use XG works very often any more as I now have Sonar and I don't have any XG boards at this time ( although I may at some point get the XG plug in for my Motif ). Still, the one reason I'll always keep XG works is that I can step record and insert chords with it using any of the Yamaha arranger patterns or others converted to Yamaha .sty files. The software recognizes all of the variations in a style and many chord types, including chords with bass inversions.

AJ