- In What Country was it made? (USA, Japan, Mexico, France...)
Taiwan.

- How many frets, Pickup Type and Configuration?
24 frets, 2 active humbucker pickups.

- What are the setting controls (volume, tone, pickup selector position)?
1 volume, 1 pickup balance, bass, treble.
All except the volume have a middle setting that you can actually feel very easily.

- What type of neck?...
It's a 5 string so the neck is quite wide, and i have little bass experience so it's hard to tell, but it seems nice enough to me! ;-)

- Does the neck have a nice feel?
Yep!

- Easy access to the top notes (last frets)?
Yes, in fact it is, but do you really want to do that??

- Is it's design ergonomic(in terms of the shape, weight...)?
It's a heavy beast and it's a bit unbalanced, which is not so nice when playing sitting down...it leans toward the head of the neck... :-/

- Can one easily get a nice sound?...
Yes!

- Does it suit your style of music?
Yes. But beware that unless you EQ it this bass sounds very "slappy", metallic & 80's style. Say Billy Idol on White Wedding, but more slappy.
The EQ is powerful and both pickups sound very different so you can tune your sound to get something quite different, don't worry.

- With what amp(s) or effect(s) do you use it?
I don't have an amp anymore, i go direct via a tube preamp or preamp-compressor and it sounds great.

Manual: http://www2.yamaha.co.jp/manual/pdf/emi/english/port/PSR90E.pdf

- What type of keyboard (synth, piano...)? How many octaves?
This is a 5 octave electronic keyboard, not a synth nor a piano. Not even close.
The touch is like most synths: ok, but no dynamic touch or after touch here. This is an extremely basic machine with crap sounds and it was probably extremely overpriced when it came out around 1982. However, if you stick it through some good effects, i'm sure you can use it quite adequately.

- What connection types are there? (audio, MIDI...)?
RCA stereo out, some sort of effects loops out & in (still stereo RCA) but i've never used that...MIDI in & out...exp pedal and footswith. Power is a separate adaptor.
The keyboard comes with a plastic & metal stand that fits on it and lets you have sheet music to read while you're playing, as seen on the photo here. You can take this off.

- How many different sounds and/or styles available? Can they be edited?
Not a lot. Check the manual but we're talking about 24-36 here.
You can't edit the sounds other than add chorus, reverb, portamento.

The rhythms are the only reason one would want to buy this, along with the fact that this is a very simple drum machine with some fairly decent sounds, surprisingly enough.
The rhythms are cheesy & fun, it's great, you can have a looot of fun with this. Plug it into an expander (i used my Roland GR-30 MIDI guitar expander with no probs) and you can actually have a good time, but i'm not sure you can do much with this thing apart from that.

- Is there an effects section?
Nope

- What are the features/characteristics of the sequencer?
4 tracks, you can save to cartridge if you find any on the second hand market (good luck) or to cassette or minidisc. Those of you who have had a Sinclair ZX Spectrum or a Commodore 64 will know what it's like.

- Is the general configuration/setup simple?
Oh yeah!

- Is the sound or effects editing easy?
The what?

- Is the manual clear and sufficient?...
Yep.

Made in Japan, 22 frets (no fret markers...just side dots. Nice look!), maple neck, rosewood fretboard. Proprietary Yamaha piezo tremolo.. very smooth with great tone. A mix between an AM Strat and Wilkinson trem. Blend controls as well as tone and volume. Flamed maple top on alder body. Sweet. Sperzel locking tuners. Seymour Duncan JB and 59' pickups stock. Sculpted bolt on neck heel. I don't know what else you could ask of a normal electric guitar.

Neck feels GREAT. Very playable... playability of an Ibanez, with a bit more slight "C" shape profile. Love it. Great neck heel...easy,easy access to upper registers. Body weight is less than my Strat. Very manageable.

Heavy music is what I play in general, but I do like playing blues,funk,acoustic... this guitar can pull it all off. Smoking incendiary tones are where it excels, however. Nice balanced hi gain when I run it through my Voodoo Labs Preamp... with a Digitech GSP2101 running effects and parametric e.q., and a Keeley TS9 in front.. I get some decent proximity of Eric Johnson's early tones... (back when he wanted to rip and played with distortion).. fuzzy, but focused.. with a singing roundness to my notes. Honest.. this was the last guitar I expected to pull off that type of tone.
My favorite tones are thru the JB with high gain. Very rewarding.. the 59' is a bit muddy and unfocused..not crazy about it, but it is decent for soloing as well if I need a flubby Yngwie-ish tone. The piezo is great for cleans, chicken' picken' and live approximations of acoustic stuff. I am thinking of throwing in a new neck pickup.. but the JB in the bridge STAYS.

I have owned this set for about four years and I can say without a doubt that this is one of the best drum sets ever made. If you're looking for a fat, huge sound, the Yamaha Maple Customs are the way to go.

First big plus- the snare drum. When tuned just right this drum gets that disgusting snap reminiscent of Sting era Vinnie Colaiuta. This may be due to the 7ply x 7mm. Construction- versus most 6ply x 6mm. Shells.

The Bass drum sound is extremely fat. It features a 10 ply 10mm. Maple shells. This is really amazing when you compare it to the industry standard of 7ply 7mm. Shells. At 10x10mm. The maple custom comes up with 100mm of shell versus everyone else's 49mm (7x7mm.) shells- You're literally getting just over twice as much drum. All this makes for a seriously unbelievable sound but brings these drums only true drawback- they're freakin heavy! If you're looking for a set to throw around town this is not it- a 22 inch bass drum in a hard case will pretty much kill your back as I can attest to. (If you've got to case them up and throw them around- for the bass get a hard case with no foam padding and a soft case. Put the drum in the soft case to throw around town and then put the soft case in the hard case for tours and such).

One thing I'd like to say about these drums is that they sound very different from the 'Maple Custom Absolutes.' I have a friend with the same drums in the 'Absolute' series and they don't resonate as well. The biggest difference is the snare drum- I even borrowed his for a week to see if I could get the same sound as my snare drum and I just couldn't get it. His drum was a little darker and just didn't have the same synergistic pop through the whole drum that I get with the 'Male Custom' snare (14x5.5). Its not a HUGE difference, but in my opinion if you're going to invest in a set of drums at this high end, go all out and get the sound you're looking for, otherwise you'll be left with yet another drum that ALMOST gets the sound you're looking for but not quite.

Another great feature of these drums is that they're REALLY loud. I frequently play these drums behind a very loud, highly amplified, special event party band. I play without micing them and I never have any problem playing over the group.

These drums also retain they're tunings remarkably well (even after I play with the aforementioned group!). I very rarely have to re-tune because my drums pitches have dropped. The snare drum is especially good about this- I almost never have to touch it unless I just want a different sound.

I have a 16x16 floor tom I've converted to a bass drum on this kit to play in jazz situations instead of the 22x16 and it sounds okay. These drums are much better suited (in my opinion) towards getting good rock and roll/funk/r&b sounds and volume level than acoustic jazz situations (piano trio, etc.). Honestly they just ring too long and have too bright a sound. Not a bad jazz set- but they really aren't optimum in my opinion.

These drums are expensive, but in my eyes are the TOP of the line, rivaled only by the Yamaha Recording Custom drums, and are well worth every penny.