Korg must have something in their sleeve...

[JimDavis]

I asked Guitar Center in multiple central CA locations and there is not a single Kronos in stock.
It is surprising that even after the recent price drop and promotions right before the Christmas time not to stock one single unit in any one of their stores.

They have multiple new Fantoms almost in every store but no Kronos... 88 or 73 or 61...

Suspicious!

[GregC]

it is interesting but GC in CA hasn't demo 'd or carried Kronos for about 2 years.

If you ask them, they will special order. But there might be strings attached.

I bet money is involved with the GC/Korg related to Kronos

[kday]

The big three also work together in new workstation releases.

They often let the other Asian competitors release their flagships without trying to compete and they usually release a year or two later on their major flagship workstations. They try not to cancel each other out which could financially devastating to one of the companies.

But because the Roland Fantom is debuting you most likely won't see a flagship from Korg or Yamaha being released the same year. Korg and Yamaha are probably at least two years away from release of an all new Flagship workstation.

[GregC]

I think we need all 3 to be successful on the high end.

If they construct ' market timing ' for their new high pricers that suggests the over $3000 pie is not very large or aggressively growing.

I think Kurzweil is a strong contender in the $2000+ space. Big picture, we don't have much info how they fit into the market share game.

[Liviou2004]

Hi Jim,

I don't know how things go in CA, but I've just given a look at GC website : all Kronos models are said "In stock and ready to ship".

[19naia]

I am stuck in limbo, myself....
Without a keyboard but not up $#!+ creek.
I am actually at the beach but still without my rig.

So i am ready for a new keyboard, but can’t get myself to decide. It will cost nearly as much to fly back to my Kronos, pack it up and ship it to where i am now, and it will still have the output malfunction it developed this year or late last year. Also had no responses after listing it to sell.

I can leave it in storage and buy a new keyboard to keep where i am now, but i would really hate to settle for something now, only to see Korg release something next generation in January.

Maybe i will just get a cheap USB controller keyboard to play my iPad keys until January, just to keep my fingers in shape and my song memory exercised.

[NormC]

The Danvers MA and the Newington NH GC haven't had Kronos at all. I bought mine sight unseen back in 2015 from Sweetwater because GC didn't have one to try. I was told they had a falling out of sorts with Korg over store space allocated to them. GC was pushing Williams Electronic Pianos and less workstations.

[JimDavis]

Hi Jim,

I don't know how things go in CA, but I've just given a look at GC website : all Kronos models are said "In stock and ready to ship".

Yes they do! But that "in stock ready to ship" applies to their warehouse and not stores...

That's what I meant.

I am between 6 GC stores within 1-2 hr distance around me. Most of them had Montage and New Fantom on display and if you like the displayed model they have one in the box ready to go in the "store" rather than "we can order one for you".

[ITguy54]

I asked Guitar Center in multiple central CA locations and there is not a single Kronos in stock.
It is surprising that even after the recent price drop and promotions right before the Christmas time not to stock one single unit in any one of their stores.

They have multiple new Fantoms almost in every store but no Kronos... 88 or 73 or 61...

Suspicious!

The price reduction at Sweetwater is temporary. Therefore I wouldn’t read too much into it. Now if they had a permanent price reduction...

[kronoSphere]

Maybe the GC were given instructions to sell as much Fantom as possible !

[janrhansen]

Plus you will most likely never see Korg compete with Yamaha either since Korg is owned by Yamaha

[kronoSphere]

I remember that some years ago, I have seen in a music instruments store, the Yamaha crew coming to verify if their instruments were well exposed in the store. An I remember that all the staff from that store were not smiling at all ! Not a word ! Frightening...

[tunaman]

I was interested in getting a Kronos but wanted to physically test one before jumping in. I have an Extreme and wasn’t certain it was worth making the plunge, and the documentation didn’t really satisfy the questions that I had.

I went to a couple of GC’s and a Sam Ash, and found none in stock. I also checked online and couldn’t find one anywhere within 50 miles, at least.

I ended up finding a mint Kronos2 on Reverb and put in an offer, and a couple of weeks later I was starting down the long and winding road.

What an amazing device.

[janrhansen]

I ended up finding a mint Kronos2 on Reverb and put in an offer, and a couple of weeks later I was starting down the long and winding road.

What an amazing device.

Yep, even all the nagging about the ui being old, the wimpy Atom processor and too little ram etc etc, its still an amazing device