mc,

what if Roland came out with a Fantom like arranger with its top notch sounds, and with audio guitar, drum and bass accomp. as has AUDYA, beautiful touchsceeen and let's say 1GB RAM,

would you still not buy Roland? :-)

OMG! Guys seriously..., go back and re-read the FIRST post. Then look at the DATE it was posted!

Yes.., Roland US is clueless in the arranger area, but this post was done last year.

Yeah, I just saw that but, they haven't gotten any better in 7 or 8 months later.

Lee,

I haven't tried the the Fantom, so I don't really know their sounds. I did have a EM2000 and then G1000 then VA7 (just a week). The Em2000 screen went out twice, the G1000 zip drive only worked when it wanted to, which Roland never wanted to repair and their turn around time was at least 1 month. The VA7 was horrible in every way possible for me (just my opinion).

So all in all I don't think I would buy a Roland, because I honestly never cared for their styles, even in the G70. The EM/G keyboards were only used for midi play back, which they are very good in.

I did try the G70 and for the type of music we play Ketron was much more adaptable. If their styles were more like Ketron's styles I would then give them a serious try and try to make it work.

Thanks, Mario

Although RolandUS's general tech support and marketing of arrangers leave a lot to be desired, I will say one thing for them. I had a hardware problem during warranty (right at the very end of it, also!) and they bent over backwards to help me get it fixed with NO downtime at all (well, one day to take it to the local dealer and have the parts put in - pretty good!).

They basically had no positive idea of what was wrong, so they replaced out nearly every main board (three of them) just to be sure they got it. At considerable cost to them. I was back on the gig the next day, problem solved!

Now THAT'S service!

I would say in all fairness to Roland, when I had the problems with mine is was 1999-2000, nine years later I can't say that there better or worst, since I never used a roland again.

I want to really try the GW8-L but I can't find one. If happen to come across I want to go in with an open mine and give it a real shot.

The E80 was really tempting for 1600 +/- but from what I understand its weighs about 50 lbs and I don't know if the styles are the same as the G70 and I can't find one.

[This message has been edited by mc (edited 02-26-2009).]

Hmmmm, maybe I should give my 2 cents on the E80.... after playing with it for about 4 days.

Well, the keybed itself is the same as in the PA800 (not so good), still has a stinking Floppy Drive(in 2009 , can you believe that)...and the unit is veryyy heavy might I add.
The overall sound is quite decent, but drums haven't really improved from the VA series. The drum edit function in the make-up tools is lacking the ability to substitute different sounds from different kits(big -). I found the Brass sounds quite weak and lacking richness that I am used to from the VA-series. All the other sounds are pretty much average!
The effects haven't seen any major improvement over the previous series. I also found out that styles from the older Roland series have to be converted in order to work properly ( I guess because of the new style structure). One thing that I love on the E80 is the guitar mode, which is 10 times better than on the PA800. As far as the harmonizer is concerned, PA800's TC helicon is far superior.

If anybody has any specific questions about it, please ask !

[This message has been edited by hitman (edited 02-26-2009).]

[This message has been edited by hitman (edited 02-26-2009).]

Hitman,

Do you know if the styles are the same from the G70?

The internal styles in the E80 do they come from the older models like the G1000, G800, e86, etc?

Is it very similar to the VA7?

Thanks

Hi MC,

The styles are basically the same as G70, with a few additions! Some of them are very similar to the VA series, but they have been reworked. In my opinion, the E80 is basically a VA7 with minor additions and SRX expansions. I honestly think that they could have done much, much better. The only way to make this E80 sound great is by adding a coupple of the SRX boards which cost about $ 250/piece.

The PA800 offers much more for the money!

[This message has been edited by hitman (edited 02-26-2009).]

Squeak - good anaylsis on your part - LOL