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Just got the M3 a week ago. Looking forward to using it for the first time in rehearsal this evening. My favorite things so far are:

- Very strong sample set. In particular, I enjoy the greater number of pads, the stereo strings, and the high quality solo brass, woodwinds, and piano in the expansions.
- New effects, especially the tube emulations. They add a lot of character to my sounds.
- The new key actions. I got a 61 and an 88, and I plan to sell the M3M from one of them to keep overall cost down.
- The Radias expansion. Talk about option anxiety.
- The alt sample start points and polyphonic legato options. This allows users to get a lot of mileage out of brass and wind samples in particular.
- Other new voicing options: envelope curves, modulation mixers, stereo multisamples, layering at the oscillator level, dual filters, etc. After using the Triton for years, it's clear that Korg profoundly increased their synths' voicing potential in the M3 / OASYS / M50.

Haven't had time to explore Karma much or sequencing at all so far, but I look forward to it.

At this point, my requests for improvement would be limited to:
- Better brass ensemble samples. None of the current ones sound realistic to me, unlike the 3-velocity stereo brass ensemble in the Motif XS, which is quite beefy and realistic IMO. On the other hand, there are tons of great solo brass samples in the M3 expansion, so it should be easy to construct a realistic section in Combi mode.
- The ability to use Gates in the modulation mixers for global-type modulation. Haven't explored this very much though, so perhaps there's another way to do what I'm trying to do.

Congrats! It's an exciting board!

I'm migrating myself from an XS, and I've been astounded at how much more i like most things on the M3. There's a quality to many of the sounds that is exactly what i've been looking for forever- lots of the organs, strings, brass, woodwinds, keys, have an articulate brightness that just satisfies- it feels like some good juice in the sound is turned up, and I totally dig it- makes many of the sounds in the XS seem less vibrant in comparison. And some of the ethereal pad sounds are out of this world- i've never had a keyboard that came close to the smoothness of the sound- i've heard this quality, the richness of the choirs, horns and synthy textures, on top recordings, but have never had it for myself. And of course, there's a fair collection of clunkers and or ho hum sounds as well, but they serve as a reminder of how good other sounds are.

i've only had it a week too, and one thing I'm not so sure about it there seems to be consistent weakness (?) on the bottom end of many programs. For example, when i'm looking for a Rhodes or a good organ patch, i like something that can hold its own with the left hand, and i've found a consistency with most patches that the bass is relatively weak, at least volume wise. As i notice the Korg "sound", I can't help but think that it's part of how they roll.

AND- I'm just so lovin' how customizable the board is. I struggled with the XS to have it be my board- the sounds i like the most, at the ready, and after fighting that battle for two years I got sick of it (the file system and sample management can get ridiculous). And now that i've got a decent comparison, i like it much better that you get fewer sounds, many many more that i'm likely to use, that they often sound much better to my ears, and there's a really decent drum groove for most of them.

And in general I like how the effects are changed in real time- on the XS you could get more specific, and of course with 2 inserts per voice, you could create combis with the effects intact- and while that seems desirable in principal, so far, with my incomplete evaluation in progress, so far I prefer the Korg way, there's far less time fussing getting to a point where I can do fun real time changeups, partly because of how they designed the combis effects, partly because of the realtime sliders and other controllers that are well mapped for the most part, but also cause many of the patches were obviously done by talented musicians that weren't just filling sound banks- many of the combi pads are just beautiful (i am totally bummed though that there's not a second control pedal input- that sucks the big time. i use the volume pedal a lot, so there's no option there for using it as a mod pedal, esp. it being a global assignment.)

For example, the chords for the pads are almost always excellent, as are the drum grooves for each Program, and same goes for the choice of fx routing and changing things up with the controllers- very well done (meaning of course, the standard I would shoot for if I was a sound designer).

What's blowing me away is how little i've heard about the Korg- maybe cause i've been in the Motifator circle for awhile now, and that i bought into the hype around the xs. for the most part i like the sounds much BETTER than the xs, and that you can change the patches, preset and user, is w o n d e r f u l. and karma is, so far, much more fun and engaging and interactive than the XS arpeggios. and having a virtual analog board that can filter what's coming in the inputs? YES!

i have to say though, the M3 is more convoluted than i would have imagined, it has a reputation for being user friendly. i guess with all that busyness from KARMA, it's no surprise that the sequencer is not as intuitive as i was hoping. but the touchscreen, and the commonality of pages in all the modes is making it doable- who knows, maybe i'll get frustrated with this board too, but so far the prospect of using the pads to trigger RPPR patterns, program and effects changes is pretty motivating, and the sequencer, even as much as it seems a bit convulted at the moment, still feels more open and accesible to me than with the XS.

funny how different people have different preferences. overall, for me, it just feels like the XS was designed by engineers, who worked hard to bring ease of use, but there's no comparison to the Korg, where it feels like, even if everything isn't as straightforward as i'm sure it could be, it just feels like a musical board that inspires me- i've been waiting since the 80's for a board that sounds this good, is reasonably user friendly and just plain inspires me. guess i'm sounding like a certifiable fanboy! partly i'm just mad at myself for having chosen the XS 2 years ago, but then again, I was still learning what i wanted- it's hard to know without first hand experience, and i was still learning some of the basics like what good keyboard and organ sounds are like.

what's your preference, plus and minus with these two boards? enjoyed your post!

Randelph wrote:I'm migrating myself from an XS, and I've been astounded at how much more i like most things on the M3. There's a quality to many of the sounds that is exactly what i've been looking for forever- lots of the organs, strings, brass, woodwinds, keys, have an articulate brightness that just satisfies- it feels like some good juice in the sound is turned up, and I totally dig it- makes many of the sounds in the XS seem less vibrant in comparison. And some of the ethereal pad sounds are out of this world- i've never had a keyboard that came close to the smoothness of the sound


for me, it just feels like the XS was designed by engineers, who worked hard to bring ease of use, but there's no comparison to the Korg

I agree!

While I have both keyboards in the studio here, the M3 is always the one I reach for first. Some of the acoustic sounds on the XS are better, but overall... the M3 offers more with those (as you call them) juiced sounds, KARMA, drum tracks and of course ease of operation. Yamaha needs to improve its user interface--maybe add a 10-key pad as well?

Anyway, the M3 is the perfect choice for the type of music I play and it's great in a live setting.

ksounds wrote:
At this point, my requests for improvement would be limited to:
- Better brass ensemble samples. None of the current ones sound realistic to me, unlike the 3-velocity stereo brass ensemble in the Motif XS, which is quite beefy and realistic IMO. On the other hand, there are tons of great solo brass samples in the M3 expansion, so it should be easy to construct a realistic section in Combi mode.

I always found the brass patches kinda wild and out of control. For a lot of them, you can use the ribbon controller to adjust to the tone you want (they tend to play a bit too bright), and then use SW2 to lock the ribbon... or you may want sweept the ribbon while playing for more expression.

Alternatively, adjust the EQ on the brass patches. If you tone them down a bit, they're still very realistic and punchy. The "slow" EX1/2 brass patches seem more realistic to me in an orchestral setting... and they also need a lot of effects too.

I use two keyboards. The bottom is a Triton 88 with ksound samples. I have auditioned Kevin's great accoustic piano on this forum before. The top keyboard is an M3 88. They are a powerful arsenal for live play. I love this set up. I don't use my Motif in live play anymore . The M3 is sweet. I like the Fender Rhodes sounds I get from her as well.

Long live Korg!

jazlover wrote:I use two keyboards. The bottom is a Triton 88 .....The top keyboard is an M3 88.

That's interesting...same setup here for live playing, but I use the 61-key versions of both.

I like to travel light.