From what my friend tells me, the GW-8 imports and plays G70 styles without too much drama.
A bit of re-voicing, you are done. This should negate the need for a US specific model, IMO.
Admittedly, it would benefit Roland's sales in the US if they did the work for us,
even sold us a $50 USB stick with 100 G70/E80 US-specific styles optimized for GW-8 (I think that's fair enough).
I honestly think the days of ROM style sets is LONG past. One should be able to load whatever you want
into the style categories section, and decide for yourself if country is more important than meringue,
if R&B is more useful than enka, if zydeco is more important than Schlager...
Give me a voucher for however many styles it is supposed to come with, and let ME chose which and what I need.
Then let me load them into the style category section (and let ME label them!). I think most of us could remember a number as being 'Cajun'
if it came to style category selection, especially if we had made the decision where
to put that type in the first place, so that gets rid of the need to silkscreen the category names...
(or a sticky back blank, to write the categories down on)
My G70's internal ROM styles aren't ROM at all! Every one of them can be replaced
But due to a stupid decision, they can't be renamed... but if I WANTED to, I could take every style I hate
out of the ROM section, and put one in where I want it. That one niggling detail needs changing,
and presto! A completely customizable ROM style section!
This is how ALL arrangers should be. Each of us needs something different in the style department.
There are European players who do nothing but country. There are Wisconsin players who play mostly polkas. Geography has nothing to do with it...
LET US DECIDE FOR OURSELVES WHAT ROM STYLES WE GET
And this would get rid of the need for Roland to manufacture different versions of what is,
underneath it all, exactly the same arranger (lower costs, hint, hint
)
[This message has been edited by Diki (edited 10-09-2008).]