I present to you my wish list for the next TOTL Yamaha Arranger:

- New name: I'm bored of the name "Tyros" - it's at least 11 years old! A new name would signify a new look and direction.

- Smaller: For travelling musicians the Tyros is just too big. Korg managed to make the Pa3x look classy yet even when boxed it is still undersize (62 inches) and underweight (50lbs) and can be taken on any plane domestically or internationally for free. (Domestic airlines in the USA can charge up to $600 for a round trip!!)

- Balanced outputs: Let's face it: Most of us are not using DI boxes. This feature would just give the Yamaha a cleaner and better sound.

- New Direction in sound for bass and drums: Although Yamaha has excelled in so many ways, I personally feel that it has lacked a certain punch and clarity from its "kick" "snare" and "basses". There is something muddy about the Yamaha when played through a sound system with subs (and I've played it through MANY) - it lacks a certain punch and openess.

- More spots for custom drums: The Tyros currently only allows 20 custom drum kits. I for one have many more than this. I have about 15 Turkish and oriental kits, 10 Western kits, and many tweaked kits. Why limit us?

- Give all the features of the s950: In the past the MOTL arrangers have had drum kits and voices that were not added to the TOTL arranger. Can't figure out why...

- Remixing of preset styles: On the old PSR-8000 there was an option to remix the preset styles, change the OTS, and redesign the groove - without saving them as new custom styles. The remixed versions were saved in a folder called "Groove". This allows us to tweak without using up valuable Flash ROM.

- iPad integration for editing sounds: Instead of plugging into a PC for detailed editing, it would be great if we could plug into an iPad instead. I'm sure there are other iPad uses that can be though up.

- This is my big one: On the new S950, Yamaha added the option of Audio Multipads. I would like to see the option for time-stretching and pitch-shifting on Audio Multipads, so that we can record an actual audio instrument doing a solo, save it as a Multipad, and then trigger it at other keys and speeds (as can be done with audio mp3s on the S950). I currently use audio multipads for solos with my Tyros4 (long story how it's done), but whenever I have another singer or want to change the speed, the multipads become useless...

- Based on the S950, it seems obvious that with the next TOTL arranger Yamaha will be going the Audio Drums route. I'm very much looking forward to this. However it takes about 2 seconds to load an Audio style. Hopefully this time can be shortened or eliminated.

- Legacy: Yamaha has always been good about this, but it needs to be said considering that it looks like Yamaha is about to change direction: The next TOTL needs to be downward compatible with the Tyros4. Not having compatibility would be a big problem for me.

- 2GB Flash RAM: I hope I'm not asking too much by asking for the option to expand to 2GB of flash RAM (as on the Motif). I'm reaching my limit with all my custom sounds, drums, and multipad audio riffs.

- Allow us to easily import samples from common formats like Giga, Kontakt, AKAI, etc. Or at least give us tools to create UVNs!

- More Flash ROM memory - 6MB just ain't enough...

- EQ controls on the sounds. Currently there are just bass and treble controls, and they don't work properly.

- Quality mastering on the outputs!

So that's my list so far. Hopefully the right people will see this.

Chony

I was at an exhibition last weekend and somebody told me there is no planned Tyros 5 and Yamaha are concentraing on the PSR range from now on...does anyone know if thats true? It would be a terrible shame if it were so!

Welcome to my world!

TBH, in a way, it's a good thing. The best stuff from the TOTL trickles down to the MOTL, and you end up with something pretty amazing, at at least 1/3 the price!

And much of the stuff 99% don't use gets dropped... I sometimes wonder what percentage of T4 users use the sampler at all?

" Give all the features of the s950: In the past the MOTL arrangers have had drum kits and voices that were not added to the TOTL arranger. Can't figure out why..."

So you'll have to buy the next TOTL to get 'em!
DonM

Everyone wants something different...

I want a bigger less plastic version with 76 keys, 18 inch touchscreen, vst support, attacable 2nd keyboard (abacus pro style), real sliders, knobs to control the sound, vextor stick, full audio styles. Sound edditing at the same level as Korg.

But, then i realise this will not happen in the first ten years to come.

On any future Yamaha, I'd like to see more effort placed toward the instrument mix of the preset styles. I've owned a bunch of Yamahas and have wondered who does the mixing. If you look at the panning, it's a mixed bag. Of course, bass and drums are usually in the center. Beyond that, it's all over the place on some styles. How about getting some real mixing/mastering pros to look at that issue before any releases? Another issue: on some instruments within a style, you get the balance about right, then on the intro or ending that same instrument (or a different one on the same track) may come blasting out at a much higher volume level. Need some consistency here.

Registraion Memory (Presets) directly below the screen.

Uncompressed sound
24 bit sound board
Touch Screen
Multi Format Sound Support
Ability to natively play Roland Styles
Real Ale Dispenser

Bill

Same sample waveform as the Motif so all those great sounds would be available to the TOTL arranger out of the box.

Bill G

Total on board editing. PC/laptop and ipad may be the rage, but I would rather not need a piece of peripheral equipment to program/edit.

Chord recognition from right hand like Korg.

For Bill and I- Add Wersi Pegasus sound card (orchestral strings are awesome).

But sorry Bill- German Lager dispenser

76 notes. Touch screen. Drum kits from the DTX e-kits. Chord Sequencer. Audio multipads loopable.

Espresso dispenser.

... now THAT might get me thinking ...

If it was good enough for Beethoven...

He used to count out 60 coffee beans for every cup (talk about OCD!)

His prestissimo must have been formidable!

Decent Vocal harmony VH2 sounds like a machine.

God Bless,
Don

All these t5 wish list things will certainly be at a cost upwards of $5000.00+....

Software, another circuit board, maybe a chip or two,,it should still be "humanly" priced..

No espresso dispenser- or you won't be sitting at that keyboard for long..

Everybody "wants" but, nobody wants to pay.....

I'll just play faster and loooonger ....

Heck Sparky. Right Hand, Left Hand can be overcome by adding an external MIDI controller where you need it. But a adding a chord recognition mode that mimics Roland's "Chord Intelligence" or Korg's "Fingered 1" mode, plus a dedicated Bass Inversion button on the console would be a huge step forward. Even a user setting to interpret G2-D3-E3 as Em7 (instead of G6) would make a difference to me.

Yamaha hasn't made any acknowledged changes to their chord recognition modes in over 10 years (although some subtle changes have been implemented behind the scenes.) Maybe it's time?

In multitracking in the midi recorder, with some of the multipads like bossa guitar chording or latin percussion----rather than recording those parts in real time, instead, having the ability to select the multipad, and with one button push, add that pad to the entire selected track. And, afterwards, still have the ability to adjust volumes, panning, etc...

Quote: Everybody "wants" but, nobody wants to pay.....

I'm willing to pay but there is a limit. First of all high-end keyboards are a lot like fine furniture. There is a huge 'mark-up' on both products. A nice piece of fine furniture can sell for a lot of money but the profit margin is huge. A piece costing $5,000 can turn a $3,000-$4,000 "profit" and the manufacturer laughs all the way to the bank.

High-end keyboards are a similar "pot-of-gold" for keyboard manufacturers. For example a Tyros4 costs around $5,200 and I'm estimating Yammie probably makes $2,500-$3,000 in pure "profit" on each Tyros4 they sell. It's a brilliant marketing scheme that Yammie and others have seized upon after realizing that many people are more than willing to fork over big bucks on so-called high-end keyboards. Most consumers who buy high-end arranger keyboards are senior citizens... many with large bank accounts with money to burn... and they seem to have a tendency to acquire the "latest greatest" gadget(s) i.e. the Tyros1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9 and so forth. Yammie adds just enough additional "improvements" in order to keep the ball rolling i.e the scheme perpetuating itself, and the result is a huge profit margin going directly into Yammie's overstuffed pockets as they laugh all the way to the bank that their brilliant marketing scheme remains intact for the next generation of keyboards that rolls off their assembly lines.

Was it P.T. Barnum that said "a sucker is born every minute"?

I'm not suggesting people who buy each new generation of any given product is a sucker. Rich people with money to burn don't really miss the money and if it makes them happy then more power to them. Apple products are a similar case study. The iPhone, iPod and i-Pad are also highly popular and usually much more expensive than the competition. Yet consumers devoted to Apple products keep forking over big bucks on each new model in many cases.

What I think needs to happen is for consumers to "step back" and realize what they're doing and once they become more "discriminating" in what they purchase (that is to say in what each new model has to offer in terms of significant improvements vs. 'incremental' cosmetics) and then hold off buying those products with incremental improvements. It would go a long way in holding manufacturer's 'feet to the fire' and force them to produce keyboards worthy enough to write home about without breaking the bank. In other words, those excellent sounding Drum Kits everybody wishes were on the Tyros4? If Yammie realized consumers were starting to "buck the trend" and wouldn't settle for "incremental", Yammie would then be obligated to provide consumers with what they wanted and those excellent sounding Drum Kits - from the Motif series, etc. - would finally arrive on Yammie's high-end arranger product(s) no doubt. Or else Yammie's Music Division could suffer severe repercussions and their "stream of money" could dry up and they could eventually go out of business. The same thing applies to Korg, Roland, Casio and Ketron.

Consumers need to take the bull by the horns and demand excellence in the products they buy, at a fair price. But if enough people keep purchasing those incrementally induced products, then Yammie and the rest of them will likely keep dishing them out to consumers in a "business as usual" manner. Thus perpetuating the marketing scheme that keeps Yammie and the rest of them laughing all the way to the bank and consumers scratching their heads that the Drum Kits still aren't up to snuff and/or the keybed still feels cheesy, etc., etc., etc.

I owned the original Tyros. It was a great keyboard (at the time) at a fair price and the Drum Kit(s) were a nice step up from my PSR-2000. The Tyros4, on the other hand, is a nice keyboard with many excellent sounds but you pay through the nose and the Drum Kits just don't cut it for the price you have to pay. The Korg PA3X is a nice keyboard as well. But it too is way overpriced in my humble opinion. Although the Drum Kits are much better than those on the Tyros4.

I'm a consumer advocate if you haven't noticed. I don't fault Yamaha for trying to make a profit and I don't really fault senior citizens for forking over big bucks on the latest/greatest product(s) which seems to bring them joy and happiness and a chance to brag that their toy sounds better than the other guys toy. No pun intended.

What I take issue with is incrementally improved products that cost and arm and a leg and yet still "lack" features and functions considered professional in nature. Making them cost prohibitive to me at least. If, on the other hand, Yammie released a Tyros5 (or whatever they call it) and it was reasonably priced and fully featured and had great sounding Drum Kits, I would seriously consider buying one. But why would Yammie produce such a beast when there are so many eager beavers out there willing to fork over big bucks on over-priced, incrementally improved products? Therefore in all likelihood Yammie's successor to the Tyros4 will once again be astronomically priced and the Drum Kits will probably still sound amateurish. I would like to be proven wrong on both accounts. But I won't hold my breath needless to say.

All the best, Mike

Yep... T4 $5k+, PA3x $3.5k+

What does that extra $1500 buy you? A used car to carry it in? LOL

Its easy to forget the hidden costs and be distracted by the plastic case and circuit boards alone. But so much more is involved then a parts list:

Design, R&D costs..including prototyping, software developers and programmers, style writers, plus all the other staff involved in production, manufacturing, packaging, logisitcs, marketing accountancy etc...how many people do you think are involved in total in Tyros Project from beginning to end?), , plant and machinery (including maintenance and sevrice), building overheads, taxes, licenses, government standards complience (emmisions, safety, ROHS, WEEE etc), legal fees, taxes, logistics, taxes after sales service, support, warranty costs, parts, taxes...and the list goes on.

Yamaha seems to have the biggest price difference between currently available models. A psr 650 at $800, psr 750 at $1,200, a 950 @ $1,900, then a T4 at $5,200!

Ketron went from a $2,000 sd5 to a $3,900 Audya.

Korg from a $1,200 pa600 to a &2,900 pa800(900??), then to a $3,700
pa3x.

Roland a bk-3 at $650, bk-5 at $1,000, to ???

All of the associated costs mentioned are involved in every model at some point after conception.
I know we're talking lower MOTL and MOTL vs TOTL, but $1,700-$1,900 difference from two manufacturers, and a $3,300 from Yamaha, who are reasonable between their MOTL arrangers, then dispose of that logic when offering the big boy. Roland is reasonable (between their two BK models)until we see if they do a TOTL model- not likely from the chatter I read..

But as stated, it is what the market will bear when you look at TOTL. Not so much supply, but demand. Prices won't change if the demand doesn't fall and enough people are willing to pay.

The ideal situation is to sell more. If that were the case, then the hidden costs can be divided up between more units. Unfortunatly the manufacturers are floundering when it comes to finding new customers and so prices remain high.

This is not helped by online sellers who are happy to operate at under 5%. On the surface it appears good for the consumer but the reality is very different.

Retail showrooms are neaded for new customers to see and hear an instrument of high value. No one is going to shell out a few $1000 for something they have not seen or heard. However retailers have realised they cannot compete with online sellers and so there is no incentive to stock those product lines.

This means there will be no new customers..only returning ones who are quite frankly..moving to a better place!

Less sales mean higher prices and possibility of ceasing production altogether.

What can we do to help? Avoid on line discount merchants and support your local retailers. If Yamaha were to stop TOTL arrangers it would be a MAJOR disaster for the whole industry. There are only three main players now and I am very certain the industry cannot support another manufacturer dropping out of the game..and arrangers would go the way of Electronic Organs.

IMO as computer technology advances as it has been year after year current technology which is still in its infancy will continue to escalate to better things leaving what is now behind including arranger Kb's, electronic musical instruments, etc,etc, and all things TECH in our lives as it stands now....don't be naive to think these small increments of so called advancements will even be around 10/20 years from now as we know it.
Enjoy whats here now .....stock pile it if that's what you need to be happy because it will quickly disappear for sure in the near future.The fun hasn't even begun yet ...the sad part most of us wont be here to see it or enjoy it.

TWD ... this is true - to a point - ... but how often does a board come out that is TOTALLY NEW in design, concept, OS, styles, sounds, etc. ... I agree the 'cover' may look different, but today's KBs are still products of R&D, programming, etc. that has been evolving through the years, not being completely re-invented ...
And is the high price because there is such a small market, or is there a small market because the price is high ... It seems to me the manufacturer sets the price before the product even hits the streets ... and THAT's when we see what kind of market there is for it ...

The manufacturers are floundering when it comes to finding new customers because they are basically ignoring the needs of younger players. You can only look forward to diminishing returns when you pin your future to an elderly and aging demographic. If you can't sell arrangers to kids, it's game over. Look at the 'home organ'...

Unless the big 3 make a concerted effort to make something like the old Yamaha DJX, but updated and improved to contemporary arranger abilities, the 'arranger' will turn into a rare, expensive niche keyboard, or a cheap nasty toy, or both!

Young players want something that can make THEIR music... and the arranger ain't it! Where are the arpeggiators? Where are the loopers? Where is the easy import of audio loops? Where are all the knobs for the synth sounds? You can't find them on modern (hah!) arrangers!

OTOH, the WS is gradually adding arranger like functions... chord following, buttons to change to different sections of a song, styles (of a sort), things like that. But it seems like they are doing it in a vacuum, that each new 'arranger-like' feature was invented from scratch, and nobody in the WS division is looking at a TOTL arranger and going 'that's a handy thing to do'. So they don't QUITE work right...

It's time for one of the big 3 to step up and go 'what's the easiest way to make modern music?'. The answer is a hybrid of arranger and WS. But each manufacturer out there seems utterly bent on balkanizing both these keyboards. Shared functionality is almost non-existent. But the bottom line is, if you want to sell a LOT of keyboards, you have to make modern music-making easy... the arranger is 'easy', the WS is 'modern'.

Somebody needs to combine the two.

All the kids need is FL Studio and few plugins to do everything they listen to.

Can't take that out to a gig or over to their friends... and they can't PLAY it!

Diki is on the right track here. I have a Tyros 3 and it is easy to use especially recording, customizing, etc. However there are few modern styles and too many ballroom, big band, easy listening old 50's, 60's, 70's styles. Now I also own a motif XF6 and while it has a more modern approach to sound there are still older style performances there as well that cover various Rock, R&B, Jazz, Dance, Trance, etc genres. But no Ballroom, easy listening, etc. These however are only examples and you can easily (short learning curve) create your own by simply selecting from the 8,000 arps and modifying tempo, effects, etc.

In this way I have the best of both worlds as I can create the Bass and drum parts on the Motif and combine them with selected channels of a Tyros Style, with some Tyros lead voices and Motif lead voices. Of course this required me to buy both. But you could buy a MOX and a 750 and get almost everything I have.

The problem the big three have is their Arrangers and Workstation groups are not even in the same country and the operating systems and overall designs of the two are very different.

So I don't believe we will see this mind meld soon. However the Arranger could be made more attractive to younger players if they did just three things:

1. Include only modern styles. Focus on the same genres that you find in the workstations and that allow the player to cover songs from the last 20 years or so. Also exclude ballroom, big band, easy listening,etc. Purge it.

2. This is the difficult one. Have a marketing strategy that gets demo equipment into the major chains ( Sam Ash, Guitar Center ) so people can try it and see how easy it would be to create or cover songs.

3. Get some major endorsements from actually bands or players.

I have said several times, the way for arrangers to be marketed to youngsters is by style selection. In other words, no ROM Styles... All Styles to be loaded into Flash ROM on customer selection.

So, you have the Modern Pack, a full set of modern beats and grooves, hiphop, dubstep, rap, house, modern rock styles etc., tailored to the under 30 crowd.

Then in the exact same Arranger, a Classic Pack, with the styles that we old farts need and want...

But here's the icing on the cake (especially for the manufacturers) - For maybe $100-200 more, you can purchase BOTH sets of styles. Obviously, these will have to be copy protected (something I've advocated for a long time, to incentivize style producers) or everybody will pirate the other set, but that's nothing that can't be figured out.

But the home organ is the perfect illustration of what happens to a type of keyboard when the manufacturers give up on trying to appeal to younger players. Gone the way of the dodo...

I didn't mention this before but IMHO Workstations sound better than Arrangers. When I had just the Tyros 3 I really enjoyed the sound and thought it first class. However after playing the Motif XF for the last 2 years as well as having spent time with the Korg Kronos and Roland Jupiter line in music stores these workstations just sound better as well. Lately I have been listening to the Roland and Korg Arranger products and while they in some cases have a more lively sound than Tyros they are still less enjoyable to me than any of the workstations. So I think to appeal to a younger demographic the product would need the more "real" sounds of a workstation rather than that of the typical Arranger. There are exceptions. I do find certain Acoustic instruments to be more "real" on Arrangers. For example the Sax and Trumpet voices on the Tyros, again IMHO, are not equaled in any other Arranger or Workstation. However the Motif Performances and Korg Combis, to me, alwasys sound better than Styles.

Very good suggestions from everyone - wonder if Yamaha even cares what we think. Would sure be nice if the next TOTL arranger from Yamaha was much lighter and had a smaller foot print.

Deane

IMO how much more does anyone need from Yamaha......this S950 I have to say is definitely one of the best units they have made since the PSR3000...certainly will be a Classic amongst arranger keyboards....there isn't much I cannot do with this baby on stage, looks great (Black), lightweight, sounds Amazing using styles & sounds, great onboard speakers, MP3 USB audio player, USB, great Voc Mic processor w/fx, easy editing abilities, & the few improvements it might need like a better VH2, and couple of added features to the MFD, would make it complete for MY needs, but they are miniscule compared to ALL the greatness the S950 provides the Pro Gigging OMB player,....who needs a TOTL anymore at extravagant prices unless you got bucks to burn ? Nothing compares on the market most certainly the Yamaha S950 is the BEST BANG FOR THE BUCK!

I think Diki is right as to the demographic that is/should be aimed at by Yamaha and others. While the "old farts" and ballroom dancing population is shrinking, there are more younger top 40 youngsters around. We want the older stuff and I'll bet most of us scroll right through the hip/hop/house and metal/grunge hard driving styles. But from a business standpoint, where do you put you R & D and manufacturing dollars? I imagine these decisions are not just sales driven , but demographic and competitor driven. Looking toward the future, the arranger dollars are better spent on MOTL as the market shrinks. And the big money spent on current and future direction of music and the related technology.

That being said, the TOTL arrangers that we have available to us now may be the highest level we will see. It's not a bad lot to choose from. Their may be changes due to technology- a music rest with ipad dock built in, more touchscreens, but not huge improvements.

When I was a kid I listened the music of my Father that was always being played in the house and grew to like, appreciate, and perpetuate it. My kids are ages 19-26. They have no connection to "our" music even when growing up with it playing in my house. We are only one generation away from the "old fart" music disappearing. So T5-no. It is about business, not us. Put some dollars into MOTL arrangers for us until we are all in diapers again..

Until some combination of loops and arps (which operate completely differently to styles' chord lookup tables) is combined with regular arranger operation, the kids are going to look elsewhere. Certain aspects of arpeggiator features sound utterly different to styles. The notes you actually PLAY are what trigger the arp, not what the software interprets you MEANT...

This results in patterns and figures that are so different from style NTT's they really can't be compared. But there is much in style NTT's that IS useful, too. It's about time that the two methods were combined... affordably. I know someone is going to say that there is an arpeggiator on the Ketron's, but sadly, compared to the complex one's on modern WS's, the Ketron's is little more than an 80's style arpeggiator. You only have to go play a MotifXF, or a KorgM3 to see how far things have come. But they still sound utterly different to styles.

Come on Yamaha/Korg/Roland... Time to consolidate both methods!