The best demo person I've seen to date from Roland is Dr. Scott Tibbs. He has done many videos for Roland..., and is a great player too. He's the one who did the very extensive GW-7 demo.., and played a nice piece at the end. He has also done many Fantom demos, V synth demos, and a few others. I've seen some nice demos by Ed before, but this clearly isn't one of his best.

It's really odd too as this is Roland's new budget arranger and they still have yet to post a great demo of someone playing the thing. Oh well.., we'll just have to wait for them to start popping up on YouTube I guess.

Ocamin.., that new Korg M50 is going to be HOT! Korg just killed Yamaha's MO series with this model...., and if I saw the prices right the 61 key model will only be $99 more than the 61 key MO6, but you get a hell of a lot for that extra $99 too.

Korg's got a winner there. I wonder if they're going to use this to replace the TR series...

*also important to note is the 61 key M50 comes in at less than 15 lbs!!!!!! WOW! That's a lot of M power for under 15 lbs

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 09-19-2008).]

An M50 is not an arranger. It's kind of like saying 'I don't like the look of that new Honda sports car, so I'll go and get a station wagon instead!'

My take is that, despite the bumbling demonstrator, and some of the awful patches he demoed (there actually ARE some very good trumpet sounds in the Sonic Cell ), at the price point it comes at, there isn't much out there with as good a sounding basic sound-set. Just the piano alone is better than most stage pianos of that price range...

And, if software can be used to edit styles, setups, etc., how is this any different to Yamaha, that require quite a bit of extra software (that they are too cheap to even develop themselves and leave it to talented amateurs to do it for free for them) to do the same things?

Overall, this move towards the Sonic Cell as the underlying engine on newer low and mid-price keyboards is a hugs step in the right direction for Roland...

The move AWAY from hiring talented demonstrators, OTOH, is an idiotic exercise in cost cutting in the wrong areas... Yamaha spare no expense for their product demonstrations, and reap the benefit of it. Roland should do likewise.

Whoever is in charge of Roland arranger division marketing SHOULD BE FIRED! And replaced with someone with at least HALF a brain! What do you need to run Roland's marketing these days? A PULSE?

This barely flies as an MS demo

We're well aware that the M50 isnt an arranger. Ocamin mentioned it in an above post.

Also from what I saw.., the software for the GW-8 doesn't allow you to create a custom style from scratch using the GW-8 as the base.., and is more of a STYLE CONVERTER that you use to convert styles from other makers or take a midi file and create a style from that. It allows some editing, but the Yamaha S-550 does all the style recording "internally", and allows you to build a style from the ground up (all within the environment of the keyboard).

I agree that it's great Roland is bringing the SonicCell sounds into the GW-8. Although Ed's demo wasn't anything close to stellar you can still hear the quality of the sound itself.

Yes I too agree RolandUS needs to clean out the house in the demo department. People have been complaining about poor demos of the GW-8 since it was introduced. Roland even put up that gawd-awful demo of the one guy playing (which was an absolute joke and insult) to the latin music community.

Yamaha does a great job on their product demos..., and Roland could learn a thing or two from them on that.

Does the GW-8 software allow you to import MIDI files?

That would be the door to user style creation, I guess, and to be honest, I prefer to do all my editing in Cubase (because of the power and familiarity) before I assemble the style, anyway...

And, I'm still confused... as radically different as an M50 is to the GW-8, why is this the next choice? Surely, if that's what you would need, you wouldn't even LOOK at the GW-8 in the first place (or vice versa)? Loop and arp WS's have virtually NOTHING in common with any arranger, either sound, OS or style-wise...

It's still kind of like saying that, if the T3 doesn't work out for you, your next choice would be a FantomG

They are like chalk and cheese!

Creating a user styles from a midi is not the same as starting with a blank canvas.., and entering in the parts yourself. Sure you could create your own midi.., then use the software to convert that to a style, but it's really not the same as starting with a blank canvas and creating all the intros, ending, and variations.

Ocamins decision on the GW and the M50 are his own. It's also not uncommon for someone to move from an arranger to the synth.., it just depends on one's needs really....

Too much sway towards the Latin arena for me. Sounds are ok, I don't understand the need to play MP3 files within the keyboard when most Keyboards have an aux in for an MP3 Player or even Notebook.

Just like many of the older workstations were Hip Hop and Rap oriented. I prefer a generic workstation that is versatile.

How is making your own MIDI file from a blank state on a sequencer any different from creating your own style file from a blank slate on an arranger?

Surely the vastly better display and editing capabilities more than makes up for the inconvenience of having to do a quick USB transfer before you can try it out in arranger mode?

And especially with Intros and Endings, all they are is MIDI files, pure and simple. Linear, one shot sequences. How is it easier to make those on-board, with next to no display and editing power, than to use a sequencer? You DO use a sequencer, don't you?

I still have yet to see Roland's software with this..., but Diki have you ever created a user style using a midi file? The programs for this vary..., I've yet to see what Roland has included, but often it works like Style Conversion. The program will take your Midi and the program will make the decision on HOW the midi is split up for style use.

I don't want the program to make all those decisions for me. I want to say..., this is the intro, this is the ending, variation and so on. Perhaps Roland has included features in this new software that will allow you to take midi, convert it to a style and then allow YOU to choose what goes where within that style rather than let the program just take it and do a conversion. If this progam for the GW-8 lets you create a midi.., then during the process of conversion allow the user to decide what and where each part will go.., then it won't be so bad..., but creating user styles on the keyboard itself isn't rocket science. It takes talent, but I don't see any current mid and top arrangers working with 2 line LED displays.. The current models are no PC screen, but are more than capable of providing enough viewable info to the user.

Again....., I'll have to look at the software. Once I see what it can do.., then who knows.., maybe I'll smile

Also.., when it gets converted you may not like the conversion done by the software. What if variation one isn't exactly to your liking. Will the GW's software let you go in and make more detailed changes or will you be stuck with how the software has converted the file? What if the midi converted kinda loses it's feel from the original? Can you go back with the software and put it back? Your original midi seq could have some great feel to it, but sometimes midi to style conversions will lose the original feel.

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 09-19-2008).]

Yes, Roland allow you to say which bar #'s are which divisions.

How on earth could it work any other way?