Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards casio privia digital piano 3 pedals and midi question

1) is the 3 pedal connector on the casio privia digital pianos proprietary? is there such thing as a generic pedal set that can be connected to any digital piano?

2) if i get the casio px-150, will i need a usb to midi cable like this: http://www.m-audio.ca/products/en_us/Uno.html so i can control pianoteq? or can i just use a regular usb cable (which kind of usb cable?)?

1) Yes proprietary for the 3 pedal unit (SP-33), the single pedal connects using a separate non-proprietary 1/4" jack but the polarity is different for a Casio. There are generic single pedal units that have switchable polarities:

M Audio

On-Stage

2) No a standard USB printer cable is what you will need.

USB A/B like this (click image):

is having 3 pedals really important? i don't want to be stuck with the casio pedals if i don't like them and want to get better ones. how do other digital pianos do 3 pedals, what plug do they use?

will the 3 pedals work properly in pianoteq?

(Fixed the link)

The SP-33 is the only 3-pedal unit available that will work with the Casio 150/350 as of this time, last I heard at least.

No one makes a generic unit that fits multiple pianos.

The 3-pedal technology may be approached differently between brands? The 3-pedal unit jack on a Casio 150/350 is a rectangular shape. On the Yamaha P95, for instance, it is a circular shape with pins reminiscent of Windows PC keyboard jacks.

As for need, I am only a piano noodler rather than player. I have read that one of the three, sostenuto? is rarely used.

When I get to the point when I need them and the SP-33 is still the only option I will cut it up and mount the pedal part to a slab of metal or wood. I need a different stand and would not be using the SP-33's CS67 stand.

The Casio 3-pedal unit also supports the "half-pedal" feature built into the PX-150/PX-350.

And it's the _only_ way to get that feature - it's not available through the rear-panel "pedal" jacks.

The question of Pianoteq support remains open. I'd _expect_ that the Casio pedals would deliver a MIDI signal, and that Pianoteq would pick it up. But that's supposition .. .

. Charles

The single pedal supports Damper or Soft/Sostenuto.

There are two 1/4" jacks for a single pedal unit, each having unique functions.

Single Pedal Functions:

1. Damper (separate jack)
2. Soft or 3. Sostenuto (separate jack)
Note: the soft/sostenuto jack is shared and you can use only one of the two functions assigned to that jack.

You can buy a 2nd single pedal unit (Casio SP-3, M-Audio or On-Stage) to use both of the 1/4" jacks and their designated functions simultaneously.


As Charles mentioned the Sp-33 3 pedal unit adds half-pedal.

You will only need one pedal in all likelihood. The soft pedal (leftmost) is used for nuances in phrases in classical music and/or accompanying, and most likely not very necessary on a digital. The sostenuto pedal (middle one) is only called for in a few particular classical pieces, or for a special effect of sustaining only one note while the rest remain dampened. I doubt you will ever miss having the other two.

There's basically no chance this doesn't work. It works on all digital pianos including the predecessors of the current Casio models, so I'd be shocked to my foundation if it did not work correctly with the current models.

Regarding sotenuto, I think Ampy and Moro are right. The sostenuto pedal on every piano I've ever played is completely shiny and brand new and I've never personally used it. There are indeed a few pieces that require it to play at a performance level, but I just don't play those pieces or at that level, and I have been playing and performing (not for money, though) for many years. I personally use the soft pedal seldom or never as well.

I was just looking at this yesterday. According to the midi implementation for the px-150 , it only supports three values on the sustain pedal: off, medium, and on (0, 64,127), whereas the px-350 supports continuous values (0 thru 127).

Someone else will have to discuss whether that really matters, I'm new at all this.

tom

What does this mean? In practice?

That the PX150 has off, half and full?

While the PX350 sustain pedal has a potential up to 127 different pedal positions?

Not so much that it "has" them, but that this is what it sends out as MIDI data. AFAIK, it's the exact same pedal, so the pedal itself can generate continuous values. Although now I'm wondering if the 150 operates differently than the 350 when using the sustain with the built-in instruments.

More generally, how many piano simulations use these pedal values in their simulation? All of them? None of them? Only mid-range and above? Only high-end stuff?

tom

I was wrong about the pedals that come with it, which are apparently just on/off switches. Only the optional SP-33 allows half-pedal. It's not clear from the manuals if it's really continuous or just three values. The 350 has an option for setting the half-pedal effect that makes me think it's only three values for both, but the 350 lets you change the middle value.

Can someone confirm any of this?

That's the first time I've heard of a piano that has three MIDI levels for the pedal. As far as I know all the VST's only have three pedal settings, so probably there's nothing lost and I probably wouldn't have even noticed if my piano did put out three levels only. Sampled VST's have a layer with pedal up, down, and half, so three MIDI levels is sufficient. I'm not sure why Casio would do the 150 and 350 differently.

The sustain on digitals isn't the same as acoustic anyways, so there's hardly a need for less than full on - you'd hardly notice it missing. On an acoustic, of course, you would. But for most people on/off is sufficient.

would be nice if someone owing the PX-350 and the SP-33 pedal unit can confirm if the sustain is gradual or just ON, HALF,OFF.

Excellent point, though I would point out that it's piano dependent. Probably the #1 reason I like software pianos but can't tolerate most hardware pianos is that the latter tends not to have realistic sustain and it affects the way I play. Software pianos have nice long decays so you are less likely to forget to clear the pedal.

The PX-350 manual is pretty clear (see Function 8-6, "Half Pedal Effect), pg. E-46:

. . . dampers are ON, HALF, or OFF;

. . . You get to specify _how much damping_ "HALF" means,
. . . through a Function menu.

It makes a lot of sense to have a damper pedal with two switch contacts:

. . . One is closed when the pedal is half-depressed or lower,
. . . One is closed when the pedal is fully down.

If only M-Audio would find the market large enough to cater to it . . . <G>

. Charles

I have an older Casio Privia- the PX-120. I've connected three M-Audio pedals to it that have worked reliably for several years. The details can be seen here:

http://www.joflaherty.org/PianoPedal/Pedals.pdf

On the PX-120, the pedals affect the sounds from the piano itself, and they also send out the appropriate midi commands to a software piano, which I use exclusively.

The PX-120 may not have the same connector or operate exactly the same as the PX-150, or it may. FWIW.

how important is half pedaling? is it really true that to get half pedaling you have to use the plastic 3-pedal setup from casio? i cannot buy another brand (higher quality) single pedal and plug it in and get the half pedal effect? (not to mention the included single pedal that comes with casio pianos looks like a crappy junker, has anyone told the casio rep on this forum yet, i forget his user name).

WIthout half-pedal, when a song ends (with the pedal down), you can either chop the sustain off abruptly or hold the pedal down and let it slowly fade out for however long the piano decides that should take.

On a real piano, you can smoothly release the pedal to dampen the sound as gradually as you like.

I have no idea how often this is used in real life.

The half damper that is offered is not continuous, but only one single intermediate value. On the 150, it is a fixed value. On the 350, you can adjust what that single value is but it is still just one value. So the half-damper pedal on the Casios is essentially a three position switch instead of a two position switch. I don't know if anyone offers a true continuous damper pedal.

I did notice that on our PX350, when you press the pedal, it simulates the subtle sound of the strings being rapidly released from the dampers (I only noticed it with headphones on). I don't have the half-pedal, so I don't know if using it alters this simulation at all.

tom