How many think Genos is too EXPENSIVE & Why?

Thoughts?

It’s certainly is up there in price and when I look at what I paid for Tyros 5-76 in December of 2013, it’s about $325 more. Looking at it from that angle it eases a little pain of the price. $325 over the course of 4 years is about an $85 increase per year is not exorbitant.

On the other hand in November of 2013 I purchased a slightly used mini van with 16,000 miles on it at retirement for our travels to and from Florida, I saved thousands. This year I was toying with the idea of another mini van and quickly shutdown the thought of upgrading ........sticker shock. It was quite few more thousands so $325 more than the 2013 price doesn’’t seem too bad

Of course since I usually sell older equipment privately via Craigslist I don’t have to take the entire cost out of. pocket.

It's possible that Genos's price is right from Yamaha's point of view, but for my part, I do not see so much differences between Korg and Ketron's top models that it defends the big gap in price.
Tyros 5 was priced much closer to Ketron and Korg, but just before Genos was launched, prices for T5 increased considerably. (At least here in Norway)
This I consider to be a strategic action by Yamaha, which obviously will "milk the cow as much as possible" ....
As I mentioned earlier, it's not that I can not afford it, but I think it may be a good point to wait until "the first shopping rush has gone".
Not sure if the Genos sales are as high as anyone claims, that would be reflected in the sale of switched keyboards.
So far there is just a couple to see here at local ebay....

When I was still working as an entertainer, my gasoline bill for the year was twice what a new Genos cost and my van gets about 20 MPG. Slip rent and winter storage costs for my 33 foot Morgan Out Island sailboat are about equal to a new Genos and that gets shelled out every year I own the boat. So, from my perspective, it's really not that expensive.

Gary

Whether or not an item is expensive depends on the desire/need of the purchaser ...

The price depends on what someone is willing to pay for it – not’s it’s value.
Do you want the latest keyboard? Can your budget handle it? I always felt guilty when it came to a large price tag. I’m glad I got over that.
Do I have unlimited funds? No! If I decide I want something I see what I have to do to get it. If it falls out of my range; or just I do not wish to spend that much i back off. All of this depends on where you are financially.

Sooooo, Donny if you can afford it buy it. Amen! If not, enjoy your great Pa4z.
John C.

PS, How many here buy the latest keyboard because we really need it?

Tony is right on. If you really need a Genos to satisfy your goal for the purchase, it’s probably worth it.

I’m just frustrated with Yamaha’s philosophy of gauging the arranger player when their Workstation counterpart is 2k less.

They price it high because they know they can get it. From a marketing standpoint...good for them. From a close to retirement fixed income home user standpoint...it sucks!

Genos should be around $3695.00 - 3995.00 US they would sell so many more...

I think the PA4X will do everything a Genos will do (and maybe more) for less money. That said, if a person is using it to make a living or can simply afford the purchase, it would be justified.

I received this evaluation from a very respected member of this forum. It doesn’t necessarily address the price difference...but did help clarify for me, why I switched from the PA600 to the PSR-S970. It also helped me determine whether I should take out a second mortgage for a Genos!


“Korg has added much more to their pallette, but they are still Korg sounds and Korg styles, which are very different from Yamaha.

So what I'm saying if you are not a Korg fan, I don't think you will be overly impressed, for me, I feel that Korg and Yamaha both excel at certain styles, but Yamaha has the user base, that has millions of styles to share with. Korg is more of a closed community with not that type of feel.

Korg is a much deeper instrument with allot of newer tech, and an easier style creator, with a deep synthesis engine. But some people just want to press a button and play”.

I have both the Pa4x and the S 970 – to compare would be like comparing apples and pears. They both are able to do a great job but in a different way.

John C.

I think the early adopters are going to pave the way for a much cheaper and more competitive Genos. Can’t believe it’s 2k Aus $ more rrp than the top of the line Montage 7.
This is gouging the faithful, but if Yamaha Want To make inroads to a new audience they must price Genos closer to the PA4X Pro.

I mean the Genos “made in China”. Come on, no improve=e to a TCHellicon Voice Processor, even i’m Surprised about those two things. Honestly, I think the sounds etc on the Genos are fantastic, but I could never justify the current price, and I don’t think that’s only me.

So here’s hoping once the dust settles for a huge price reduction, Yamaha should learn from The a Korg Oasys exercise. Eventually the old faithful die off and you have to come back to reality.

how fair would a big price decrease be to all the initial purchasers who paid the original price ? ... would Yamaha be willing to rebate the difference in price to those initial buyers ? ... I doubt it ...

This is an excellent marketing comparison. Korg created a monster with Oasys. Everybody wanted one...not everyone could afford one. Plus, it was buggy.

Hence, Kronos was born and reached a much larger audience.

Yamaha could have done the same thing with Genos. They tapped the market with the Tyros line. Why not re-address their marketing and price it to allow a larger user base. Because of the pricing being the same as Tyros 5...people will continue to make the comparison. A lost opportunity for Yamaha.

From what I'm reading on other forums, the dealers can't get them in fast enough to fill all the pre-orders let along new orders that are coming in daily, and that's on a worldwide basis. Keep in mind that Yamaha is the largest musical instrument manufacturer in the world. I seriously doubt that they shot themselves in the foot with the Genos and its pricing. Only time will tell.

Gary

The number of sales proves this statement wrong...

There is way to many people prepared to pay this much money for a Genos.
Its more them €1000 expensive then the 76 key Montage, more so in the US
That was way more expemsive to build
And the only reason for that is so many people are prepared to pay big money for a Genos.

Initial sales for Yamaha are incredible
But how many will they sell next years christmass?

When it’s all said and done, Yamaha is proving that capitalism works. My local dealer (no longer working) never stocked the top of line Tyros due to it’s limited market. He also told me that there was a large profit margin built in for dealers to make a sizable gain.

This keeps the dealers happy and in business. So I guess it makes sense in the grand scheme of things.

So rather than get shot by my wife...I’ll stick with my lowly 970 until I find an estate sale where the family is trying to get rid of a Genos.

I’m also a believer in the free market economy, so hooray for Yamaha. But it still irks the poop out of me!!!

Many dealers who sell Clavinova are happy with the bigger margins. Back when the Tyros started to jump in MAP (minimum advertised price) those dealers were the drive in upping the profit margin.

I think the T3 price was $4299... When I was selling keyboards, I sold it for $3399 and still made a good profit. The owner sent me a message and said why do you sell it so low? I told them that we only sell one or two a year, and this was a guy is already a returning customer from the T2.

That’s the same thing that’s happening with the Genos right now. $5499 in the US is the minimum advertised price. If you advertise below that price, you could lose your dealership. So, once you get the customer into your store, you can start to have private conversations about what they are willing to pay. The dealer has to make a certain amount of profit overall in their business to stay in business. A Genos sale can be a huge payday for the salesman and the store. But you will be expected to do a lot of customer service with that sale.

I wonder how much it cost to actually make the Genos?!?
Developing… Sampling… Engineering… Programming… Manufacturing… Shipping from China🇨🇳 … Shipping from California to the rest of the USA…Yamaha Japan’s 🇯🇵 cut... Yamaha USA’s 🇺🇸 cut... Dealer’s cut... Everybody needs a piece of the Genos pie!! 🥧

Yamaha’s PSR E series and PSR S series are a much better bang for the buck. In my opinion, compared to the Genos, the PA4X is a much better bang for the buck.

In my mind, the Genos is very hard to justify $$$ wise. From a business standpoint, value for investment of TOTL arrangers, Genos would be at the bottom of the list of current TOTL arrangers. Based on what the Genos can provide, vs. other TOTL arrangers, I would think that Genos would be the least, not the most, expensive arranger.

However, if the heart, and not the head, were doing the deciding, I would think “Go for it”.

I’d love to own a Genos...might even take the plunge. I’m sure I’d love playing it. But I would buy it because it’s a want, not a need or even the best business decision for me.

Having played the E series several times, mainly because the local music store stocks them and they are just 10 minutes drive time from home, I would never purchase one. Sorry, they don't come remotely close to my aging PSR-S950 when it comes to overall sound and features. I guess that's why they are so inexpensive. The E series would be something I would buy my 10-year-old grandson for Christmas, but he wouldn't appreciate it as long as he has an I-pad in his grasp.

Now, if I were 20 years younger, knowing what I now know, I would have a Genos is a heartbeat. And, that would be a gigantic leap forward over my S-950, which I dearly love playing. The economics of it would be simple, at least for me. I would sound better while performing, which would translate to more jobs than I could possibly handle. But, like most on stage performers, I have always found it extremely difficult to turn down a job, even when it meant doing triples, which were brutal on this old man when I occasionally confronted them. Tearing down and setting up three times in a single day was just brutal, but what the Hell, I managed to survive this long.

Now, is the Genos better than the PA4X? I really don't know, mainly because I have not played either of them. Though, I have heard lots of great demos from the Genos and the PA4X, I NEVER rely solely on what I hear from demos. The demo merely shows us what a very, very talented arranger keyboard player can do - not what I can do using the same keyboard, which is the most important factor of whether or not I wish to upgrade. I do know that if I sound better, I will book more jobs, therefore making the upgrade cost effective.

The next part about the business aspect of the upgrade is the ability to write off the purchase of the keyboard as a capital equipment expenditure, which is still fairly easy to do, though if the new tax bill is passed, I'm not sure how this will be effected, though I do not believe it will have any impact. This will, of course, lower your adjusted gross income, thereby lowering your tax burden for that fiscal year.

Consequently, the only economic benefit would be if you were able to book more jobs because you sound better. Book more jobs, make more money, work more hours, keep the wife happy. Well, two out of three ain't all that bad. (Unfortunately, the keyboard cannot make me look better!) Donny used to boast that the keyboard would eventually pay for itself - nope - that cannot happen, but that would take too long to explain. The more performances you book, the cost per performance decreases, but it still NEVER pays for itself.

Bottom line, if you don't perform for a living, and just enjoy playing and sounding good, buy the damned thing. You only go around once and I don't know about you guys and gals, but I'm not leaving my money to the kids to piss away. Hell, they're already getting my sailboat, music gear and the house when my wife and I are dead. What more could they want?

All the best,

Gary

People spend big bucks on quality pianos but they not only get the elevated playing experience but a good resale value where it may actually appreciate. Unfortunately electronics of all kinds are like boats with their depreciation.
So the question is if your a home player is the keyboard worth it to make you happy ( and we all know you can't put a price on happiness ) and you don't care about the resale ,or are you a working musician who depreciates his gear for tax purposes and uses it as a tool for his business? Will it generate more business to justify the coast.?
Personally I doubt it but again if it makes you happy go for it.
Bottom line is if you can afford it life is too short so have fun either way.

Gary: Would you please buy a damn Genos so we can get your expert opinion on how great the thing is. Donny is chomping at the bit. I’m ready to take a bullet from my wife. I’m sure there are others on the fence that might fall on the Genos side with your purchase of one.

Besides...you deserve it!!!

Well, I came pretty close when a young couple approached me to buy the boat last month, but they couldn't come up with the money, so I guess I will have to stick with my S-950 for now. The boat is still up for sale if any of you folks are interested in buying a sailing yacht. (Yes, it's a yacht!)

Gary

[quote][/quote]

I think total hardware component costs might be less then $200 max $300

Its the software devlopment and espescially the sound and style engineering that cost most money with a product like the Genos that does not sell in large vollume..

The hardware costs of the montage are definately higher then the Genos, with the aloy casing. And the much better knobs..

The dealers must be getting the genos at $2000-$2500 i think and making alot of money even with discounts

Nah... that would be a tad to low...

I guess its more like €3000 here in europe (€2500 witouth sales tax)
Any cheaper would really really surprise me..

But they are not allowed to sell under the lowest price set by Yamaha
Thats why some dealers offer more money for a trade in instrument then they actually sell for..

Here's my nickel and dime opinion on the pricing. From 1975 to 1978 I worked selling pianos and organs, the dealership was the franchisee for Steinway pianos and Hammond Organs. The family business had a sister store that catered to other musicians since they sold guitars, drums and band instruments.

Steinway would not allow discounting to the point where the dealer could lose the franchise if the piano was sold at a discount. Hammond organs and other band instruments as I recall were called a B item, if my memory serves me correctly a B item was one where the dealer's cost was 60% of MSRP.

In the case of Genos MSRP is $6799, 20% off =$5439, the large music dealers in the US are advertising the Genos at $5499, so the B item theory seems to hold true if it does then the dealer's cost may be about $4079. When you do the math if the B theory holds true for Genos, not everyone is making lots of money.

OK...how much did you guys pay for discounted T5??
Is the discounted today price that much more for Genos?

I'm guessing no...but I didn't get a T5...even though I priced one.

When I had a retail store, we had two markups. The big ticket items usually had a markup of just 25 percent, while low priced items had a 40 percent markup. However, major purchases, such as boats, outboard motors and trailers, only provided us with a 10 to 15 percent markup. Those items were floor planned, which meant the manufacturer paid the interest on the bank loan made to purchase them for inventory. Floor planning only lasted six months, therefore, if you didn't sell them all within that period you had to shell out the interest to the bank, which destroyed any possible profit in a very short time.

Gary

With almost 1000 hours this post I guess people think Genos is too expensive...?

Sometimes to create value, the manufacturer inflates the MSRP. You can’t tell me that a pair of shoes sold at Louis Vuitton is worth $1000. You can go to Payless and get a $20 pair shoes that are just as uncomfortable as the Louis Vuitton shoes.

When my wife got her first Masters degree… We went to the Louis Vuitton store and bought a $700 purse. It wasn’t about a purse… It was about the status. It showed two other people that you have expendable income to buy the best named purse 👜 available.

Three years from now, the Genos will be selling below $2500 when they announce the replacement. I have a Tyros 2 I can’t sell because the screen is messed up. $600 to replace the screen... it was from 2004.

Value is perception!

Some do - some don't! Carol thinks the yacht was too expensive.

Gary

It is too expensive because I cannot afford it.



As simple as that.

Well, you also can't afford that luxurious Mercedes thats currently on offer with 50% off

its relatively too expensive compared to other TOTL arrangers that can do a very similar job for much less money. But its not too expensive or there would not be so many people on this board spending their money on it.

Their strategy is to wait and extract all monies for genos for a while and then in a year or so release the more comfortable less featured MOTL S series replacement (baby genos) at a lower cost for the people who cant afford genos & want a 61 key version...as for me ie seen and heard enough........
my verdict is to stay with KORG all the way.

Its much more expensive then the Korg pa4x.
while missing quite a lot of the functionality the pa4x offers.

And yet, it sells much much better then Korg could ever dream.

Where it comes to pricing, and making both dealers as well as their instrument owners quite happy. Yamaha is the king. I guess its a community thing. However i have found that Yamaha owners frown upon criticism against Yamaha. Its not accepted to be overly critical in both their arranger as well as their pro synth community. Which is quite the opposite of the Korg community. In all aspects.

Personally i think Yamaha does not welcome my attitude of saying praise where praise is earned, but also being critical where Yamaha under-performs.


What hurts me, is the fact that Yamaha's most expensive mobile instrument does not offer all and everything Yamaha has to offer. And i think its strange the community accepts such.

Yamaha not even uses 50% of the hardware resources the Keyboard has to offer. If Apple would do such a thing, the whole world would speak shame of apple. Yet the Yamaha community is blindly accepting this. Cursing everyone that speaks out loud. thats something i can not understand. Because its this attitude of acceptance that withholds Yamaha from performing their best. Spreading their technology thin over several instruments..


In my vision, the top product of a company should offer all they have to offer... Thats what for example the Korg Kronos is all about (when it was released 7 years ago)


So while i dont think the Genos is to expensive..
I do think it should offer much more for that money..

I know it sounds strange, but thats the way i see things.
Currently my musical soul says Want want want.
But my mind says.. No..
Since i will not make the decision before spring..
I am still wondering who will win, my heart or my Brains.

NUFF SAID!

When I was into motorcycling, I drove a Jap bike while many of my friends drove Harleys. I would have loved to buy a Harley, just to be part of the club. Even though I could afford Harley, the practical side of my brain said stay with a bike that costs less and works better...less troubles.

I still own Yamaha keyboards, just haven’t bought into the club status(Genos)yet.

That said, I still might do the Genos thing with the full understanding that it’s the status/community thing I’m paying for.

Hurry before Genos 2 rumors start up lol

Bachus: I know you realize the feature set you’re interested in is irrelevant to the majority of Genos buyers. Hence your Kronos and 4X. Both deep machines.

If you want the sounds and simplicity of operation...Genos seems to satisfy that type of user.

Interesting point about sales figures. Where did you get your information if you don’t mind me asking.

The point is that yamaha wants to pull new buyers to their money cow the Genos... to do so, they need to add features to pull in new people... and not just stick to the features that keeps the current group of users happy...

Yamaha pretends they are pushing the Genos into the workstation area, just to try and pull in new people.. like previous motif users.. pa4x owners... composers... younger people... but as said they are just pretending, they are not adding any new features at all that would peek these groups interest..

The Genos is at it is, an arranger... and not a workstation at all. To me writing the word workstation on the box, is the same as trying to sell a sedan as a sportscar... they are both cars.. to put it blunt, yamaha is outrightnlying and cheating by calling the Genos a workstation... and that is a kick in the balls for people like me that are actually wayting for a true workstation with arranger capabilities..

agreed bachus anyone can see watching all these demos on you tube that the audience is senior citizens, NOT Young new players who want nothing to do with or understand an arranger style of music at all.....why aren't those audiences filled with young musicians? the new age is making music in new ways period no need for an arranger its archaic to them in so many ways lets be honest....there is a major split in our culture in music and that's the way it is until we are all gone and the new generation is alone to create their music.....things changed too fast and the old ways still linger in the new for a little while longer and us oldie folks are trying to hold on like Yamaha is doing with their so called "new Workstation"....
just too many branches on the tree and too many cooks in the kitchen nowadays...the ship is sinking slowly keep bailing my friends stay afloat with what ever you play for now ....
Happy Thanxgiving to All

Donnie
That was well said !

$3700 including tax, 3 months after lounched.

Regards.

thank you sir just my feelings on the subject..

I agree that the term “Workstation” has become somewhat of a misnomer regarding the current state of arrangers versus modern day synths.

It appears that both arrangers and synth workstations are melding into new category of instrument. The term workstation has meant something unique in the music keyboard world for a long time. Maybe a more specific term should be adopted. After all, we have computer workstations, digital photography workstations, music workstations, etc.

The term workstation has become a generic term for digital work domain. To argue that it means anything more than that appears moot. I suppose we could use more specificity like...arranger workstation, synth workstation, drum workstation, etc. As I write this...I think I’ve heard these terms before. Don’t mind me...I’ve just taken a pain pill for my recent knee surgery.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by one person at a time, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems. The term workstation has also been used loosely to refer to everything from a mainframe computer terminal to a PC connected to a network, but the most common form refers to the group of hardware offered by several current and defunct companies such as Sun Microsystems, Silicon Graphics, Apollo Computer, DEC, HP, NeXT and IBM which opened the door for the 3D graphics animation revolution of the late 1990s.

Workstations offered higher performance than mainstream personal computers, especially with respect to CPU and graphics, memory capacity, and multitasking capability. Workstations were optimized for the visualization and manipulation of different types of complex data such as 3D mechanical design, engineering simulation (e.g., computational fluid dynamics), animation and rendering of images, and mathematical plots. Typically, the form factor is that of a desktop computer, consist of a high resolution display, a keyboard and a mouse at a minimum, but also offer multiple displays, graphics tablets, 3D mice (devices for manipulating 3D objects and navigating scenes), etc. Workstations were the first segment of the computer market to present advanced accessories and collaboration tools.

The increasing capabilities of mainstream PCs in the late 1990s have blurred the lines somewhat with technical/scientific workstations[citation needed]. The workstation market previously employed proprietary hardware which made them distinct from PCs; for instance IBM used RISC-based CPUs for its workstations and Intel x86 CPUs for its business/consumer PCs during the 1990s and 2000s. However, by the early 2000s this difference disappeared, as workstations now use highly commoditized hardware dominated by large PC vendors, such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard (later HP Inc.) and Fujitsu, selling Microsoft Windows or Linux systems running on x86-64 architecture such as Intel Xeon or AMD Opteron CPUs.

So, after reading the above, how many folks on this forum really want a workstation? Lets see a show of hands. Not me - I just want to play music and sing, and you know what, the Genos, call it what you or they wish, will do a great job for anyone with similar desires.

Happy Thanksgiving,

Gary

Hey Gary. Since Uncle Dave called you the "grammer (or spelling) police", I'll do the same to you . You neglected to use quotes in you post above, thereby depriving Wikipedia of it's proper credit and possibly leaving us to believe that that wealth of knowledge on the origin and development of computer workstations came directly from you. We know you wouldn't want us to have that erroneous impression (which is why I mentioned it ).

chas

Doesn't matter what you call these things...they all started with home organs...and many of the buyers are getting them as a MUCH cheaper alternative...go price a Roland or Lowrey today...WOW, it will knock your socks off. Genos is cheap by those standards and can do as well or better with that type of playing. If you chop off the LH section and put it below...and add pedals it is a home organ (a GREAT sounding one at that) and you play it like we did on organs for decades. A lot of groups here where I live (On Top Of The World, Ocala,FL) are using MIDI backing tracks or audio background and 1 or 2 singers....much easier and to most (not me) of us old folks sounds just as good or better than an arranger does.

My ultimate setup would be the Genos with Tyros Magic V-console, a second lower kbd and maybe some pedals...for a FRACTION of the cost of a organ of today. I may even build a nice cabinet for it (I belong to the wood shop here with cabinet making quality people and equipment). Actually I can do that with a T5 and be pretty happy...and save some $$.

Because I want a home organ with terrific sounds bacl...but don't have $30k - 100k to spend!

Gary...you took the words right out my foggy brain!

Happy Thanksgiving Sir.

Chas, I thought the Wikipedia part copied, and it was my bad for not checking it more carefully. Good call. Just goes to show you that even pros can make mistakes, but not very often. But, you already knew that.

All the best,

Gary