Back in the fog of college I belonged to a theatre group that sponsored semi-regular open-mics. To facilitate them, they bought a KB-100 keyboard amp and a Roland RD-250 digital piano. Somehow I managed to be the unofficial custodian of both for a full year. The piano was stolen after one of the open-mics. I managed to pick up an RD-300 many years later but I was hearing the samples through rose-tinted headphones, so I sold it quickly.
Later one of my bandmates let me use his RD-500 when I needed to drop on keys. Roland sure got its stuff together by then — it had excellent piano and organ sounds (one of which formed the basis for the feel of one of my tunes). So I set out to buy one, and did, but the moron who sold it to me didn’t pack it worth a damn and the piano was severely damaged. Yay for eVilBay Buyer’s Protection!
By sheer chance, somebody was selling an RD-600 on craigslist, insanely cheaply, so I snagged it in the hope the sample set would be similar/compatible with the RD-500. Alas, no such luck. Excellent sounds in their own right, but that one organ sound is now the stuff of legend….
