This is the Korg OASYS. This is a revolutionary piece of a really mean keyboard set to take over the world of professional workstations. I’d learnt about it from Jordan Rudess’s website. He’d played it at the Winter NAMM 2005. For those of you who know who Jordan is, please skip to the next paragraph. Jordan Rudess plays keyboard for Dream Theater, one of the best progressive metal bands. He dropped out from Julliard (a proper Classical Music school), while learning to play the piano (of course!), experimented with synthesizers and became THE respected keyboardist in the history of Progressive Metal/Rock. (The only other keyboardist I can think of is Derek Sherinian, who, incidentally, was also a part of Dream Theater ) [OK, I love Dream Theater, so what? ]
I call this keyboard mean only because the other keyboards in the market don’t stand a chance. The acronym OASYS stands for Open Architecture Synthesis Studio. Korg says it took 10 years to create this beauty. For the first time in the history of keyboards, the OASYS is functionally limited only by it’s hardware interface and the speed of the processor. What do I mean? Simple. The entire implementation of the OASYS is through software! There you go, simple enough, isn’t it? Built with 616 MB of on board memory, one CD drive (can burn CD’s as well), support for SD memory, and 4 USB drives (with plug and play), who could ask for more? New sound module installation? Simple, just insert a CD and install it from there.
Now, let me get to the description. I’ll start from the left hand side. As one can see, there is the CD drive with the tray ejected. Then comes the programmable Ribbon, which is the tiny black strip you see just above the tray. Touch sensitive, and easy to use. (Oh yeah, I saw the introductory videos on NAMM, available KORG’s website) Above that is the familiar Korg’s 4 way joystick. X for pitch and Y for Modulation. Again, completely programmable. The two buttons above that can be used for anything!
The blue stick is the Vector Joystick. I believe it glows. No big deal. What is surprising is that each position can be used for some specific task. For example, you pull it towards yourself and you have a split mode! That easy. Then comes the Karma (actually, it is called Karma2)implementation on the OASYS. Gives you complete Karma and more. Offers eight real time scenes, knobs and drawbars for real time control. Did I mention that the large screen on the keyboard is actually a touch response screen? Oh, and by the way, you could control the knobs, scenes and the drawbars using the screen too. The black pads just below the screen are touch sensitive too. They can trigger drum patterns based on the impact level. Plus the regular stuff on the right side of the screen.
I won’t go much into the technical stuff but if you’re interested, here are a few links that you could check out.
Manufacturer’s link – Korg OASYS
Sonic State
Harmony Central
Sweetwater

The 76 Key version costs a cool US$ 8000 and the 88 Key version is priced at US$ 8499.
I wish someone would gift me either of the two for my birthday.
BTW, if anyone has links to photos/videos of Jordan performing on the OASYS with Dream Theater, please leave a comment with the link.