Motif ES7 Questions

So I picked up a Motif ES7 the other day. I'm trying it out to see if it'll be a good replacement for my Roland XP-80.

I have a couple of questions.

1) The keyboard has a few scuff marks/dings on the end caps. Is it possible to replace the end caps? Any idea if I can do it myself orwhere I could get this done?

2) Any suggestions for where I might find good patches online? In particular, I'd love some better organs and EP's.

Thanks for the help!

I'm sure you could replace the endcaps and might be able to order replacements from Yamaha.

Schloads of sounds available from the Motif Mart linked from www.motifator.com

Enjoy your great new board!

Thanks for the help.

I contacted Yamaha and the end caps are about $90 for the pair. One is backordered 4-6 weeks though.

Any suggestions on which patch collections are the must haves for playing wedding/club dates? I recall seeing something about there being an essential organ collection, but can't remember what it's called.

Some more questions...

1) Any thoughts on the PLG-150 VL expansion board? Worth keeping around?

2) Does the keyboard come with sampling RAM, or do I have to buy it. When I press the "Integrated Sampling" button I get a "No DIMM Memory Installed message." Does that mean the original owner removed it. If so, any suggestions what to get?

Thanks for the help. I've been a Roland user for years, and have recently been learning how to speak Kurz, but Yamaha and hardware sampling are both new languages for me.

Thanks again!

No, the ES doesn't come with sample memory, so the original owner didn't remove it. Check the manual and it will tell you the correct kind of memory to buy. Don't bother buying any more than 512MB of sample RAM. The USB port on the ES is pretty slow, so the load time on 1GB of samples would take forever. I have 256MB of sample RAM in my ES8 and that's plenty. I've loaded sounds from the disks that were on the original Motif as well as WAV files for sound effects and I still had plenty of RAM to spare.

So, what did you pay for your ES7?

Mike T.

I paid about a grand which included the PLG-150 VL expansion board and BC-3 Breath controller as well as some tutorial DVD's, (I think that's what they are, haven't had a chance to check them out yet.), a sustain pedal and misc. cables.

It seemed like a good deal, so I figured I'd jump on it. At that price, if I decide it's not the right board for me, I can easily flip it.

Now I need to find the time to learn Yamaha's language.

I don't think he pulled any internal memory out. Unlike a Fantom (if you are thinking Roland) they don't come with any and it probably was never there.

If you are gigging for weddings and clubs I wouldn't worry about sampling right off the bat anyway.

As you have noticed B3/Leslies are weak in Motifs and S Yamahas but you can improve on them . I didn't buy any third party voices for my ES7 but finally got acceptable organs by running two rotary sims in series in effects.

I usually gig with only an ES7 but it took a lot of work to whip it into shape so it could cover all the bases. You'll need an SM card if you want to do what you can on your XP-80...make a program change with the sustain pedal down and not have the board cut out.

Binkeys:

Yep, a grand for that package is a great deal. I have an ES8 over 4 years and it has worked out great for me. Yep, learning the Yamaha lingo and the UI will take a little time. Don't get frustrated. You'll need to go through the DVD's several times. They will save you a lot of time down the road and will help you to learn how to use it much faster than trial and error. One of the things about the ES is the screen is small, so you end up with a lot of abbreviations for features on the screen. The secondary manual will tell you what all the abbreviations mean in the FX section, and the owners manual has a getting started section that you want to go through step by step.

Specific questions can be addressed on www.motifator.com. There is a section for the ES that is still pretty active.

MPCPro is correct about tweaking the Organ Sounds. I've gotten much better results out of the organ sounds by tweaking the Leslie Simm speed and running them in series, as MRCPro pointed out. Its not quite as good as a dedicated clonewheel, but the sounds are more than acceptable IMO. I've certainly gotten my money's worth out of mine. I've made back much more than what I paid for it in gigs I played with it as my main ax.

Mike T.

I'd be really interested in how you did that. Leslie sims are not that great on the ES. It's still an excellent keyboard though.

The "Stage & Studio" sound set by Peter Krischker is a great basic set for gigging musicians. Highly recommended!

"Vintage Keys" has great EP sounds.

For organ sounds there are three sound sets: "Organ Session", "B's Knees" and "Organimation". I own "Organ Session", which is great and features completely new samples, but the other two sets should be great, too.

"Organ Session" unlike the others Harp mentioned does require sample RAM installed.

werone:

Even though you didn't ask me, :poke: here is something that "Bad Mister" (Phil from Yamaha) posted on the Motifator.com ES forum about working with the Leslie SIMM.

"There are 11 Rotary Speaker effect algorithms in INSERTION EFFECT 2. These are very deep algortihms with a great deal of control. If you look in the Data List booklet on page 29 you can see all the different combinations. Depending on what you are after.... you get just the straight "Rotary", in combination with the DISTORTION, with the OVERDRIVE, with the AMP SIMULATOR. Then there is the "2-way Rotary Speaker". That has a separate Low and High Drive and introduces stereo mic position angle as an option. Then the 2-way is combined with the DISTORTION, with the OVERDRIVE, and with the AMP SIMULATOR. Then there are the one's I find the most fun: the "DUAL ROTOR 1, 2 and 3". These have the Speed Control as a switch, i.e., Fast or Slow (like the real thing) and then you get slow to fast transition time of the Rotor and a separate parameter for slow to fast transition time of the Horn. You can set the Rotors minimum/maximum speeds and the Horns minimum/maximum speeds. (Jimmy Smith had his B3/Leslie modified so that he could control the transition). Plus this algorithm lets you play with the Stereo mic angle.

The organ Voice "16+8+5&1/3" uses Dual Rotor Speaker 2. If you look at the Effect setup: EDIT/ COMMON/ F6 EFFECT/ SF1 CONNECT you can see that this Voice uses INS2 (Dual RotarySpeaker 2) of the dual insertion first, then signal is routed to the INS1 (EQ). (There is also very little reverb on this Voice, cool). The Percussion has "monophonic" behavior (Element 2 is the percussion element and through some very fancy programming, the element does not sustain and will not reproduce additional notes while others are held - done with an LFO and Amplitude Modulation) this mono percussion is, again, like the real thing.

-Go to F4 Control Sets and see how the first Control Set lets you control "EfSpCtl" Effect Speed Control with the MW. The MW switches from slow to fast. When setting up Control Sets you will see the different Destination parameters. the MIDI Parameter numbers appear in the Data List booklet - when you place a controllable Effect parameter in the Set it will show as an abbreviation like "EfSpCtl" - if it is not controllable you will see something like "INS2-P15" Insertion Effect 2 parameter 15 (you would not change mic angle in real time, obviously).

-Control Set 2 has the Assignable Knob1 (actually KN3) controlling the ELEMENT LEVEL of Elements 3 and 4. As you turn Knob 3 clockwise from 12 o'clock you increase the output of elements 3 and 4.

-Control Set 3 (SF2) has the same knob turning down Element 1 (Depth = -50) as you turn clockwise from 12 o'clock.

-Control set 4 has a HPF (high pass filter) meaning it will block the lows from all four elements as you turn AS2 (Knob 4) clockwise from 12 o'clock.

explore! When you are looking at the EFFECT/CONNECT page you can drop in to Edit the INS2 eff by pressing SF3 INS2. When in the INS effect use the cursor left and right to navigate between edit pages."

Something else you can do in the Control Set is change the operation of the Leslie Simm from the ModWheel to an external pedal. There is an "assignable" input for a second pedal on the back of the ES and you can set it up to operate the Leslie SIMM with the pedal instead of using your left hand. You can change from the Mod Wheel to the pedal in the selection of controllers in the Control Set. You have to save these setting with each voice you make this change too, its not a global setting.

Enjoy.

Mike T.

Wow, Mike! Thanks for the detailed instructions. This is a complex board! So much to learn.

Some more questions...

1) When I turn on the board, I get a message that it is "now scanning auto-load files". From reading the manual, it looks to me like that means it is checking the USB/Smart Card. I don't have the keyboard connected to USB or Smart Card at all. Why am I getting this message?

2) If I do install RAM, and some libraries that require it, will that increase the amount of time it takes the board to boot up, will it take time only if I select a sound using samples in RAM, or not add any more time at all?

3)

How does this work? Do I need to install the programs I'm using on the Smart Card?

Thanks!

If you install RAM and plan to use samples, these samples have to be loaded each time you boot up the Motif. This can take a few minutes. Otherwise every voice using these samples won't work. Of course the preset voices are not affected by that.

Concerning the patch change and SM card comment:

The performance mode on the Motif series only allows the use of four parts simultaneously. Switching between performances or voices results in cutting off the sound.

But there's an alternative to using the performance mode: song/pattern mode. In these modes, up to 16 channels can be split or layered at the same time and it's possible to switch between channels (while holding the sustain pedal) without cutting off the sound.

Even better: you can edit voices directly in these modes and save them into the mixing of each song/pattern - without sacrificing user voices!

The only problem: song/pattern data is stored in volatile memory and has to be loaded from a SM-card or USB-stick everytime the Motif is booted. However, loading these data takes a lot less time than loading large amounts of samples....

There's a vast amount of information and help to be found at www.motifator.com

I just got the Vintage Keys voice library from them ($35), and couldn't be happier. Requires additional sample RAM, but it's well worth it. Go here.. http://www.motifator.com/mart/mainframe.htm

Binkey:

Don't be concerned about the KB checking for auto load files. That's a normal part of its boot sequence. You can choose to have the KB load the factory demo songs or choose not too. The original owner chose not to have them load, as I did, so no biggie. If you want to hear the demos, which are a very good example of some of the results you can get from your Motif, there is a section in the owners manual that tells you how to load them.

I don't know what MCRpro is talking about on the Smart Media card and holding down the sustain pedal?

The only thing you really need a Smart Media Card for is installing a new version of the OS. The Motif ES has a boot sequence that you use to install a newer version with a sequence of key presses when you power on. Then you can proceed to follow the screen prompt and install the new version. This is a flash memory install, so it will wipe your old version and install a new version of the OS. So be sure to follow the directions explicitly. Other than that, you can use USB Flash Drives to store/load anything you want to the Motif. That's all I use now.

As I mentioned previously, I loaded some factory sounds that were on the original Motif from the CD's I got with my Motif ES when I bought it. I tried different voices that were on the CD to see if I wanted to keep any of them in my User Banks. I found a few that weren't similar to what was already resident on the ES. I saved them to User locations, and then stored these voices using "All Voice". Now when I boot up my Motif ES8, the first thing I do is load up my voices. It really doesn't take all that long, Just keep in mind that some voice libraries are pretty big (like some that are on Motifator.com) so if you load up a huge piano sample that is not resident in your Motif''s ROM, it will take some time. Personally, I think the FULL Grand piano sound is very good, and i use that most of the time. I also use the Brite piano sound, but I edited it. There is a four band EQ setting for each voice, so I pushed up the low end on the Preset (there's a Brite Grand in the User banks too) and saved the changes I made. Personal taste. You will want to get through all your presets and compare them to the user voices that come with the instrument. You might want to save the current User Voices you have to a USB drive, and then when you go through the User voices and give them a listen, make a note of what voices you have no use for. Then when you decide to edit a Voice, you have somewhere to store them. You can't overwrite factory presets.

You CAN have as many sets of user voices as you like. Just be sure to use a method of naming you user sets so you know what they are. Keep in mind that you CAN load individual User voices too. You don't have to load complete sets. So if you accidentally overwrite a voice you want, you can load it back up, no biggie.

The Motif Series is a very DEEP board. You can do a lot with it. But you must be patient, it takes time to master. I have mine 4 1/2 years and it has returned my efforts in $$$ from gigs. I pulled my hair out with this thing in the beginning, because I was expecting instant results when I started doing sequencing, learning how to use the sampler and saving samples into my sequences, and setting up Master Mode. Yep, it take time, but it is well worth it. I've gotten more than my money's worth out of this board, and it has been 100% reliable. I move it around in a flight case, and I'm careful with it. I expect years of more service from it, so I handle it with care. Good luck with new ES7, you got a great buy on it.

Mike T.

Now I need to find the time to learn Yamaha's language.

You need an hour with no distractions to get to grips with basic operation, if that Yamaha kit isn't nearly as cryptic as everyone seems to think, and I don't think I ever had to refer to the manual when I used an ES7. Although I didn't use the sampling function, which I probably would have needed help with.

I have an S90ES with the Vl expansion and breath controller and I love it. But it's not for everyone. If you spend the time developing your voice on it, it can be remarkable. Here's David Sancious playing the original Motif with VL (VL is added in at 3.09). It's quite a synth. Enjoy!

Jerry

[YOUTUBE]RByaN8w5mso[/YOUTUBE]

Quote by JEZ:

"You need an hour with no distractions to get to grips with basic operation, if that Yamaha kit isn't nearly as cryptic as everyone seems to think, and I don't think I ever had to refer to the manual when I used an ES7. Although I didn't use the sampling function, which I probably would have needed help with."

It might be that you have more experience with workstations than I had when I got the ES8. One of the inherent drawbacks of the ES series is the small screen. That made Yamaha use a lot of abbreviations in the control and FX section. The XS series has a nice color screen that is somewhat larger than the ES, but I haven't worked with that synth enough to know if the synth is a lot easier to get a handle on than the ES. I didn't have much trouble getting a handle on the "basic" operation, Voice mode, Performance mode, and Master Mode, although setting up external devices and other programing features of MM is somewhat convoluted. Making the most use of the sequencer and adding samples to your songs takes some practice. Getting the most out of the sequencer memory requires that you strip Control Codes, Pitch and mode wheel values from tracks that do nothing but take up space, editing presets while in song mode and remembering to SAVE your changes with each song, as well as working samples into your songs all build on your capability using this synth more to its potential.

All in all, I'm real satisfied with the results I got from it, and will be looking at the new model Yamaha releases after the XS series. Yamaha would like to strip away the sample and possibly the sequencer from newer models, and they want everyone to get on the DAW bandwagon. If they do that, I will keep my ES8 a long, long time. I don't think its necessary to use a computer to create typical rock sequences. i like having one KB that has everything I need built in. Less headaches and more music. If Yamaha goes away from this basic workstation design, that will be one less customer they will have in the future. "Some" of us like to keep things simple.

Mike T.