WestHarp

The Nord Stage 3 Compact ist great - and I have no problem playing piano on its action. But: it seems that the release of a new model (Stage 4 or Stage 3 EX) is imminent...here in Europe no dealer has any NS3s in stock and the NS3 88 is "discontinued" at Thomann...

Hello Eric, I have a MODX 6 for exactly the same use case. Because the sound engine and capabilities are almost identical to the Montage, the MODX was the better (= cheaper) choice for me. The build quality ist more plasticy but fine enough. The keybed is worse than the FSX action of the "bigger brothers", but it's definitively playable. I wouldn't bother buying a Motif XS oder XF - the Montage/MODX has way more waveform ROM (and preset patches) and arpeggiagor phrases and the user interface is much better due to the touchscreen.

All A/D-converters in audio interfaces use crystal clocks to determine the sample rates. But: due to tolerances, these are not always in sync. 44,1k is not always EXACTLY 44,1k. Therefore, it's possible that one of your friend's DAW recorded e.g. 44007 samples per second and someone else's DAW 44201. Your DAW uses the same sample rate for playback of all files - therefore all tracks are slightly different in length. That's why there's drift. And that's the reason why "master clock generators" exist to sync different digital devices to the exact same sample rate...