Juno Gi or Yamaha MOX?

[yamahaforums]

Just thought I would put this out there. I currently have a Yamaha MOX6. Had it four days and have to say I am not exactly blown away by the sounds. I'm a bit of a Roland fan really and was originally going to buy the Gi but then Yamaha announced the MOX and I thought I would give it a go.

So, just wondered what you lot thought about the merits or drawbacks of the Juno Gi in comparison to the MOX? Oh and by the way the lack of an onboard MIDI sequencer is not a deal breaker for me. The keyboard spends all it's life sitting right in front of my iMac which currently has Logic Pro 9 and of course GarageBand to take care of sequencing duties.

So, any thoughts? Should I stick with the MOX or exchange it for the Juno Gi?

[Mystic38]

My real recommendation would be to order a juno Gi tomorrow and have both for a little while and check them out side by side.. as long as you remember to return one !..lol

[yamahaforums]

Ah yes! If only I could afford to do that but still waiting on the old lottery to come in:)

It's a tough call. I'm in London at the weekend so perhaps I'll get along to a store and check out the Juno Gi and take it from there. If the sounds are right that is what will do it for me :)

[PauloF]

Ah yes! If only I could afford to do that but still waiting on the old lottery to come in:)

It's a tough call. I'm in London at the weekend so perhaps I'll get along to a store and check out the Juno Gi and take it from there. If the sounds are right that is what will do it for me :)

Just for the sake of curiosity...what part of the MOX caused that bad impression?

[DJ RAZZ]

Yes I am wondering the same? If you are a Roland guy why the switch. Has some past Roland board shifted things for you or is it something else, maybe the Yamaha demo did you in. I loved the Gi in the store. Hated it when I got it home, but spent time editing the sounds and now love it more than ever. Good Roland rock organs and brass, finally.....

[yamahaforums]

@PauloF It's a few things. First and most importantly for me the acoustic pianos are lacking in warmth. They sound kinda anemic and lifeless at least to my ear but then I am used to that "Roland" sound so could be I just need to adjust to it and do a bit of tweaking. The acoustic guitars also I think are not a patch on Roland's guitars, neither is the electric come to that. Brass, woodwind and strings are all fine, no problems with those but they are not really the sounds I use much.

Next up and something that REALLY annoys me is the arps. They sound great but they sometimes don't respond to key presses. Like you go along for 8 bars ok then suddenly you press the next key and nothing happens, like it just can't keep up and runs out of steam. Maybe it's just me I don't know but it happens too often and it's really frustrating. Maybe they are not really meant to be played live and are more for recording a few bars then looping?

Then there is the display and the category search, at least the half hearted way Yamaha have implemented it. To deal with the display first, it seems to me that at this point in time sticking such a small and low res monochrome display on a keyboard in this price range is really unacceptable. Bear in mind I had not seen the thing for a hands on as I had pre-ordered it. In the demo's it looked fine, small but fine. In reality it's small and blocky, the type of thing you would have expected ten years ago, not in 2011! In fact there are much older keyboards out there with larger and higher res displays. The one on the MOX is just plain cheap and that's all their is to it.

As for the category search it works but just feels a bit clunky and "boxed in". I guess this is in part due to the size of the display. Maybe I'm just splitting hairs but some of the sounds I am looking for don't appear in the categories where you would expect to find them and some sounds just aren't there at all! Seems to me they didn't make the best use of all that wave rom?

@DJ RAZZ Yeah it's an odd thing for a Roland fan to do but I was in the market for a new keyboard, my last one being the Fantom G which due to circumstances at the time I had to sell. Things are better now and I had about £900 to spend. My choices were limited in that price range between the MOX and the Juno Gi. As you know I run a site called YamahaForums so I thought, the MOX is brand new, let's give it a go and fly the flag for Yamaha :) Unfortunately that flag is now flying at half mast because I have this feeling I should have gone with my gut instinct and bought the Juno Gi instead.

Thing is, it's not just about the sounds. It's also about the feel of an instrument. Does it just plain "feel" right? The MOX doesn't, at least not to me and despite my best efforts to convince myself otherwise I'm not feeling the love here lol.

So I thought I would pop along to the Juno Gi forum and see if others liked it or hated it and I can already see a two camps forming up. On the one hand you have those who love it and enjoy the sound quality and audio recording and on the other there are those who bought it under the impression it was an "updated" Juno G, which of course it is not and people who were also under the impression it was a complete "workstation" synth, which again it is not. What I need to determine is, is it right for me? Will it do what I need it to do and will it sound good doing it ?

If it helps with opinions, I am not a gigging musician and never will be. I am quite happy with the keyboard sitting in front of my iMac (Intel) and working with a software sequencer which at the moment is Logic Pro 9 and sometime GarageBand. So the lack of a midi sequencer on board is not an issue for me and also I suppose it makes the audio recording pretty redundant? The audio interface however is something I would use as I need to be able to plug my guitar and mic (phantom powered) in and at the moment I don't have an interface to do that. The MOX has A/D inputs but there is no phantom power so can't use my mic.

So, should I head back to the Roland clan or stay out in the wilderness with the MOX? What do you think?

[yamahaforums]

Just wanted to add, should I also maybe look at the GW8? Isn't it the same as the Juno Gi but without the audio recorder?

[Mystic38]

The arps in the motifs are not really designed to be used like in an arranger keyboard..playing live with them will cause issues..so if u would like an arranger then you can check out the gw8 or the korg pa50

If you dont feel inspired by the mox then i would ship it back and start again.. Every board i have got i was "wow" either by sound set, feature set or ui.. So to start off with "ho hum" isnt good.

So if you sequence on a pc, then the gw8 gives you arranger (and quite a competent one too) or the gi gives you the audio recorder.. If it was me i would go for the gw8 but you aint me lol

Just wanted to add, should I also maybe look at the GW8? Isn't it the same as the Juno Gi but without the audio recorder?

[yamahaforums]

Thanks for that. Yeah what you said about

If you dont feel inspired by the mox then i would ship it back and start again.. Every board i have got i was "wow" either by sound set, feature set or ui.. So to start off with "ho hum" isnt good.

is a very sensible place to start. I really am not blown away by the MOX at all. You know when something is not right and always best to go with your instincts :)

[mgmg4871]

From your comments and needs I think the Juno Gi might be a better fit for you. Minus the sequencer, which you say is not an issue I don't see why it wouldn't be what you are looking for. The sounds are excellent. Also you get the audio recorder thrown in. I had to come to grips with it not having a sequencer but I actually enjoy working with Sonar and Ableton live now. Especially Ableton live because of all of the controls available on the Juno Gi in the midi control mode.

[yamahaforums]

Ahh, I forgot I also have Ableton Live Suite 8.1 :) Anyway, yeah I think I'll call the store tomorrow and get this swapped out. Will let you know how I get on and thanks for the input, much appreciated :)

[dbijoux]

The sounds are excellent. Also you get the audio recorder thrown in.

It blows my mind why having an audio recorder 'thrown in' is a plus. Especially if the first thing you are going to do is plug it into a DAW. I'm probably repeating myself, but just saying.

I'm surprised the MOX is more of an ox. I could see the 88 key version being useful, but that's not the question here. For me, it would also come down to the sound and ease of editability; I haven't seen many positives for either board on that.

Look forward to hearing the your impression after the switch.

[mgmg4871]

Less load on my computer is why it's a plus for me.

[dbijoux]

Sensible answer, but audio isn't a source of much CPU consumption at all - even with a large number of tracks. Now, vst's and softsynths are a different story all together.

So why would you use the Gi's recorder when you're going to at the least transfer stems back to the DAW anyway? Unless you're mixing everything on board.

[PauloF]

The sounds are excellent. Also you get the audio recorder thrown in.

It blows my mind why having an audio recorder 'thrown in' is a plus. Especially if the first thing you are going to do is plug it into a DAW. I'm probably repeating myself, but just saying.

I'm surprised the MOX is more of an ox. I could see the 88 key version being useful, but that's not the question here. For me, it would also come down to the sound and ease of editability; I haven't seen many positives for either board on that.

Look forward to hearing the your impression after the switch.

Don't forget the MOX is somewhat the new MM6, which was based on the ES but not exactly the ES...
This MOX is based on the XS, but a cut down version...and what a cut !!!