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I agree with a lot said here. I auditioned both side by side and for me the choice was EASY. M50 all the way!

Reasons:
-I felt Karma "got in the way" and liked the "Vibe" of the M50 WAY better
-The action is FINE, and the board is LIGHT as a feather. Great for gigging!
-Price is half of the M3
-There's really NOTHING that can touch this board in this price range (New that is).

The M3 has these over the M50:
-Sampling expansion (But ONLY 256 MB) so you can replace the crappy
stock Brass sounds common to the M50 and add user samples.
-Radias Expansion (This is the killer app IMO)
-Karma* (Depends on whether you think this is an "upgrade")
-Color Screen/more controls (Sliders/buttons)
-8 drum pads that feel good and are assignable to do more than the pathetic "Chord buttons" on the M50 (Useless IMO).
-More patch memory

For me the choice was obvious because I had to choose either the M3 by itself and keep my old Motif Classic from 2001 OR get the M50 AND upgrade to a Motif XS because my upgrade budget allowed for it. Since the M50 has most of the M3 sounds, and the Motif has 1GB of sampling etc....it was a no brainer!

Don't underestimate Karma. I never use Karma for its intended use. I'm a live player, but with Karma I have program/combi changing without cutoff of sound, which to a live performer is priceless.

Is the actual sound quality pretty well identical between the two? I mean if you were to play the same program on both, would there be no difference in a blind A/B test?

From what I know, sound quality is identycal.
Look here for a detailed comparison: http://www.karma-lab.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13182

Scroll down a bit on the thread for an updated version of the chart.

MrT-Man wrote:Is the actual sound quality pretty well identical between the two? I mean if you were to play the same program on both, would there be no difference in a blind A/B test?

It is exactly the same sound engine, and from everything I've heard from reliable sources (such as Stephen Kay, of Karma Labs, who was one of the sound designers for the M3), they sound exactly the same. You'll hear some internet buzz about better D/A converters on the M3, but that doesn't seem to be accurate.