Roland, Korg, Or Yamaha?

[DogmaticRock]

Which do you guys like the best? I'd have to go with Roland myself. I have the Juno-Gi and its a great performance keyboard. I hope to be getting the Jupiter-80 soon. I think Rolands one of the most innovative in the keyboard industry with their Supernatural technology and features. So what do you guys prefer?

[john]

I have to say I alway liked my Korg 01W FD. Some great standard sounds and easy to use. That said i have used nice bits of gear from all of those manufacturers.

[DogmaticRock]

I'm not sure what the 01WFD is, maybe its that I'm informed on the current keyboards. I was stoked when I saw the Kronos. At first I thought it was weird it lacked a lot of buttons but that was before I saw everything was touchscreen. Despite how helpful the Kronos can be, I hear it has some defects.

[TapperMike]

Everything is software for me these days. I used to be a big roland fan. Too much so I'd played roland stuff for so many years I just got tired of the sounds. I had an emu XL-7 with the 2500 rom which was a remasterd version of the composer/proteus 2000 rom. It sounded great till one cup of coffee ruined my command station.

The nice thing about hardware is that the sounds are "homogenized" to a degree. I've got a large collection of vsti's and they don't always sit well in the mix starting out. It gets frustrating for me because if the sounds aren't jelling from the get go I'll spend hours tweaking them so they do. A pefect example is m1 house piano originally released on the korg m1. now available in software format (sorry mac users I don't think it will work with the latest release of osx) It's great in rave situations but doesn't sit well in the mix for pop/rock/folk/jazz or country.

Re Kronos, that's big budged stuff my pockets don't reach that deep. Yes it does take a long time to boot, however once it has the sounds load fairly quickly.

[SanguineRose]

I'm voting Korg, mainly because their sounds are so fantastic.

[Darmin Deflern]

Well my newest keyboard is the Korg Kronos 88 but I have two other superb keyboards in the Roland g70 and the Roland VA7 so im not going to vote as all the keyboards give me something to use,

[guitaristafroboy]

Depends what for. I have a Yamaha stage piano and love its piano sounds, but love my Korg's synth sounds. That's why I normally run both!

[DogmaticRock]

I still hunger for a Roland Jupiter 80. I wouldnt mind even having a Jupiter 8. The sounds on those machines are unreal and outstanding. Does anyone have a Jupiter 80? If so, how is it?

[Loonatic]

I have a Korg SP-170S. It's great for what I wanted and for the price, although there are many small problems with it. I think they're all probably equally good, with different features and different flaws. I just don't have the other ones.

I would love to have a Kurzweil PC3X. Some amazing sounds there.

[BigBubbaBrown]

Roland for quality (which is why it got my vote), Yamaha for nostalgia. My first two "keyboards" (toys at best) were Yamaha. Tonight I bought a DX7 that I'm happy with (though it's been modified with a knob next to the volume slider and I have yet to figure out what, if anything, it does) and it will probably become my main keyboard but if I could have gotten a Roland for the same price I would have.

[TapperMike]

If only one keyboard would do then It's a kurzweil pc3k or even just a pc3.

 

[veksar]

It all depends on what you want to get out of it... The workstation style keyboards like the Korg Kronos, M50... Roland Jupiter 80, and the Yamaha Motif series are great if you're into sampled instruments and want pianos, pipe organs, brass, and strings... But if you want synthesis sounds, these keyboards pretty primitive in comparison to the 'pure synthesizers' that are on the market, analog, VA or digital... Personally, I choose synths based on sound character... If you want a moog sound, you buy a moog... You can't buy a workstation with sounds that are 'based on moog sounds' and expect them to have the same character as the real thing... If electronic sounds are your thing, and you have $3k to burn, I definitely wouldn't advise getting a Jupiter 80, you'll get much better sounds from a DSI or Waldorf, or an older/used Roland, Korg, Yamaha, Emu, Alesis etc..

[TapperMike]

I don't think you've explored either the PC3K or the Korg Kronos very far. Kronos has not just one but several synth engines.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korg_Kronos#Sound_Engines

[Raymond Hayter]

I like all of Roland, Korg and Yamaha, especially for their vintage synths from around the '80s.

 

If I had to pick one, it would be Roland, and if I had to choose one synth, it would be the JX-8P.

 

But Korg, Yamaha, Casio, PPG, Moog, EMU, Oberheim, Fairlight all had such great gear back then.

[Rudi]

These posts are fairly old. What is a reasonable KB for a home studio now?