I find this launch pads very interresting
the sd9

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8jfQbyYJRY

Kwtron is the only company innovating the actual styles engine

There is a lot of workstation players that undoubted would love launchpads as a backing... it suites them much more with the scenes then the intro/endings of the typical styles...

Actually for many it turns styles into a pro feature... if yamaha would add this to the montage 2, it would be a huge huge hit... and work very well for any backing system...

As of now after watching this demo using the Launch pad Feature and many others which is really innovative and gives the player countless combinations for style performances with amazing sound over anything on the market the Ketron SD9/SD60 hae moved into my #1 positions of arranger KB excitement and as it stands now with further research my "Next List" looks like this........
I see a road trip soon to AJ's lab to try a SD9.

1- Ketron SD9/SD60 Speakers a plus
2- Yamaha Genos
3- KORG PAx 5?
4- Roland TOTL ?

Both SD60 and SD90 have the full feature list of the SD( pro, incudling launchpad..

I think however, where ketron has the best most versatile and probably best sounding accompaniment tools (styles, players, launchpads). Yamaha leads the pack where it comes to lead voices, espescially due to their huge DSP power, but also trough things ensemble voices and SA2 sounds... And the PA4x, is the most versatile where it comes to creating your won sounds, so much accessible power in the PA4x sound engine..

But where it comes to innovating and updating the aranger part of the instruments.. Ketron is the only company really trying to make progress (altough the Casio MZ-X also made some real progression, but their sound engine still can't sattisfy us spoiled western arranger players, maybe the new Air engine works better)

Sadly it seems Roland left the building for now.

As a singer first lead voices don't concern me too much as they are all up to par for accompaniment and solos for a singer/player. It amazes me how little people use sounds anyway in their performance demos songs...mostly I hear lead piano, but not alot of changing instrument lead sounds thru-out the song which gets boring to the listener imo...
Everything out there in arranger category is fine to do almost anything these days....the silly nit picking gets less and less as technology progresses..............just pick one and enjoy playing and learning it's features and you will be more then happy at this point.

I agree it's funny that Yamaha has scores of great guitars but rarely puts one in their demos. I suppose the guys doing the demos are really piano players.
And most, but not all, of the demos I hear are playing music I don't like or want to do. But I'm old.

I've already seen all these. Not saying there aren't any, just that most seem to feature piano and "dance" music.
I haven't seen much I would prefer over Korg, other than it's new and great improvement over previous Yamahas.

Can't let one thing control all thoughts...
Have to really evaluate as a whole..

It is the new AiX sound engine. My privia has the AiR sound engine. About the sound engine, Some sounds are not that good out of the box but as soon you start editing the sounds you will be amazed what you can achieve. Same for the styles. Also the Mz x 500/300 have much improved after the updates.