Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards Connundrum: frustrating search for DP nirvana NEARLY OVER!!!

It has been over a year that I have been searching for a new DP, and I want to thank the many thoughtful contributors who have taken the time to share their experiences and thoughts.

Several times I thought I had found the right DP, and then news of a new one would break, and then another. I was very excited by the development of Roland's SN piano sounds; and several other manufacturers came out with promising hardware: then just as it seemed that the ground was fertile with fine contenders, each one was toppled from its throne.

The Yamaha CP5 seemed not to excite many members of this forum, and left me unfazed when I finally got to try it out. The RD700NX, which I tried last week, didn't excite me, though it is certainly a very useful tool with a great action. I haven't been able to find either a Kawai MP10 or a Nord Piano to try out. (I was in LA 2 weeks ago, London the week before that, and could absolutely kick myself for not making the time to visit a couple of music shops).

The Kawai sounds interesting but I haven't been able to find one to test; and I've really enjoyed the samples that folks from this forum have posted of the Nord Piano (thanks for that). Now it appears that there are issues with all of these boards (except the CP5): keyboard inconsistency on the Kawai, cut off notes on the RD, and keyboard longevity issues on the Nord. Thanks, Zac for keeping us posted about yours - I am very keen to know what Nord does for you about this. It would also be great to know if any other Nord Piano owners have this experience.

At this point, I'm too confused to think, so I'm asking members of the pianoworld community for your thoughts on these issues.

Many thanks for your input,
Jonathan

You will not likely find a perfect digital paino. They all have flaws no matter what brand you look at or how much money you spend. The same can be said about an acoustic piano. All pianos whether digital or acoustic will require maintenance on the action. Some sooner, some later. Therefore, it is important to realize that perfection is subjective. What's right for one won't be right for another. Where digital pianos are concerned perfection is usually a compromise.

I am in a similar situation. Coming from the internet industry in which amazing things happen every day, I am disappointed that all the new technologies did not translate into solid advancement of DPs. The latest Yamahas and Rolands did not meet my expectations. The Kawai MP sounds interesting but with their poor distribution I haven't been able to try one.

Perhaps you will not find a perfect piano at your price range, have you looked at the V-Piano or Yamaha Avant Grand? I believe at a higher price range there's enough resources to do the action properly and implement the acoustics similar to real pianos.

I recently got the Nord Piano as I am looking for portability and good sound, so the Nord worked for me.

Thanks for your responses, guys.

James, are you enjoying your Nord as much as Zach seems to enjoy his? And what of the action?
I really appreciated the connection between the action of the V and the sound more than in any other piano I've tried. Liked the Avant Grand action, but didn't feel the same connection between keyboard and sound as with the V-piano. They're both out of my price range, unfortunately.

Galaxy, I used the word 'nirvana' because with all the hype over the recent new arrivals, I was expecting to get a bit more excited. I wasn't really expecting perfection

What's nirvana to one is something else to another, as the great Gautama would say .

After extensive auditions, I settled on the V-Piano, which I've been playing now for over a year, and love it more than ever (especially since I don't have to fiddle with its dials and knobs anymore). But though it's miles better than all other DPs and most of the uprights (and some grands) I've had to endure over the past decades, it's definitely still not perfection in any way. It doesn't give me the spine-tingling experience of presiding over a 9 1/2 ft Bösendorfer Imperial (costing 35 times as much...), but until I become a millionnaire and can afford one (and a mansion to put it in), the V-Piano will do nicely.

I find it helpful to write down in order of priority what your needs are in looking for a DP. Some people can't do without lots of gizmos and knobs and dials; others just want an instrument with great sound to play on. Nirvana will be different to those groups.

10fingers, you know, you can buy a piano you like best from all the ones you've played and then turn around and sell it in three years and buy something new and perhaps better. In another three years you simply repeat the process.

I don't have a love affair with my pianos, I play them and when the time is right, sell them and buy something newer and better.

Isn't that the definition of a love affair?

James
x

I've played just about all the contenders. My personal preference is that the Roland FP-7F feels the best to play, the Bosendorfer ("Grand Imperial") sample in the Nord is the best sounding. But so much of this is personal preference, you really need to determine what feels and sounds best to you.

Here's one more wrinkle, though. I prefer the Nord Stage 2 as the vehicle of choice for that piano sample, because of its "long release" option. If you can get by with 73 keys, the new Electro 3 HP (which I haven't tried yet) also has long release, though it can't make use of the very best version of the Bosendorfer sample (with the full resonance features and the greatest number of samples). The Nord Piano does support all the functionality of the best sample, but doesn't have the long release control. And the tricky thing about trying these out in a store is that the display models probably don't have the best samples loaded into them! That said, you can tell a lot from what they do have, with whatever version of Grand Imperial is in them. But on the NE3-HP and Stage 2, do check the front panel and try it with and without the Long Release to see the difference.

bennevis what is your speaker setup for the V-Piano?

I am lucky to know a prolific producer in Hong Kong. His works has piano parts from the Nord Stage EX and his chart toppers / piano riffs keep playing on Hong Kong radio/TV every day. He is also the producer of some tracks for my band's 2 albums, so how happy I am and how convenient it is to have the same piano sound in such portable format.

The current wave of modeled pianos (Roland SN and Yamaha CP5) are in my opinion taking a step backwards. Perhaps modeling is the long term solution, but the current modeling implementation cannot beat a good set of samples. I am a fan of Yamaha because of its overall keyboard action but the latest S90XS and CP's did not impress me. And I am puzzled why the RD700NX sounded horrible (boxy) when I auditioned it on a Roland KC 550 amp in the music store. On headphones the sound was too resonant and busy.

The Nord action on its own is not anything to rave about, but it connects to the sound well and I am quickly adjusted to it (I expect every hardware DP to have good key-sound connection anyways) I just hope the keys won't break on me. Perhaps the NP88 action does lack ppp, that's ok playing on stage and with a band. In the studio you may edit the midi to get to ppp. To be honest, modern music production has very little dynamic range so the NP88 is not a problem here.

I must say that when you first try the RD700NX action it does have a high quality and genuine feel. Roland needs to put more work into it in order to translate that into better sound and overall playing experience. And I do hope the NP88 comes with a Yamaha action, but the NP88 action in itself does not have anything jarring that takes away from the overall enjoyable playing experience.

I don't have speakers for my V-Piano: I use headphones (AKG K271 MkII) exclusively, because I am boxed in by neighbors 270 deg horizontally (and vertically) in my small apartment.

When I auditioned the DPs in various showrooms, I quickly discovered that some DPs with built-in speakers sounded cr*p on headphones, and also vice versa; so I never trusted any speaker set-up that dealers attached to the slab/stage DPs. And indeed, if I'd only heard the V-Piano through my dealer's speaker system, I probably wouldn't have ended up buying it - there was obvious distortion when I laid in with my full power (he probably didn't expect any customer to play Rachmaninoff on his DPs... ).

Roland's KC amps generally sound pretty poor.

I haven't played the RD700NX, but I did play the FP-7N which I think has a similar (perhaps identical?) action and piano sound... and I also found it buzzy with headphones.

Thanks for your thoughts, guys. The time I spent with the RD700NX it was hooked up to a KC880 (which I had previously liked), and which had sounded good with a V-Piano. It seems that I should go back with my headphones and give the RD another chance.

10fingers,

I know it's frustrating trying to find the perfect DP, but unfortunately there isn't one, only a best set of compromises. My ultimate DP would be my NP88 with either the PHA III Ivory Feel of the Roland, RM3 Wooden Keys of the Kawai, or NW Stage of the Yamaha inside. I have to say I've become utterly spoiled with my NP88's level of flexibility and diversity of sounds. Plus the sounds are just killer. From the Bosendorfer to the C7 grands, to the Petrof and Schimmel uprights, to the killer selection of EPs. If you haven't played the NP88, definitely make an effort to.

As for my action, Nord is replacing the entire key bed. Their customer service is FIRST CLASS. I've been very impressed with our U.S. tech support guy for Nord, Pablo Mastodon. He's prompt, polite, and really cares about getting the job done. Nord actually awarded him and his company an Achievement Award.

Thanks for your thoughts Zachary: it has been largely your posts and the many fine recordings that have me interested in the Nord (you should be on commission)

Great news about Nord's response to your action issues - I'm keen to know whether it turns out this was just an anomaly, or what? The Fatar 1100 I once owned was undistinguished in its performance, but reliable for the several years I abused it.

Anyhow I will not buy another DP until I have checked out the Nord. I'm not looking for perfection, (though I wouldn't refuse it if it came along) - it's mostly the connection between key and sound that makes such a difference to me.

Can I quote you and send it to Nord!? It's my pleasure helping out in any way I can. I had a lot of help from other forum members here when I was looking at the NP88. I think the Nord is a unique instrument in that it's sum is much greater than its parts. Although the action isn't as good as the Roland, Yamaha, Kawai DPs, it connects every bit as well and because of the splendid sounds plus dynamic pedal and string resonance modeling, the NP88 feels like am organic piece of gear. It certainly has its weaknesses, but the positive:negative ratio is probably 20:1. I won't be parting from my NP88 anytime soon. I look forward to your thoughts after you get a chance to play one.

Zach, I had almost given up on finding an MP10 to try out, but after your latest post about the CA93/MP6 I'll just have to make it happen. How would you compare the MP6 with the NP88? And have you played the CA63?

So today I bit the bullet and spent over an hour on each of the CP5 and the RD700NX today, this time with my own headphones, and liked them both considerably more than the last time I investigated them through the store's sound system. The CP5's headphone preamp was not able to drive my cans to my preferred volume (something comparable to playing a real piano), so it was a slightly uneven contest.

I was much more impressed with the CP5 than on my first outing. The cans provided a far better sound than the (cheap) monitors the store was using. Whilst the action was light, I still found it very playable, and easy to get the nuance I sought. The operating system drove me bonkers, but obviously you would read the manual if you bought it. Intuitive it wasn't! It may sound silly, but I liked having the sequencer on board - it makes it so simple to record something, rather than firing up the computer. Unfortunately, whist I liked the AP sounds, it just wasn't loud enough in my cans to really listen to in depth, especially the lower velocity layers.

The RD700NX was infinitely improved through the headphones, compared to the amp it was put through last time I auditioned it. Why shops would even bother to set up a flagship DP these days with a mono speaker system beats me. Anyhow, I liked it a lot. Pianos were warm or not, as I chose. I spent more time tinkering with the parameters, and found the way the sympathetic resonance was implemented to be a little unnatural. But it seemed that with some effort one could figure out a great sound. Also, nice to have all the other sounds to play around with (don't you love the scat singing voices?). The other thing is, I realized that the action is very important to me, and the action of the RD is really excellent. It needs a more positive touch than the Yamaha, but that is better for my technique.

I would like to have tried out the competition, but as Dave Horne said, I can always sell up in a couple of years if I ever get my hands on either an MP10 or an NP and fall in love.

Now I'm just wondering whether the FP7-F has as much ability to change parameters as the RD - does anyone here know?

Almost certainly not. For one thing, they are really aimed at two different markets. For another, V-Piano aside, Roland view the NX as basically the flagship of the stage piano range (certainly the one that will see most high-end pro and backline sales) so will protect it as such, feature-wise.