Roland Customer Relationship

Jan_nl: you can try to email Roland with questions about updates and ARX but you won't get a straight answer. Either they really don't know, either they don't want to tell anything before NAMM and co. As about Dan, why should he "come" here anyway? Didn't you see the reactions to that thread you mentioned? Most people here would not be bothered at all if the Fantom G production would be stopped. All you can hear is "hardware expansions are RIP" (so why one should care about ARX), "Roland, Korg and Yamaha sounds are history", "hardware is dead","we only need a midi controller, a Mac and plenty of VST's" and so on. So why would any Roland representative bother himself? For what? Anyway, I'm glad if they ignore this site, because if they wouldn't, probably the FG's production would have been stopped a long time ago. So Dan, go ahead and enjoy your vacation:)

Have you noticed the bashing the Motif XF received on the Motif forum?
Yet it did not stop any of the Yamaha officials from participating in the forums, even addressing the criticism.

When you're in the business of selling music workstations it's not smart to carry grudges because people complain due to the fact that their expectations differ from what is offered, and 'punish' them by staying away from the forum.
It's childish and it will hurt your business in the end.

I can't believe that Roland would adopt a childish attitude, it simply does not fit the profile of any professionally run company.
Criticism should be taken into consideration and evaluated for its worth. At least, that's the way I see it.

I have a little company of my own, and I know how important it is to be able to receive criticism without taking it personally.
If I would start bearing grudges and take it out on my customers I would not be able to survive for very long, business-wise speaking.

This is why I do not understand the absence of Roland here at all.
Maintaining your customer base and responding to them -even if they criticise you-, is a very important aspect of doing business and promoting your product.

As for Dan being on vacation, I hope he enjoys it, his instruction videos are a great help.
But it's not about Dan, it's about Roland representation here interacting with the customers.

jan-nl

I totally agree. Your clarity and focus on the point you're making keeps the subject of your argument on track.

What do we, the customer, expect from customer support.

I been buying keyboard for 30 years, I currently have 21 different electronic keyboard/synthesizers.

I printed every tutorial, manual, quickstart, service manual, etc., I could click my mouse on. (I've read most of them also)

I read forums, watch youtube video's and just eat all this stuff up.

I've only call Korg service in my history, once for a freakout wavestation, where they updated the ROM chip, and then again for a cracked touch plate on the Kaoss Pad II.

I would not say Roland is the worst "customer service" music equipment company out there. There lack of involvement in this forum does seem to be by choice, but, as Art has said, this is an independent site, where motifator is a stated "Yamaha" supported site.

In my experience, all the MI companies have given us multiple updates to thier software products, but maybe that's because all software has issues.

I really enjoy my FG7, I find it to be a good upgrade from my FX7. Of course I may not be expecting to be all things. I do find that Roland keyboards require "Work" to utilize thier workstations, where Korg and Yamaha have tried to take the work out of them, so much so some people would lable them as "arrangers".

I would like to say that with all this negativism and criticism about Roland and workstations in general, flagship workstations will probably fade away over the next few year. I'll miss them.

Guess I'll have to set my sights lower to something like the Juno Gi.

Jan_nl said....."I was wondering: I noticed that on a site like Motifator there is a lot of interaction between Yamaha officials and the customers, and also on the Korg site very regularly someone from Korg answers questions of their customers and if necessary corrects false rumours and/or ideas."......

You are right...don't know what's Roland doing....Probably at Roland "no new is good news". Or they don’t have answers to your questions/complaints/suggestions....

AC

wat are you talking about? we have sRa... (^^)b

From customer service I expected Roland to release updates to the FG to make it do what they claimed it would do

This is taken from Sweetwater's Fantom G sell page 12/3/10

the Fantom-G ............contains a treasure trove of Roland's world-famous SRX-quality sounds, but what really sets this instrument apart is its new ARX expansion, which allows additional .......... fully dedicated synth and effects engines to be added to this already powerful live workstation.

This is taken from ZZ Sound's Fantom G sell page 12/3/10

Power Sequencer Onboard
The Roland Fantom-G6 is the first Roland instrument to feature Roland's newly designed power sequencer..........this pro-level composition tool provides .......... a fully intergraded audio/MIDI graphical environment. A mouse can be also incorporated for computer-like speed and ease.

Hi emenelton,
let's make it clear, I do complain a lot about the FG and Roland when there is a reason. But to be honest, I don't see how the words from Roland that you quoted are not true?
There are ARX expansion on market.
The sequencer is newly designed and it combines audio and midi like no hardware workstation did ever before.
And the part about the mouse is also true.
Complaining, yes. But please, with some valid arguments.

fully dedicated synth and effects engines to be added - ?
computer-like speed and ease - ?

emenelton, I will agree with what mojkarma said. All that you describe is your personal interpretation of what's written. You can't measure these things with numbers, this mean they're relative. Roland writes 128 voice polyphony and you get that. Anything that uses adjectives instead of numbers, is very, very relative.

I guess you and I have different expectation form the term “customer-service”

Since Roland does not seem to participate in this forum, I’d thought I might try and respond to your comments.

“contains a treasure trove of Roland's world-famous SRX-quality sounds”, this is a hard one, I never bought any SRX cards for my FX, but from what I understand many of the included sounds are direct from the SRX series, One-mans treasure is another man's garbage. Quality is very subjective, but I have found more than a few patches on the FG I'd call "quality" sounds.

“new ARX expansion” they gave us three (3) how many do you want, shoot there is only room for two (2). But here again I haven’t bought any, and don't plan too.

“fully dedicated synth and effects engines” I say since you can access the ARX cards directly, they meet the definition of “fully dedicated”, besides you can not make they do something else other than what they are designed for, and that is "dedicated".

I know people would like a GAIA ARX, much like the M3's Radias EXP. Here's an expansion card I did purchased. And it's nothing to write home about, the Radias Keyboard is much more satisfying, and you can pretend it's and expansion using nothing more than a MIDI cable. I plan on getting a GAIA keyboard for my birthday! What kind of a gear hoarder are you? I want more independent hardware, not crappy old expansions, Speaking of "expansion", that's something for memory, And to think of it, in this day and age, workstations should come fully "memory expanded" anyway.

“powerful live workstation” I’ve used the FG live and it is definitely powerful, especially compared to something like an acoustic piano that only has one (1) sound.

“Power Sequencer Onboard” I have to say it more powerful than the MC-50, my only "off "board sequencer.

“pro-level composition tool”, considering how much I paid for thing, it must be “pro-level”, and like every “pro” thing I’ve ever purchased, or used, it takes a lot of time and effort to get good results and more so the more "pro" it is.

“ fully intergraded audio/MIDI graphical environment” I recorded both audio and midi in the thing, and I think with the large screen they have changed the definition of graphical environment. Sure beats the PC-3, I can’t even read the XS/XF screen without glasses. (I still prefer the M3 graphics personally, easy to read with nice color scheme.)

“A mouse can be also incorporated”, I just plugged the mouse in and it worked, very easy. I don’t know what “computer-like speed" means, isn’t the FG a computer?


Sorry dude, sound like you bought the wrong keyboard. I personnally got exactly what I expected. But then again I am a gear hoarder.

Good luck to you, and try not to be offended. I am simply saying Roland gave us what they claimed, and not much more

And I still hope for OS 2.0. (Heck there is a rumor that Yamaha is going to update the XS one nore time (1.56 to 2.0?), and it's being phased out). Besides Most keyboards don't make it past 2.0 anyway, except the M3 which made it to 2.04 My FX made it 2.0, the V-synth made it to 2.0 of course my Korg D3200 is still 1.0 and my PC3 is only at 1.35)

'Power Sequencer Onboard' - is there still anyone out there who believes this from Roland ! ? The Fantom G sequencer is that one you'll need to put all your channels on 1 track to have a mod on all Tracks at once.... I think it will be the only one for the coming years.

just fix the bugs, and maybe solve the PFX effect, so that users have a choice if they want to use the PFX setting, or other in Livesets/Studiosets. As you probably noticed, persons programming these PRE were also suprised when a PFX reverb sent was set to 0 ?????? Too dumb to be ... unfortunately true.

Gentlemen,

fully dedicated synth and effects engines to be added - ? A synth does not mean trombone , drums or f-200 - if a project called out for a vcf sweep would you bring your slide trombone?

computer-like speed and ease - ? This is describing the G's sequencer, Does the sequencer exhibit computer like speed and ease? That's a yes or no question.

A VA card was one of the things talked about a year and a half ago here, not anymore.

These are things Roland Hyped about the G - everywhere you could read about it.

I bought my G because I liked a solo string sounds and a solo trumpet sound built into the X. I never found those sounds in the G.

lol @ people defending roland in any way shape or form