Oh my ..... do you really think the Yamaha harmonizer even comes CLOSE to the Ketron? That was one of the weakest features in every Yamaha I ever played. They have other great features, but the mic input was just a step above the Technics...and that's not saying much!

Sounds are subjective, styles too, but the mic input is way under par in the entire Yamaha lineup.

DonM,
May I ask for you to elaborate on why the Midjay instead of a SD3?

Thanks,
Lee

While waiting for the Audya, better line up a second mortgage on the house!

Sticker shock is my prediction for this one, along with a deepening sense of disappointment as the limitations of the audio loop system become all too apparent...

It has been so long in coming it should be perfect (No Bugs) when its released.. but way too expensive.

I am still in the Diki camp in that I too have doubts on how they are going to achieve what the publicity is spruiking.

I'm a bit skeptical of the audio loops having the ability to read complex chords and inversions.

If they can pull it off, it will certainly raise the bar.

Ian

Yes Ian,
And that bar would be very high indeed, if they can do it, as you say..

That's some pretty heavy duty processing going on!!

I was always taught if it sounds too good to be true it probably is!!!

Dennis

Regarding Audya,
I heard $4000 ball park not $7000. I don't think there marketing folks are dumb enough to think it would be a success at much higher. Why spend all that $$$ on development to just sell to a very small part of the market? How many of us here are willing to buy a Wersi (or anything)at the $8000+ price?
Even if we thought it was absolutely perfect for us. And wanted it more than a shiny new Red 1966 GTO.

Also, IMHO technology is there to pull it off. It takes a lot of memory, and CPU and both have gone way down in cost. We will see how well it is implemented. Will the sound be that much better sitting in our own home? Demos/tutorials are out there on YouTube. Sounds pretty good.
Also today I found out all the standard styles from previous models will work fine too.

I'm certainly not sold on it yet.... but I want to play one before I decide.

Today the technology is there to do just about anything... the question is: If they build it will we come?

Lee

Hasn't the dollar plummeted against the Euro since the Audya got announced? To think they are going to be able to offer them in the US at even close to $4k (their original target price) is just optimistic, as far as I am concerned...

One more question about the audio loop technology... how on earth is it supposed to change a chord in the MIDDLE of a note..? You know, Maj(sus4) resolving to Maj's, etc.? Currently, a MIDI arranger does this by instantly bending the notes that need changing to the new ones without re-triggering them. And, if you've ever looked at the MIDI output of an arranger, you would realize it is doing this ALL THE TIME. Play a chord even fractionally late, and ALL the notes get this treatment.

How on earth is this going to happen with an audio loop? I fail to see how this could be done.

I wish that Ketron hadn't put all their eggs in this VERY experimental, untested and expensive basket. One can only hope, for the health of the company, that they have a simple successor to the SD-1/5 in the pipe as well, just in case....

Diki
Forget converting, just cross off the € sign and replace it with $ sign to get a typical US price.

Lee
Arranger sales in the US are miniscule compared to Europe and the rest of the world (This is why manufactures don’t take much notice of US buyers) so don’t base your sales assumptions on the extremely limited US market.

Bill

Uncle Dave, I agree with you that the yamaha vocalizer isn't the best but I just looking at it from a dollar stand point. I have to say dollar for dollar the yamaha is a great packaged keyboard vs. the ketron with all of the features. I was told by Ketron (bell ketron) before the closed that the SD5 was going to be a mid priced keyboard, ruffly around the XD9 price +/-, to compete with yamaha mid range line. since xd9 wasn't a big seller compared to the volume of sales they had with the MS series. Ms series keyboards was most likly there best selling models to date. There's nothing mid range about $2,900 w/hd and vocal... I would like to have an SD3, but the price point is not where it should be.