I know that I am 'preaching to the choir' for the most part, but I just want to say that when INVESTING - and it IS an investment - in any music apparatus, make sure you know who you are dealing with ...
when I was deciding on purchasing my PA 600, I found that the Guitar Center 15 minutes from my house was an authorized dealer ... however, having previously dealt with Frank at Audio Works in CT http://www.audioworksct.com/ I figured I would purchase from him even though his store is a little over one and a half hours away ...
Well, I won't go into the gory details, but after purchasing the board at a very 'competitive' price, I soon found that I needed some service ... I thought about bringing the board to GC, but hesitated because I didn't buy it there ... I got in touch with Frank, the level of service and speed of response was nothing less than GREAT !!! ... I won't say that GC wouldn't also have given me good service, but I do doubt that it would have been to the level of Frank's ...
I have found that, while there may be a 'corporate' philosophy for high service to customers, in many of these 'chain stores' that service level rests in the hands of the individual workers - if they WANT to provide great service, they will, otherwise ...
So, I just want to publicly thank Frank for his great service and dedication to S-Z forum members ...

I wish people in Europe would have your attitude, there are hardly any keyboard shops left in the UK due to cut throat internet discounting. One well known European cyberstore sells many product at Trade Price (or close to) which tempts buyers and makes it impossible for retailers to be competitive.

If only the manufacturers would enforce MAP pricing and the buyers would support their local music shops (the few that are left)

Frank is the Best...!!! Nuff Said!!

We have several terrific retailers here, at the Zone ... Frank, George, AJ, DanO and many more - keep the brothers in business!

Last time I checked, Dan0 was no longer a retailer.

Gary

Sure he is, he retails automobiles!
DonM

Like everything in this world you get what you pay for. While big chains can undercut the small retailer what you get in terms of support and assistance far outweighs the few extra dollars you may save. In the end the cheaper deal could cost you much more in the long run.

Frank, George, AJ ( and DanO when he was retailing ) in the USA and Tonewheeldude in the UK have proved themselves to be stellar in terms of supporting their customers post purchase, as well as knowing how to best configure the keyboards at the time of purchase. Many members here will atest to that. Especially with arranger keyboards ... chains like GC have little to no knowledge about these models.

I like and support Frank and George for US based retailers you can trust.


Russ

Agree about Frank and George...also curious about why you needed service on your new Korg PA600 Tony?

Well, I had said that I wasn't going to go into the gory details, but since you asked, Larry ... while setting up my 'Custom Song List', I have been 'experimenting' with many, many different voices (sounds) ...while doing this, on a number of occasions, the board would 'lock up' while I am researching voices - for example, let's say I was in the 'Trumpet & Trombone' banks working my way through every possible horn sound in those banks - about 60 in all - all of a sudden the board would 'lock up' ... I would not be able to get to any other page or function ... it would play the style I was in at the time, but I could not change anything ... the only way out was to 'Power Down and Up' ...
Frank was at NAMM and talked to the KORG people about it and they were perplexed ... BUT, they did agree to a good solution for me, and I am very happy ...

As I said earlier, the 'con' against the board is that it takes quite a bit of editing to get it to sound the way YOU want ... the 'pro' is that KORG gives you ALL the tools and then some for editing ...
While the learning curve is significant coming from the ultra-user friendly technics kn6000, I have been slowed by getting 'sucked into' just PLAYING the KB because the styles are great!!!