TASCAM Gigastudio 3 Orchestra

I've been playing keyboards for 22 years.

My gear: Yamaha Motif XS8, Roland VS2480CD.

Tascam Stuff: Gigastudio 3.0 Orchestra, Tascam FW-1804, Alienware 7700 laptop (top of the line with all of the extras).

As you can see from my gear list, I don't buy equipment based upon price, but I do buy based upon the features that I need.

Extremely complex to set-up (I am a technician for living). This product will not simply work right out of the box. I cost me alot of money (in extra gear) and even more time (weeks) to get this system to do anything.

Oh, I'd say the sound quality for the time I spent on this Tascam system was only avaerage. I've heard much better sound than this.

I purchased Gigastudio 3 Orchestra 11 months ago in the hopes of updating the sounds for my synth. I was intending to use a laptop so that I could travel and gig with the gigastudio. Well... after many, many failed attempts to get gigastudio to run correctly with my chosen components (Tascam FW1804) I needed to call Tascam for help. Unfortunately, they were not taking calls that morning (this was during normal business hours) and they simply hung-up on my call after I had been waiting on hold for 15 minutes. In addition their support personel were NEVER able to help me set-up my system even though I was using every system that they specified on their website (no lie).
Long story short... This was not the first incident of being hung-up on and being misguided by their customer service, but it's definately the last for me. I bought a new keyboard instead. It was much easier to set-up, and the customer support was great.

If you are reading this you can rest assured that I am an average consumer and not one of their competitors because I have never mentioned any of their other competitors in this review. I am just trying to warn other people about this problem. Tascam's customer service is poorly managed and it shows. You'll have more peace of mind with a different product.