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I see relevant differences. The distance to the pivot point is only one parameter of a lot of other important parameters of a keyboard action. In the RM3, the pivot is not "fixed", it is just "laying freely", like in a real acoustic piano. So if you hit the key, the key can almost "jump" a little bit out of his keyboard bed (hope the word I use are correct). This is not possible with PHAIII. Furtermore I can almost "see" the thumping effect on the PHAIII action, because of the missing continuation of the key after the pivot point, etc. etc. But as I said: You have to test this for yourself, picture don't help in this respect whether you like an action or not.

Exactly right. Discussion of these various technical details is all interesting on an academic level, and may prompt some of us to actually want to try some of these models ourselves, and may ultimately explain why some of us prefer certain designs. But in terms of deciding what to purchase, it's not very relevant. What matters is, which one(s) you go over to, start to play, and say "ahhhhh." Regardless of which combination of technologies they use to get there.

NO, I never did accuse you of lying!!!! I said I have to correct you, because I though you were wrong!! That's a big difference! I had no problem with this specific part of your post! It was about the other stuff you posted.



They are longer than every other digital piano action (except for... you know). Full stop.


Like any other DP.

proof?

Proof? Compared to what? Sound depends on individual taste.

Proof???

Proof??

I'm sorry, but your statements are nothing like a big Kawai bashing. It's like a small kid yelling to get it's way all over again, but this is not helping us if it's true or not.

Some time ago you told us you would like to test a CA63 / CA93 in a store soon. What's about that? Don't tell us theory after looking at pictures or specs, get your own experience and then tell us what you like and what you don't like.

https://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubb...%20%22Official%22%20%20.html#Post1528568

Sorry, amusing but wrong post, should have been this one:
http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1532856.html#Post1532856

...or this one:
http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1528396.html#Post1528396

Exactly. Therefore your claims that Kawai is equivalent to an acoustic grand piano or superior to other digitals based on having the same length of keys of an acoustic grand is false.

The RM3 on the CA63 doesn't even implement it.
Two is one fewer sensor than three.
Not being an implemented feature and having fewer sensors is pretty good proof that the feature is not implemented and that there are fewer sensors.

And your individual taste has you jury rigging a netbook loaded with Pianoteq to get an acceptable tone. Do you see the hypocrisy? See the DPMSD thread for more details on the objective proof the less organic sounding decay for example.

For just one recent example:
https://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubb...awai%20CA63%20vs%20CA93.html#Post1538520

If you want you can find lots more ever since the CA51 came out.


I did post my initial impressions of playing a CA63 a long time ago. You even responded to them. Do you want me to prove that we had that conversation already as well or do you remember even what you have posted in the past?

Kawai RM3 action is much more equivalent to an acoustic piano than other DP actions. I never said it's identical to to AP action. I never said it's therefore superior. You have to test drive it to find out.



Again, you're only looking at the design and not how the actions feels.



You take whatever you like to get proof of your biased opinion, eh? I would also use a similar combination with both Roland and Yamaha DPs. I even like the sound of Kawai DPs better than Roland SN, but that's personal taste. I stated that several times, but you seem to ignore this (deliberately?).



Same applies to other DPs. See Roland artificial ivory problems, buzz/hiss problems etc. Don't think that Kawai has more quality problems than other manufacturers.



Okay, that's about initial impressions... Any desire to perform a more in-depth test as you stated in one of your recent posts?

Well, I have one comment here because of the current lack of possibilities for objective testing using a Midi-file (as also admitted by Dewster): this was only a basic test of the standard concert grand single voice mode with firmware v1.06, while leaving out all sympathetic resonances, right? That's not what I call a realistic and objective testing environment, especially when making direct comparisons to competitors afterwards. By the way, there's nothing static about a CA93/CA63 in dual voice mode, but we'd better not mention it here, because Pianoteq, Roland and Yamaha cannot follow, right?

About the advanced dual voice mode:
http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1489257.html#Post1489257

I was listening to the MP6 audio demos a couple of days ago (German site I think) and noticed a rather static/flat decay to the final sustained bass note. I was actually grateful that Kawai didn't do the usual manufacturer's trick of only demonstrating with fast/staccato passages. I think this reinforces what people have been saying about where Kawai's sound technology stands in relation to the competition. Having said that, I find the overall tone pleasing. Your opinions?

The basic sound signature seems to be partly comparable to CN33 [PHI] level, so I'm not surprised about your remark on the bass note, but I'd have to do some live tests to confirm. Based on what I've heard so far, i.m.h.o. Kawai could benefit from professional presets development for the MP6, as there seems to be a lot of headroom (e.g. having 4 sound layers at your disposal) and 256-preset space with USB load/save options.

OT: voxpops, you're also very welcome at the CA93/CA63 custom settings thread.

Guess who could possibly be the main contributor to MP6 presets!

This is my action (AWA Grand Pro)


This is the RM3 action:

It seems to me that the distance Front<->Pivot is a little bit larger for the white keys of the AWA Grand Pro.
For the black keys it is of course much smaller.

They wanted to make a smaller cheaper keyboard, in order to build smaller and cheaper pianos. So they made the white keys shorter and the black keys got a shifted pivot.

Now, what does this all mean? IMO it does not mean that the Kawai action is better, because they have the largest Pivot-Keyfront distance. It is much more complicated:
For the white key they have probably the smallest distance, compared to Yamaha and Roland. For the black keys, they have possibly the largest distance.
Unique for the kawai keys is that they have much more mass and therefore capture the hammer-bounce back better and therefore play more smooth and quietly. Mass intertia goes up with keylength. (Of course only if the key has considerable mass)

Of course thats much too complicated for advertising. Therefore they advertise the longest keys, Thats simply wrong and marketing speech. For the white keys they have definitely the shortest keys ;-)

Look to their image of the RM3.

A layman will have a hard time to see wether the left or the right pivot belongs to the white key. It is so unclear.
;-)

Peter

It seems Kawai UPH and Yamaha SCM are both doing essentially the same thing: a longer attack sample coupled to a very short, highly processed loop sample. I welcome the longer attack, but I can't help but feel the the short loop is - regardless of how well it is done - a technological step backwards.

I'll say it again: I can buy an 8 GB Flash drive for $13 USD retail. Can't I at least have 1 GB of samples please? Why this strict adherence to 64 MB (1/16 GB, ~10 cents USD retail) or whatever in most DPs? What gives? When it comes to sampling, size does matter.

Dewster:

I'll say it again: I can buy an 8 GB Flash drive for $13 USD retail. Can't I at least have 1 GB of samples please? Why this strict adherence to 64 MB (1/16 GB, ~10 cents USD retail) or whatever in most DPs? What gives? When it comes to sampling, size does matter.

______________________
My thoughts exactly!

I think the 8 GB drive you're talking about is an SD card or thumb drive, yes? Those are really slow. I don't think they would be useful in a DP, except for storage of different sounds, if you were willing to live with substantial load time for loading different sounds into real RAM when switching sounds.

SD card is slower than hard drive, but has the benefit of small size, no moving parts, no real power requirement. SSD is faster than hard drive, much more expensive... but still not as fast as real memory.

I believe that DPs store their sound in custom ROMs. These are not off-the-shelf parts, so would not be produced in the kinds of price-lowering quantity as off-the-shelf parts.

Alternatively, in theory, getting back to the top of the message, I suppose DPs could store their sounds on SD or SSD, and load them in at startup. That should minimize the need for custom ROM, but would still require a good bunch of RAM and would also involve additional "boot time" for the keyboard. But I admit I'm talking at the edge of my knowledgeability here.

Edge of mine too, but seems worth the extra $80 or $100 retail to use an 8g flash Ram and 8 gig of fast regular RAM, and an extra 10 seconds of startup time to get an immense sample set. Kawai James?

My past DPs were a Roland Fantom G8 and 700SX. I was never quite happy with the action or piano sounds on my Rolands and ended up selling them and buying the Yamaha CP1, which is fantastic. Recently, I auditioned a Shigeru Kawai SK3 and absoultely fell in love with the tone and perfect action. Everyone has their preferences, but for me, the SK3 was piano perfection.

In any case, I am selling my Steinway to get the Shigeru Kawai SK3 and am considering selling my CP1 and picking up the MP10. As amazing as the CP1 is, I'm hoping for a slightly heavier action with the graded action on MP10. Too much practicing on the CP1 is leaving my fingers a little too light. If the pricing on the MP10 is low enough maybe I can keep both.

Even a slow 30 MB/sec thumb would theoretically be able to feed up to 200 simultaneous voices at 48000 Khz / 24 bit. 200 voices seem to be enough.

RAM is several orders of magnitude faster than needed for a DP (in example, being able to dump the ENTIRE bank several times each second).

And if the latency of a thumb is a concern, then implement it as Kontakt: preload the first 60KB (or so) of each sample in RAM (1GB of RAM is not expensive and that is plenty of preload room... for lots of layers).

Maybe for a 80GB sample size a thumb drive would not be enough... but for 'only' 8GB? Numbers say it would work.

Regards!

The interface (USB 2.0, SD) is slow, but the internal Flash is pretty fast, plenty fast to directly support sample playback without RAM buffering. I would guess that most DPs function this way nowadays.

The same flash is used in thumb and SSD drives, they just put more of it in parallel to increase SSD I/O speed. SSDs generally have a more complex wear-leveling controller as well, but wear-leveling isn't really necessary for DP sample playback, as only writes cause Flash wear.

They will never do this.
This would mean they must compete with computer based pianos in cost and quality.

Within the next years these costs and the boot times will decrease. Faster and larger SSD's are expected. They will loose this battle within 10 or 20 years. So they have to concentrate to products that satisfies the today's and tommorow's needs of the average customer that typically doesnt want to fiddle around with computers and software.

I think they do not want to shoot all their powder, because they must have something to offer for next NAMM ;-)

I wonder how the MP10's amp simulations on the electric pianos will compare to the CP1? The EPs on the CP1 are incredible and the signal processing really set them apart from the CP5. Im pretty confident I will prefer the action on the Kawai. If they have a Shigeru EX in there, I know I will love the piano sounds. My only hesitation on pre-ordeing one is not knowing anything about their EPs and the amp modeling they are doing on the MP10.