Groove Box Or (other) Recommendations?, D2 / ES-1 / AN-200 / rubber bands / etc Options

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I'm looking to expand my HARDWARE options for expanding my synth/rhythm/sampling experimentation. I guess I'd liken the style I'm getting into to Radiohead or Tortoise or something (mixing electronic and "acoustic" instrumentation).

I've played quite a bit with REASON, but I still prefer the off-the-cuff feel of hardware. I've been looking for a relatively cheap price range of $200-$400 at things like Korg's EM-1 & ES-1, Yamaha's AN-200 and Roland's D2.

Can anyone recommend one of these or another device that's a good box to really tweak up sounds with? Ideally, I'd love an audio input. And at the end of the day, i don't want something tweakable enough so that the sounds are nothing like the audio presets they began with. Basically, I want to have the flexibility to REALLY alter what comes in the box.

It's a tall order, but any help or opinions on the above devices would be helpful. Maybe there's just a realy great combo that I'm missing... like a synth module + outboard effects box.