Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Buying a digital piano / keyboard

Hello all!

I would like to start learning to play the piano. I do not however, have the room for a grand piano nor the money for it.

After googling for some time i decided to post my question here.

From what I understand, when looking for a digital piano you need to look for some special features that most resemble a -real- piano. Like weighted keys.

I am looking for a (simple) model without the 100 bells and whistles, but that feels as closely as a piano. I saw on amazon that one can purchase a sustain pedal for digital piano's. However, I still have to learn basic piano playing.

If anyone can help me out, I would be very grateful for that!

Thanks in advance,
Liem

Hi Liem and welcome to the forum! You might want to have a look over on the Digital Pianos sub-forum as this question comes up quite often there. In general, nearly any digital with 88 weighted keys should be fine and you will definitely want a sustain pedal even if you are just beginning. You didn't give your price range but a lot of people like the Casio PX-110 (I have one) and it's fairly inexpensive.

Good luck in your search and welcome again.

Hi Liem. Yes you need an 88-key digital piano, with weighted, touch sensitive keys. As BB mentioned above, the Casio range is great for beginners. I also have a PX-110 which I bought secondhand for not a lot of money. You do also need a pedal. The secondhand market is full of keyboards and a Casio Privia should be attainable for around £200 (UKP). Also have a look at Yamaha, which is the other brand favoured by beginners. I would recommend buying secondhand and not spending too much. You can always upgrade in a year or two.

Thank you both! after reading quite some pages in the Digital piano sub-forum, the casio px-130 turns up frequently. Apparently it is the successor to the px-110 since that has been discontinued.

Also, the advise to do a try-out on a second hand sounds logical. Especially since I'm just starting out.
One thing I also read about is the sensitivity of the keys. in the example of the px-130, it says it has three sensors. Is this to derive the speed with witch the keys are pressed? This seems like a very important feature to me, because it enables you to play the same note 'hard' and 'soft'. So this feature is a must, I take it?

With a PC and Pianoteq, and some good powered monitors, you can get any sound out of a digital piano.

No, that's not what three sensors indicate. All but the most basic keyboards are "touch sensitive" (meaning, you hit the keys faster and they will play louder. How good that is is an important factor - my very old digital definitely makes it very hard to control dynamics.

A triple sensor mechanism is there to allow quicker repetition - that is playing the same note quicker two or more times in a row.