Korg Forums

[Tblack]

I have been looking for awhile at various keyboards and while I like the Motif/MOX line there is something about the chord pads and other features on the Korg line that keep drawing me back to the M3 as I am not an accomplished keyboard player. My main use of this keyboard will be in the studio where I write songs, make backing tracks for pop, inspirational, country and worhsip styled music. I use Sonar X1 for my DAW. I also have a Ketron SD4 and Roland JV1080 that I might need the M3 to work as a controller for.

I keep reading that Yamaha has better analog sounds. Can I get a few people here to share with me how you feel that the M3 can perform in those genre's? Pointing me to any examples or Youtube video's that demonstrate this would be great. The KARMA stuff kind of overwhelms me at the moment but can it be set up to do those type of styles as well. Any guidance would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Terry

[Muji]

I also have a Ketron module - the SD2. I think the M3 and a Ketron are a potent combination that will give you almost everything you could need. As you know, the Ketron acoustic sounds are pretty killer, and are bound to beat out the M3 in many cases, but they would beat out most of the Yamaha sounds too. So, if you're looking for better acoustic sounds than you already have, you might be disappointed no matter what you do.

The reason I like the M3 is that it is one of the only workstation modules that includes a sequencer, and a powerful easy-to-use one at that. The combi mode is also nice for setting up splits, etc. with both M3 and non-M3 sounds. It allows you to bring all your modules together smoothly.

I'm not a Karma nut, so I won't sing its praises (I'll leave that to the others), but even ignoring Karma, the M3 is pretty cool.
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-Muji-

Korg Microkorg
StudioLogic VMK-176+ Keyboard Controller
Ketron SD2 Sound Module
Alesis SR-16

[iixorbiusii]

Hi,

For a while, I had a Motif XS and Korg M3 at the same time (plus quite a lot of other stuff).

I didn't keep the Motif....

Main reason for me, was that I found the Karma aspect very inspirational and absorbing, and never really used my brand new dust-gathering XS.

Regarding the pads - this is a very useful feature, especially for a below average player (like myself). You can 'prance about' on the M3 trying different chord variations and when you find one you like, save it immediately to a pad for use later on. I sometimes 'find' amazing chords by accident and thanks to the ability to save them, they're not lost forever as soon as I lift my fingers! (tip - get a sustain pedal. When you find a chord you want to keep, if it involves both hands, you can 'freeze' it with the sustain pedal whilst using your hands to press the necessary buttons to assign it to a pad).

As far as I remember, the Motif XS did generally have 'better' acoustics, especially guitars. Pianos are of course highly subjective.

Both the M3 and Motif XS/XF are very capable, professional instruments. As a non-player, you might find the 'accompaniment' of Karma on the M3 very inspirational. However, programming your own Karma accompaniment is very complicated - that is, if you're trying to get it to sound exactly like something you have in mind. However, where Karma really excels in my opinion, is in how easy it is to create a random happy accident, which sounds like a professional engineer spent days on creating an accompaniment (caveat - 'accompaniment' is the best word I can use to describe Karma at the moment, but it's not the same as you'd get on an arranger - i.e there's no intro/ending, fill ins etc).

That said, the Motif's arpeggios are excellently suited to pop, R&B etc

Don't rush into a buying decision - spend lots of time on Youtube and forums, and download as many demos as you can !! Even better, if possible, try both extensively.


Good luck.
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CURRENT GEAR: A yellowing Casio PT-80, 4 leaking batteries and some broken headphones.
WISHLIST: A PSU and some different headphones.

[gurn]

[dumeril7]

I'm going to second the comment about the Motif being harder to use. I've owned Yamaha, Roland, Kurzweil and Korg synths, and of all of them I had the hardest learning curves with Yahamas. They just aren't very intuitive for me -- so many odd abbreviations, overloaded screens, and non-intuitive (for me) naming. That's not to say its impossible to learn, but it took me longer and I found myself having to consult the manual more often. Power is wonderful, but if the user interface constrains your ability to harness it, that's a serious consideration IMO.

As a more recent example, check out this recent tutorial published in Keyboard Magazine that explains how to manage the flash memory on the new Motif XF. Take the time to read it because it illustrates perfectly what Yamaha's UIs tend to be like.

http://www.keyboardmag.com/article/synth-workshop-motif-xf-sound-management/5826

It all makes pretty good sense until you get to the section called "Flash Course" and they start explaining how the UI screen works. I read through this just shaking my head, thinking, "Good grief. Why are they obfuscating something that conceptually is really pretty simple?" If it all make perfect sense to you, then more power to you. I could learn to use this screen, but it just seems like a lot more effort than it should be. IMO Korg would have gotten this screen right, I probably wouldn't have even needed to open the manual to figure it out, and they certainly wouldn't have needed to publish a magazine workshop on how to use it.

That said, the general consensus is that Yamaha does better acoustic sounds than Korg and I would agree with that (although I like Korg much better for more synthetic sounds.)

D7
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http://www.dumeril7.com

[Tblack]

Thanks for the posts. You have confirmed a couple of things for me and given me a little more to think about. While I think I hear the Motif has better acoustic sounds, I may already have the best guitars etc. already in my Ketron module so the sounds may not really be what I need to be looking at as much as ease of use, inspiration, and feature set.

[Smetana]

Hi. Our band have new songs recorded on 8 tracker Korg D 888. We are Czech indie rock band, kapela První - Poslední.

www.prvniposledni.eu