Yamaha Motif 7

Actually, the Motif 8 has a newly designed keybed, developed from the graded hammer action found in the P series. The Motif 6 and 7 use the same FS action that has been in use since the DX7 (also found in M1, O1/W, Trinity, Triton...

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Let me correct the reviewer below me who stated that the Motif and the Triton's keybeds are the same. This person is incorrect!!!

While Yamaha makes the Triton's keybed, they are different. The Motif has Yamaha's latest generation keybed -- the Triton is one generation removed.

Yamaha uses their R&D in Digital pianos (specifically the Yamaha Clavinova series) to benefit other keyboards. The specific keybed and action on the Motif is a modified version of the latest Clavinova models (e.g. Clavinova 920).

The keybed and action in the Korg Triton is based on Yahama's older Clavinova models (e.g. Clavinova 820).

The action on both of these keyboards is great. However, the keybed/action on the Motif is slightly newer technology.

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I don't understand how so many users can say they like the Motif's keybed feel better than the Triton's. THEY USE THE EXACT SAME KEYBED PEOPLE!!!!!!!!!

Yamaha supplies Korg with the keybed for their high end models. Motif and Triton keys are exactly the same. If you notice a difference, it must be psychological.

This board is really japanese. I mean to understand it is as hard as to learn japanese language. But eventually you'll get a clue how to do what you want. Don't even bother with sequencer. Patches are cool - especially if you use realtime controls. Manual is... Oh well...

Well, I think the sounds are some kind of between Roland XV and Korg Triton. I mean it's as full and large as Triton but doesn't have that ethereal feel to them, so it sounds more like a Roland. Drums are very fresh, basses are what I like, pads are very usable in the mix, acoustics are lush (there is indeed a vibrato problem on some of the sounds), synths are fat. I like some of guitars too... Again limited fx section - when the hell those people will start to put many inserts there??? I like piano very much - very musical. Check my page if you want to hear Motif sounds: www.ampcast.com/georgeicefield

Bad points: 1) hard to use (learn), 2) limited fx section, 3) vibrato on samples, 4) UGLY. Otherwise probably the best keyboard out there... If it only had ribbon controller...

1.40 update
The presets are very impressive.
It's not easy to bang a preset into the sequencer and have it sound the same. But with an external computer or sequencer, it can be done.
Editing patches is not that easy, but you can do it with some patience, and tips from Yamaha's excellent support site, http://www.motifator.com
The unit comes with a patch editor (software.) i haven't used it, however, as I'm pretty good with books and buttons. But the manual is poorly laid out. Much "go to page 54 to find out about ...." when you're on p.200.

62 note polyphony is really MUCH less when you use pianos, because of the way the sustain pedal works.
It can be a problem in the sequencer. But if you add the Plug In Boards, you get more ways to make voices.
62 notes, is only for using voices with 1 element in each voice. Most voices us at least 2.
Built in effects. Good, but confusing: variation and insert, plus global.
Easy to expand memory. Buy a smart card too. It has SCSI, but I use the smart card, self contained that way.
The sequencer is cool, but I wouldn't want it to be my only sequencer. It can do alot, but the question is,"would you want to do it THAT way?"
They're working on upgrading the built in USB MIDI connection, which should be cool, but at this writing, can lead to lock ups, delayed and stuttering notes. But that should be fixed by the time you read this. And if you just use a MIDI interface, there shouldn't be a problem. (It has a built in USB MIDI interface.)

The sounds are great.And you can add your own samples, so, what's not to like!!!???
Good for Rock, New Age, Piano, Jazz, Hip Hop, and some Trance (tho that's not my field of expertise.)
Unfortunately, most of the sounds are not pre-programmed for aftertouch, some are. You have to go and tweak that, and save them to valuable user space.

So far, so good!
Always have a back-up!

Great online help @
Motifator.com

I'd probably get another Motif, rather than anything else, if I needed a synth today.
Playing 46 years, bought first synth in '79. (B-3,Rhodes, Clav before that.) I have alot of Roland, Ensoniq, and Sequential Gear. I was one of the guys to see the DX-7 in Japan before it came out,and work with it a bit at their factory in Hamamatsu, so I could program that one. I now have a Beetle PR-7 Programmer and a TX-816, and 3 TX7's,so I still "do" DX7.
I think the Ensoniq TS-10 had a better sequencer. Never had anyKurzweil or Korg synths, so I can't compare. the Motif to them.
It is a very FUN thing to play.
I can't always be as productive as I'd like to with it, unless I record its output directly to Digital Performer as audio, on my PB500. That way, I can take advantage of the great Preset sounds, and not be stymied by the clever and powerful, but quirky sequencer.

I'm using software version 1.40. The presets sound great. The first hour I started using it, I was going through as many patches as I could and noticed how beautiful most of them were. The pianos and organs are great. For old FM fans, the TX-81Z's Lately Bass patch is in here and it is 99.9% as close to the real thing as you can get. In fact, it's better than the real thing because there's no noise on the outputs and you can run it through the internal stereo fx if you wish. The drums are great. The pads are very good. The flute and sax sounds are among the best I've heard. Editing the patches is somewhat complicated because of the strange instruction manual. It's a very comprehensive manual, but laid out in an alien way. It makes you jump around from page to page like one of those follow-the-path adventure books (the ones that tell you to jump to page 53 or page 275 depending on what you want to do next). The index is next to useless. Once you get used to the inconsistent user interface, life gets easier. Everyone says you should read the manual first before using the Motif. Good advice. I read the first 120 pages, which includes terminology and a "quick start guide." Please do the same if you want to keep your sanity. I don't know if there is a patch editor available for the Motif yet, but if there is one, I'm sure it would make life easier.

The polyphony is 62 voices. The keyboard action is supposed to be like the old DX7, which I don't remember too well. Another keyboard I owned from the same era is the Roland D50. I like the keyboard of the D50. It's got a rubbery feel that is great for organ playing (the Screamin' B3 patches are phenomenal). When I first played the Motif, I thought the clacky feel and sound were annoying. However, once you put your headphones on and start playing, you will see why Yamaha chose this keyboard. It just feels right for the sounds it is good at reproducing. For example, pianos feel kind of like pianos with this keyboard. Organs feel like organs. The big difference is people who don't have heavy hands can play this keyboard without feeling like they're performing an intense workout with their fingers. The Motif has reverb, chorus, and other effects. You can downsample sounds to make them have a gritty feel. Once you get used to the alien user interface, everything will be much easier. The excellent thing about the Motif is its expandability. The sound cards that are available are not just memory boards filled with memory, but synth cards that hold the internal workings of your favorite synths. There's a card that holds all of the inner workings of a Yamaha DX7, for example. Think about how cool this is, to be able to add a new synth into the Motif for a measly $250. You can expand sample memory from 4MB to 64MB. You can add a card to get more than the included 4 outputs. The MIDI capabilities are very extensive and there are enough controller buttons, knobs, and sliders to keep you happy for a while. The Motif comes with an onboard sequencer, but I don't play on using it because I have Digital Performer.

All of the sounds that are supposed to be realistic sound very realistic. It is a joy to work with an instruments that has this many realistic sounds in it. I think the Motif is best suited for pop, rock, classical, and hip hop. There are a lot of dance sounds in it, but the focus is not mainly on dance like some other synths (the Yamaha CS6,for example). There is a lot of expressiveness in many of the sounds. Just tweak a knob or slider and you're ready to go. The onboard effects sounds very good, but then again, almost all new instruments come with good fx sections nowadays. If they were bad, they would become unpopular very fast. There is some reaction to your playing depending on the sound you are playing. Many samples are recorded with different velocity settings, so you would trigger a different sample by playing a note loudly or softly.

The Motif weighs a ton and looks battle-ready. Only time will tell if its solid exterior can withstand the changing climate and environment.

Motifator.com is one of the reasons why I bought the Motif 7. I would like to say that the Roland Fantom was my other choice besides the Motif, but Roland's Fantom web site really s*cks. By not updating it, they probably lost a bunch of potential customers, including me. Yamaha has downloadable manuals, advice sheets, free sounds, and an incredible web forum in Motifator.com. Roland has NOTHING. Their web site is pathetic and it's tough to find things. Yamaha, Korg, Novation, and Access all have better web sites than Roland. Please get with the program, Roland. I own or have owned a D50, two U220's, R8, DR660, DR202, SP808, SP808EX, DJ70, S750, so you see I'm not some sort of hobbyist. I try to stay loyal to companies that make good stuff, but if their support s*cks, that's just another reason for me to switch to another brand. Roland, if you need help, contact me. Check out www.catwalkrecords.com for an example. Upgrading the OS is easy on the Motif, but you'll need to buy a SmartMedia card.

If it were lost or stolen, I would buy another one. It's worth what I paid. To me, this is like the next-generation Quasimidi Sirius (a great synth in its own right) with sampling and expansion capabilities. Remember, guys and girls, you need to read the manual first. It's all in there and when you're ready to dive in and experiment and want to pull your hair out, there's always tech support on Motifator.com to help out.

The Presets sound good , but they aren't really so TECHNO/DANCE as Yamaha made us believe ( all the commercials and stuff).
I am not saying they are bad , but they ain't good enough if you are only looking for dance sounds ..
Nevertheless you can always TWEEk/CHANGE existings sounds , and there is also the possibility of buying expansion boards (THe AN and DX are quite suitable for the BOOM BOOM sounds ....).

THE MANUAL IS DECENT , NOTHING REALLY BAD , OR GOOD ABOUT IT .

It has lots of good features , it being a brand new board and all .
All are pretty good as well .
What i was dissapointed about , is the POOR REVERB , and the fact that you can't apply few effects to a very limited number of tracks .
THE SEQUENCER IS O.K , but not as GOOD as the YAMAHA RM1x's SEquencer...
The FACT that the cool GRIDMODE isn't available in the motif is really irritating .

If they say it's a revolutionizing workstation and all , they should have done this better :EFFECTS ; SEQUENCER !

TO speak of something else ...
What is the GREAT DEAL WITH THE RS7000 ????
I don't see a great improvement on the RM1x !!!
All companies , once they have made their name , don't revolutionize anymore .
The RS7000's Sequencer is the same as the Rm1x's .
The sampler CApabilities are from my point of view quite limited .
The preset sounds are not as good as the ones on the Motif (in Fact i think they are just a little bit better than the ones on the Rm1x , that means that they SUCK !) .
I WOULD BUY A RM1x and a used YAMAHA A5000 for the same price (there's much more that you could do with these do , i think )

One think i really did like about this keyboard , are the keys (nice pressure sensitive keys) ,all the standart outputs (SCSI , SPDIF OUT , etc ...NICE GOING ! ) .

But still , why a worse sequencer than the RM1X ~~@!!!!! ?????
I hope they ll have an OS update with that Grid Mode (Shouldn't be difficult ).

THE SOUNDS ARE GOOD , IF YOU WANT WORKSTATION SOUNDS ( THAT MEANS A BIT OF EVERYTHING) !
THere ain't as much techno/dance sounds as you might have thought , but for WORSTATION sounds they are all pretty good .

They Say it's a "DANCE WORKSTATION " , maybe because of the sequencer , but certainly not because of the PRESET SOUNDS !!!
(You have a sampler (very simple one , but with a nice SLICE mode) , so you can put anything you want in it ; there are board as well (as i said before))..

If you think of it as a DANCE WORKSTATION i'd give a 5 for the preset sounds , and a 8 for a normal WOrkstation .

I THINK YOU CAN DEPEND ON YAMAHA STUFF .
(Never had problems with their gear ;- ) )..

WITH MOTIFATOR.COM , YOU CAN SPEAK OF REAL GOOD SUPPORT !

If it were stolen , i wouldn't buy it again .
In Fact i sold it already , it wasn't at all what i was looking for , i am even thinking of rebuying my Rm1x (that i sold to have some more money in order to buy this workstation ).
I prefer to have lots of seperate units , for the kind of music i make (PROGRESSIVE TRANCE ) .
The Motif ain't a bad Buy (i defenitly think it's better than the korg TRITON; but it's not better than the Kurzweil K2600Xs from my point of view).
It's all a question of taste in the END , if you like WOrkstation , If you like the Motif , it's sound , it's sampler and it's poor Sequencer , than Go for it !

I Would not ;- )

Okay, this is a preliminary review as I've only been working with the M7 for a few weeks. I will submit a more comprehensive review after I've had it for several months. The reason I wanted to get a posting on was the unique way I came to own this instrument. I originally purchased a Korg Triton Pro...this was a natural choice as I've owned several Korg products (including 01/W Pro workstation) in the past. Never had a problem with Korg. The Triton that I purchased literally "died" not long after I took delivery. It suddenly was unable to hold program and combination info - even after reloading the factory disk and turning it off and back on, it would all be gone (tried this several times). Guitar Center agreed to swap the defective keyboard for another new Triton. I got that one home to find that several of the black keys made a horrible clunking noise upon key release. Again, GC was willing to swap for another Triton and I asked about maybe going to something else instead after the bad experience. They were agreeable...after demo'ing the Motif 7, I was ready to switch over although I don't have extensive experience with Yamaha workstations. By the way, the staff at Guitar Center was very helpful, courteous, and professional throughout this ordeal.

So far, I'm very happy with the Motif. As for ease of use, I think my learning curve is steeper because I'm used to the way that Korg instruments are operated. Little by little I've been able to find my way around the Motif and have been able to successfully execute most of the functions that are important to me.

The Motif had almost everything available that had made the Triton my original first choice. Probably the only major thing lacking is the Triton's touch screen, but I have found I'm not missing it as much as I thought I would (it is a cool feature, though). The Motif's button arrangement is pretty intuitive and I've been able to navigate the function menus relatively effortlessly, once I learned them. Part of my decision to jump to the Motif was that it has several features that the Triton doesn't have - factory SCSI, USB, optical connection, 85MB of sounds without optional expansion boards, and the integrated sequencer sampling. One thing that appears to be missing (or, at least, I haven't figured out yet) is how to use the Motif as a data filer for other MIDI gear so I can store sysex files to the smartmedia card. I just posted to the Motifator web site to see if someone can help me out on this one.

This is an excellent sounding keyboard. I haven't been able to explore every single sound yet, but I've been impressed with everything that I've heard. My biggest concern with leaving Korg was that I'd sacrifice sound quality, but I feel the Motif is a strong contender in this area...and certainly surpasses the Triton in a couple of areas, like Pianos. Also, I like the feel of the keyboard on the Motif better than on the Triton.

Big concern for me based on my recent experiences. Too early to tell with the Motif so far...but no problems as of yet. I've spent a lot of time on the Motifator.com website and it's nice to know so much information on the keyboard is available just at that one site.

Have not dealt with Yamaha US directly, but I've heard good things about their responsiveness. Again, the Motifator.com site is very helpful.

Again, remember this is a preliminary review...I plan to post something a little more substantial and informative maybe after I've had it for 6 months. Initially, I'm very pleased and would not hesitate to replace it with another Motif 7 if something happened to this one. As for other gear, I'm using it in conjuction with a Boss DR770 drum machine via MIDI. I also own a Yamaha DD55 drum pad. Past gear: Korg 707, Prophet 600, Korg SQD-8, Ensoniq EPS, Ensoniq ESQ1, Roland D70, Roland MT32, Korg 01/W Pro.

I have owned this since it shipped on July 4, 2001.

Coming from the S80, this was a breeze. As I accidently trashed my manual the FIRST day I got it (long story... but yammy was good enought ot send me another free of charge), I was able to figure everything out, from sampling to changing CC data. This was the easiest workstation synth I have used.

Trashing manuals is an easy and popular sport. Though I read the manual after-the-fact, I actually find it to be a great compendium and easy to follow.

I am no brain surgon, and only have 5 years of *real* synth and recording experience, but I just find this to be a very intuitive instument.

The features of this synth are widely noted, so I don't know if I really need to add much here... other than to say that bang for the buck, this synth is VERY hard to beat by anyone.

I should note that the expansion options are quite impressive. I have a DX and an AN card. That is THREE types o' synthisi under the hood of board! And I still have room for one more!

Well, I just don't know how anything less than a 10 could do. I know these things are subjective, but come on! Good it good! Simply put, it sounds amazing. No one beats Yammy at EPs or synth sounds. And the drum kits are wonderful. All the other sounds are well represented. And the onboard samples are a rich rich trove that I will be able to mine for many years. The GREAT thing about Motif is that the synth sounds great EVEN IF you strip them of their effects. To be kind, this is not always the case with other widley used workstation synths...

Built like a tank. I have no worries

Well, take one look at www.motifator.com and judge for yourself. Yammy tech support is quick and sharp, and they sent me a new damn manual free-or-charge even though I was the idot who trashed my orginal one!

I just don't think there is another synth that competes with it, blow for blow. Take a good pair of head phones and plug into one. Those that have been around synths will immediatly recognize the signifigance of this instrument. Those looking to buy for the first time... MAN, you can't go wrong. It is a great time to be a gear head, I tell you!