Ok Hi im just fixing to get my first workstation I have been playing an old casio AP-60r
and I have gotten better so im looking for something better. if any one knows of a good board if you could tell me that would be awesome but im looking at a Kronos X88 or a Motif xf8. I have played both and I enjoy both but I just need a few pros and cons. If you could help me out that would be awesome thanks.

Welcome to the forum. In the future, you might want to consider giving your post a title
something more specific than “help”. A better post title would be something like “Searching
for a new workstation”.

DavePolich - 01 February 2014 08:32 AM

Welcome to the forum. In the future, you might want to consider giving your post a title
something more specific than “help”. A better post title would be something like “Searching
for a new workstation”.

Tell us more about what you need it for...just playing at home, live performances?

What musical styles?

Do you want to be able to record your music? Will you need to record vocals or other instruments as well?

Budget?

Etc.

meatballfulton - 01 February 2014 11:26 AM

Tell us more about what you need it for...just playing at home, live performances?

What musical styles?

Do you want to be able to record your music? Will you need to record vocals or other instruments as well?

Budget?

Etc.

I would like to be able to record vocals and other instruments

my budget is around 4,500

shadows19 - 01 February 2014 03:43 PM

I want to make all kinds of music

I would like to be able to record vocals and other instruments

my budget is around 4,500

Since your member profile indicates your location as being outside the US,
what currency is the 4,500 in?

5pinDIN - 01 February 2014 03:47 PM

shadows19 - 01 February 2014 03:43 PM

I want to make all kinds of music

I would like to be able to record vocals and other instruments

my budget is around 4,500

Since your member profile indicates your location as being outside the US,
what currency is the 4,500 in?

Im a BIG Yamaha fan.....but, If your budject is $4500...you should go to musiccomputing.com & get a studioblae...just saying!!!!  check it out!

Hello, I have a Motif XF and a Kronos X and, even thought some of the sounds on the XF are great, I think the Kronos X i way a more complete instrument.  I believe you can make anything the XF does in the Kronos, but not the other way around.

Best regards,

The Kronos is a very nice board but completely different from the Motif. If you want to compose and record original music or original arrangements then the 8,000 Motif arps that intelligently respond to your playing make it the winner. There is NO other workstation that does this. The ability to quickly create a four part performance, mixing and matching voices (instruments) and arps ( what they play) is fantastic. Compare that to a Kronos Combi that has a fixed Arp per part and a Drum part with very limited variation. Certainly not the ability to quickly have 5 customized variations per part. You need to compare deeper and match it to how you want to use the workstation. For composing the Motif IMHO is the way to go. For live play they are both very good and the differences are a matter of taste.

joesax - 14 April 2014 10:31 AM

The Kronos is a very nice board but completely different from the Motif. If you want to compose and record original music or original arrangements then the 8,000 Motif arps that intelligently respond to your playing make it the winner. There is NO other workstation that does this. The ability to quickly create a four part performance, mixing and matching voices (instruments) and arps ( what they play) is fantastic. Compare that to a Kronos Combi that has a fixed Arp per part and a Drum part with very limited variation. Certainly not the ability to quickly have 5 customized variations per part. You need to compare deeper and match it to how you want to use the workstation. For composing the Motif IMHO is the way to go. For live play they are both very good and the differences are a matter of taste.

I don’t understand your exact point by calling MOTIF XF a different product sir. That doesn’t make sense to me. MOTIF XF is a ROMpler and it falls in a sub-categories of what KRONOS is/does. You should also check Kronos combies and Karma, I don’t think they are inferior compared to MOTIF XF at all and indeed Karma is superior engine which it’s embedded (no comparison here).

So you make your music with the already made ARPs and that’s why it’s important?!! I think any intelligent musician can do better ARPs and IMHO it’s not a selling factor at all and besides that Kronos has KARMA embedded. To me VOICE set is really important. Kronos is far ahead of MOTIF XF in that department.

For live performance there is no way MOTIF XF beats Kronos. sound transition is not possible without programming in MOTIFs and limited and sound wise there is NO WAY simply NO WAY to my ears that MOTIF XF sounds better that KRONOS. Even if some of the factory sounds are better on MOTIF, the key sounds such as synth, piano, e-piano, organs are beyond MOTIF’s capabilities.

Any way I agree with other posts that Kronos >> MOTIF XF :)

Hope moderator can get along with my posts too! As it seems he’s been aggressively/actively/automatically censoring my posts on this forum.

joesax - 14 April 2014 10:31 AM

Compare that to a Kronos Combi that has a fixed Arp per part and a Drum part with very limited variation. Certainly not the ability to quickly have 5 customized variations per part. You need to compare deeper and match it to how you want to use the workstation. For composing the Motif IMHO is the way to go. For live play they are both very good and the differences are a matter of taste.

Wow, this is so wrong it’s hard to even know where to start. ;-)

The Kronos, in a Combi, has 4 KARMA Modules running KARMA GEs ("generated effects” - like arps, but more powerful). Each of the four KARMA Modules has 8 different scenes (variations). That means there are four layers of 8 scenes. Then, there is a Master Control Layer on top of that. Each of the scenes in each of the 5 layers stores the positions of 16 Real-Time Controls that modify what the “arps” are doing in those scenes. Those 16 control can be connected to over 400 different parameters that change what the GE is doing. You can customize a KARMA GE into far more variations that you can with a Motif arp. Just by mixing and matching the 8 scenes in each of the 5 layers in different combinations, you could have 8 to the 5th power (8^5) of combinations available, or 32,768 variations - within one combi.

There is an additional Drum Track that can play one of many MIDI Drum Patterns, with or without KARMA. KARMA also has the ability to produce drum grooves, which can be transformed into countless variations with the real-time controls. You can run them together or separately. You can look at that as icing on the cake.

I’m not saying that the Motif XF and its arps aren’t good - they are. Both of these keyboards are excellent. But for you to make those statements about the Kronos show that you know nothing about it.

Incidentally, I made all of this KARMA Technology available for the Yamaha XF, XS, MOX, MOXF and Rack-XS (and soon for S70/S90 XS) in my KARMA Motif Software. You can have an even more advanced version of KARMA to go with your Yamaha - as long as you use a computer. It just isn’t embedded in the synth like it is with the Kronos, M3, and OASYS.

- Stephen Kay
KARMA Developer :: karma-lab.com

Felipe M. - 13 April 2014 07:06 PM

Hello, I have a Motif XF and a Kronos X and, even thought some of the sounds on the XF are great, I think the Kronos X i way a more complete instrument. 

This.

Stephen:

Thank you for enlightening me about what Karma can do. So let me use this opportunity to educate myself even more. My limited experience with Karma from reading user reviews, viewing demos and trying it in music stores, led me to believe that while there were many variations, scenes, etc it seemed that the responses were somewhat random. For example I could not be sure if each scene/variation would consistently respond to my playing? If I am going to record a composition I would want to know what each part (scene) of that composition will sound like before pressing record. No surprises. That was my impression and why I believed the Motif was a better fit for recording and why I believed the Kronos (with Karma) probably more suited to live play. If that is not correct then Karma has some potential I was not aware of. That said:

I found the Motif arp approach better lent itself to quickly creating musical ideas and arrangements in way that was more intuitive and easier than Kronos-IMHO. This was particularly true in creating four part performances. I also found that even though the arps are in voice categories I can use them with voices in other categories to create unique sounds so the number of variations is fairly large (plus each arp has its own parameters and I can make my own).

As to which workstation sounds best that is subjective. For me it’s the Motif.

Joe

For sounds: Piano/EP/synth/lead/pads: kronos wins. Orchestral/strings in specific/guitars/flutes/sax: Motif wins

Yamaha Arps are not just notes that go up and down, they are true musical ideas suited very well to the type of instrument they were made for. Take pizzicato and flute Arps as an example. Kronos version is more of a computerized version of the Arps, just math that you have a ton of options to play with and tweak, Could be extremely powerful with more variations especially with all the power that karma packs, but they are not tailor made musical ideas like in the Yamaha.

A question for the Kronos experts:

in a yamaha motif performance, when you are in performance parts control, you can trigger off and on any of the 4 parts, for example if it is a pad sound then after you switch that part off and as long as you are not pressing any keys the sound of that part (a pad in this example) decays naturally and when you do the opposite, i.e. if you already have some keys pressed down and switch on another part, then you don’t suddenly hear that sound kicking in as if it was playing but on mute and suddenly un-muted.

That here (I hope you understood my examples) is a problem with the korg combis. Yes, you get 16 parts vs 4 and yes you can control all aspects of all parts including midi signaling and filtering. But, when you use the switch buttons in the control surface to switch any of the 16 parts on or off, you are actually muting/un-muting them so they suddenly die and they suddenly pop up because they are always playing, you are just putting them on mute (switches are actually labeled as mute buttons).

The question: am I missing something? are there real on/off switches for the 16 combi parts like there is for the 4 motif performance parts? Thank you whoever can answer this.

wizardgraphics - 16 April 2014 02:28 AM

Yamaha Arps are not just notes that go up and down, they are true musical ideas suited very well to the type of instrument they were made for. Take pizzicato and flute Arps as an example.

I think the Yamaha arps are quite musical and useful. I would not say otherwise. And I don’t really want to get into a debate here about “which is better”, KARMA or Yamaha arps. I would say they both have their strong points - and leave it at that. ;)

Kronos version is more of a computerized version of the Arps, just math that you have a ton of options to play with and tweak.

Again, in the vein of “they both have their strong points”, you could say it that way, or you could also say:

KARMA “arps” are not based on MIDI note patterns, but are generated algorithmically, based on parameter settings, so they are not limited to just doing a single type of pattern over and over.

Could be extremely powerful with more variations especially with all the power that karma packs, but they are not tailor made musical ideas like in the Yamaha.

I think that statement has some truth, and if you prefer the prepackaged musical phrases approach to the more experimental approach, then the Motif wins. If you like the ability to morph a KARMA phrase into something completely unexpected that drives you in a new direction, or the ability to subtly randomize the performance so it feels more like additional musicians, then KARMA wins. I like the Motif arps, which is why I use them as additional elements in the KARMA Motif Software.

A question for the Kronos experts:

in a yamaha motif performance, when you are in performance parts control, you can trigger off and on any of the 4 parts, for example if it is a pad sound then after you switch that part off and as long as you are not pressing any keys the sound of that part (a pad in this example) decays naturally and when you do the opposite, i.e. if you already have some keys pressed down and switch on another part, then you don’t suddenly hear that sound kicking in as if it was playing but on mute and suddenly un-muted.

That here (I hope you understood my examples) is a problem with the korg combis. Yes, you get 16 parts vs 4 and yes you can control all aspects of all parts including midi signaling and filtering. But, when you use the switch buttons in the control surface to switch any of the 16 parts on or off, you are actually muting/un-muting them so they suddenly die and they suddenly pop up because they are always playing, you are just putting them on mute (switches are actually labeled as mute buttons).

It’s true that they USED TO work that way. But in the most recent 2.1.x OS, they provided an option for the behavior. From the manual:
========
Mute Mode
Version 2.1 gives you a choice as to how the Mute buttons work in Combinations and Songs.
Previously, in Combis the Mute buttons muted the Timbre’s audio output, which is convenient for sound design; in Songs, they stopped only the sequencer’s output to the Track, while leaving the keyboard active.
These behaviors are still available when the new Mute Mode parameter is set to Studio. A second setting, Live, provides alternative behaviors designed for use in live performance.
In Live mode, Combination Mute buttons stop the MIDI input to the Timbre; this saves polyphony, and is well-suited to muting and un-muting layered sounds as you play. Similarly, Song Mute buttons control MIDI input from both the sequencer and the keyboard.
For more information, see “Mute Mode” on page 751 of the Parameter Guide.
========
I’m not sure myself without testing it (not in the studio at the moment) whether using them in this new configuration silences notes that are currently being held, but it does work more in the way you are asking - and as you say, Kronos’s 16 parts vs. 4 can be an advantage.

I want to be clear about my motivation for joining this discussion:

- As the developer of KARMA, I’m not here to promote or defend the Kronos. I happen to have a long-time association with Korg, and the Kronos is a fine keyboard, but I mainly jumped in to correct some misconceptions about KARMA on the Kronos.

- In the last few years, I’ve decided to create KARMA Software for a number of Yamaha keyboards. So Yamaha has graciously provided me with access to a number of Yamaha models, and I’ve since learned an awful lot about them, while making the software work. Enough to learn about and appreciate the arps, and to even integrate them into the KARMA Performances in the software as additional elements. So I’m now fully aware that the Motif XF is also an excellent keyboard. So is the MOXF. But of course I can’t really take a public position on “which is better” because that would be unfair to my relationships. And also, I don’t really think one is better than the other - they both have their strong points, which is what this discussion seems to be about.