Great News!! Next Year or?

Diki,

I don't beleive that yamaha is the "best" or no other company. Each company suites everyone needs. I currently own a s900. This was my first yamaha ever, I've always owned a Ketron, with a korg or roland here and there, but it was always a ketron. I gave yamaha a try, the s900 was a nice packaged keyboard, it was different. I liked the sounds, styles it had voice effect, usb and I got it onsale. My dad always used yamaha until the mid to late 90's, then he switched to solton/ketron. I remember all of the psr's with the exception of one, were 76 keys. so there were plenty of 76's before 9000pro.

I don't believe a company will go bankrupt if they don't sell 76's that they manufactured. But from what I hear and see yamaha is probably has the best selling arranger division then any other company. The visit the samash in times square, nyc the rep told me that they can't give the g70 away, but the tyros has sold. Either way it does not matter to me, if the next keyboard has what I want i'll buy it, if not, I won't. As you stated there are other companies that make 76, so purchase one of those or a s900 midi to a 76 controller will also way work also. If your that upset that Yamaha does not make a 76 tyros/s900 keyboard obviously your hooked on them also.

I would adore a 6 octave S900, 700 or 500.

Had I not read bad stories about the 9000Pro's processing problems I might well have picked up a second hand one rather than my PSR3000.

To my mind [not] creating such a keyboard looks like a market deliniation issue, I agree with the theory that making a 6 octave mid-range arranger could well impact other sales.

Lets face it, Yamaha already make 88 key arrangers in the CVP range, seemingly based very heavily on PSR 1500 and later hardware. They make bearable (to some of us anyway) lightweight 6 and 7 octave keybeds used in the DGX range and the NP30 piano. Putting a 6 octave keybed onto a CVP eletronics board is damn near just a case of getting around the "some keyboard matrix connections aren't in use" issue, so I don't think it would cost Yamaha that much time, effort and investment to put S900 electronics into a DGX 6 octave shell.

Therefore it's a marketing issue!

Yamaha of course know EXACTLY how many XS7's they've sold. And I agree (shock, horror!) that the sales figures for that size may indeed be the lowest of all three. BUT....

IT DOESN'T STOP YAMAHA FROM MAKING IT...

And, I predict pretty confidently (because Yamaha has been making all three sizes of WS's for decades, now) that, although it is the lowest selling size, they will continue to keep making it....

Yamaha are quite content to make keyboards that sell in lesser numbers than 61 versions in other divisions. What is it about the arranger division that prevents them from doing the same? A spine, perhaps?

Hi Steve,
since we're doing a bit of a wish list,
has Yamaha ever considered an arranger module??

With all the free 3rd party style editing/creation software available,
the module possibly wouldn't even need style creation functions onboard.

Something basic with good quality sounds & styles.

Suppose we can only dream.

best wishes
Rikki

What a lot of persons seem to be doing when discussing Yamaha making a 76 key TOTL arranger is comparing the requested Yamaha 76 key arranger (lets call it the “Nirvana” for this discussion) to the G70 PA 2x and the 9000 pro. That IMO is an incorrect comparisons. That is mixing apples and oranges.

The “Nirvana” would not be anything like the other 76 key arrangers. For one it would be light. It would have every thing the T3 has except it will be 76 keys. And most importantly, it will be a Yamaha.

After all, it is the sounds and styles that people are wanting to get the T3.

The “Nirvana” would not have to be 5LBS more than the T2. It would not have to be more than 4 inches that the T2.

And best of all, the “Nirvana” would have the supreme Yamaha styles and sounds and that would be the compelling reason for persons to buy the “Nirvana”. So those who had a T1 T2 or a PSR would not mind if it has 76 keys because it does not subtract anything that they had already but it only ads. They can choose to use or not use the extra keys.


Every time there is a discussion about Yamaha making a 76 key arranger, you must ask the question:

When Yamaha upgrades their TOTL arranger (T1-T2 or T2-T3), would there sales decrease and would their profit decrease if the keyboard was 76 keys, lightweight, compact in size, has the great Yamaha sounds and styles and is reasonably priced?

If their TOTL was only 76 keys, not only would the sales not decrease, but Yamaha would also get a new market (people who want the 76 keys). They would do that without loosing any of their current customers.

When they don’t make a 76 key arranger (when the evidence shows that there will be no harm to Yamaha and there is no reasonable explanation as to why Yamaha does not make a 76 key TOTL arranger), they demonstrate to their market that they just do not care. Its almost like giving the finger to persons who want a Yamaha TOTL 76 key arranger.

Come on Yamaha, give us “Nirvana”. A 76 key TOTL lightweight great sounding arranger.

I think this is raising a red flag to T2/3 and S900 users.

Why would Yamaha STOP making a 61 arranger that is SO successful? It wouldn't be in their best interest at all...

And, again, a brand new 'pro' arranger with a 76 and totally new features and sounds, styles, etc., is simply a risky move for a company already gun-shy about the idea. No... simply a Tyros and/or an S900 with absolutely NOTHING added or taken away other than the keybed is all we are asking for. No R&D, no new styles, no new OS, no new features, no new sounds, nothing nada zip....

Just a 76 tacked onto the same internal parts, sounds and OS. Pretty simple, eh?
----------------------------------------------

Look, Steve, if you are still lurking, I've got one other suggestion. Perhaps a way we can BOTH win. A simple OS modification that would allow a 76 to control the 61 arranger....

The problem using an external controller on an arranger is that the arranger's Registration takes it's internal keyboard, and divides it up into the ranges for each Part, allows velocity curves to be different for each, routes aftertouch to the correct destination, changes split points, assigns the correct, range for arranger control, etc., etc., but to do all that from an external keyboard requires some pretty fancy programming, none of which is, of course, controllable from the arranger's Registrations. You have to do double the programming, and even then there is a lot that just doesn't work right....

BUT... what if there was an "Arranger Mirror' channel? In other words, send the arranger ONE MIDI channel, from top to bottom of the source keyboard, and have the arranger itself map those ranges, controls, destinations, all that other stuff, JUST AS IF IT WERE LOOKING AT IT'S OWN KEYBOARD.

There is a very similar function on my K2500. No matter how complicated the Setup, eight zones, multiple destinations, controller mapping, velocity cross-splits, you name it, if you send the K2500 ONE 'dumb' MIDI channel from another keyboard, the Kurzweil maps all those splits and everything to it. It basically just treats it as if it were the raw input from it's own keyboard.

Now this, I imagine, is probably VERY easy to do. The arranger already is doing this to it's own keyboard, all the code has to do is do exactly the same to a MIDI input of ONE channel only. Simple, no?

Now, you could hook up ANY 61, 76, 88, MIDI guitar, you name it, and the controller will have the same functions as if it were the REAL arranger keyboard. Maybe an NP-30. Maybe an XK8, maybe a Motif XS7/8, maybe anything the customer wants...

If Yamaha Japan are adamant about nixing the 76 PSR and Tyros, perhaps they might consider adding this to the OS. Who knows, this could result in the sale of TWO Yamaha keyboards (an arranger AND a 76/88 controller) to someone who at present is unable to buy any... That's good business sense, isn't it? Even if we were to use our existing 76's, you'll still get a 61 sale out of someone who wouldn't buy one under any other circumstances.

A simple OS addition to get MANY additional sales of existing products... Sounds like win/win to me

Quoting Diki,
"BUT... what if there was an "Arranger Mirror' channel? In other words, send the arranger ONE MIDI channel, from top to bottom of the source keyboard, and have the arranger itself map those ranges, controls, destinations, all that other stuff, JUST AS IF IT WERE LOOKING AT IT'S OWN KEYBOARD.

There is a very similar function on my K2500. No matter how complicated the Setup, eight zones, multiple destinations, controller mapping, velocity cross-splits, you name it, if you send the K2500 ONE 'dumb' MIDI channel from another keyboard, the Kurzweil maps all those splits and everything to it. It basically just treats it as if it were the raw input from it's own keyboard.

Now this, I imagine, is probably VERY easy to do. The arranger already is doing this to it's own keyboard, all the code has to do is do exactly the same to a MIDI input of ONE channel only. Simple, no?"


That can be done already(talking Ty2).
There are default midi templates that are setup for Ext. KB control or if you want something more special you can edit them yourself.
In fact even using the OOTB default "All Parts" template, if you connect a controller KB set up to transmit on ch1 to the midi-IN B port of Ty2 that's what you get.


You can also play a single midi track into Ty2 (setup in Keyboard mode) and it will treat it in the same way as if a pair of hands were playing the keyboard directly.
Which has all sorts of implications- if we can think of a good use for it!

John

John is exactly right. This feature of remote keyboard operation emulating the usage of its own keyboard is already presesnt in all Yamaha arranger workstations for many years now. Some of the lower models can do it too.

Rikki,

Thanks for the input.

Steve