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That's what I think as well, I'd like to know what Roland owners think about this as well though.

Probably, but neither of us are going to gain anything by another long post.

It's moot anyway now. I spent a long time looking at Roland's products and their guy just sighed so I went somewhere else

I've not noticed any unwanted sound from the keys on my HP605.

But this, to me, is why it's so illogical.

If I'm going to buy these because I'm actually googling for "physical modelling" and I care about changing these parameters then I'm out of luck. If the message is, as you seem to be implying "these pianos are dumbed down for Roland's customers" then fine - I think that's just insulting their customers though because, as I said, if someone buys a real acoustic piano and they want, say, a mellower sound, they get a piano tuner to come and he or she physically changes their piano. Roland, you're suggesting, would sell this customer a tambourine to avoid them having to make a decision about hammers

I think a pianist who has played a real piano would relate perfectly to many of the parameters you can change in a physically modelled virtual piano.

It's like an arcade racing game might have a slider that says "oversteer" at one end and "understeer" at the other. A better simulation with a physical model would talk about tyre material, tyre pressure, suspension yadda yadda yadda - the end result of changing these parameters would be a car that tended towards oversteer or understeer. But trying to say "Well, car drivers don't really understand these things" is not really true. Most car drivers know what tyres are.

You could argue that it's simpler to move a slider, but I would argue that's just at the expense of actually being able to use the physical model.

The other point I tried to make is , if I'm this supposed naive customer who doesn't care how the sound is made or who doesn't want to sit and change parameters, well, then why only configure 4 piano sounds for me?

Surely one of the main aspects of a physically modelled virtual piano is the ability to sound like myriad different pianos? So why doesn't it? You know, for guitar players they are doing this kind of thing now, and they model amps and a couple of companies are trying to model guitars. So you get a box and it's trying to sound like Marshall, Fender or mesa boogie amps etc and a guitar with some kind of digital interface to sound like les paul and fender and a banjo and an acoustic guitar, 12 string, and also to let you change the tuning to drop D or whatever without having to actually tune the guitar.

How well do they do? Well, it's early days. They sort of sound a bit like a les paul, in the same way that some of the physical modelled pianos sort of sound a bit like a Steinway D. There might be something a tad artificial about them. Getting an electric guitar to sound like an acoustic or a banjo is a stretch. But you can see where they are going and why - and you can also see why a guitar player might think "This is great technology" - not because he has a degree in physics or comp sci - but because you put a box and guitar in his room that makes a passable attempt at imitating tens of thousands of pounds of real guitars and amps.

My question is, if these pianos are physically modelled then why don't they act like it?

Saying "it's because our customers don't care" seems flawed. They'll care about something that physical modelling can offer them otherwise, if they don't then physical modelling is an expensive waste of time researching and developing.

They don't appear to be trying to sell the piano to me, nor to this hypothetical customer who just looks at the spec sheet on digital pianos. I gave one example where for every other model of sample-based Roland piano from FP30 upwards, the more you pay, the more piano sounds (and other sounds) the piano has. Perhaps there are some other changes too like a more expensive action or bigger speakers, more polyphony and so on, but watch any video of a roland employee on youtube doing a demo and they are going through the different sounds. More is always better right in the eyes of this naive consumer. That's why the F130r is now the F140r. Or the LX15 is the LX17.

When the guy from Roland just sighs at you when when you tell him "I can't see the point in spending the money on this product" I suppose I have my answer.

The V-Piano and V-Piano Grand have not been discontinued. You should demo one of those.

Probably time for an update though. You'd think the V-piano could benefit from the latest PHA50 action at the very least.

But this, to me, is why it's so illogical.

If I'm going to buy these because I'm actually googling for "physical modelling" and I care about changing these parameters then I'm out of luck. If the message is, as you seem to be implying "these pianos are dumbed down for Roland's customers" then fine - I think that's just insulting their customers though because, as I said, if someone buys a real acoustic piano and they want, say, a mellower sound, they get a piano tuner to come and he or she physically changes their piano. Roland, you're suggesting, would sell this customer a tambourine to avoid them having to make a decision about hammers

I think a pianist who has played a real piano would relate perfectly to many of the parameters you can change in a physically modelled virtual piano.

It's like an arcade racing game might have a slider that says "oversteer" at one end and "understeer" at the other. A better simulation with a physical model would talk about tyre material, tyre pressure, suspension yadda yadda yadda - the end result of changing these parameters would be a car that tended towards oversteer or understeer. But trying to say "Well, car drivers don't really understand these things" is not really true. Most car drivers know what tyres are.

You could argue that it's simpler to move a slider, but I would argue that's just at the expense of actually being able to use the physical model.

The other point I tried to make is , if I'm this supposed naive customer who doesn't care how the sound is made or who doesn't want to sit and change parameters, well, then why only configure 4 piano sounds for me?

Surely one of the main aspects of a physically modelled virtual piano is the ability to sound like myriad different pianos? So why doesn't it? You know, for guitar players they are doing this kind of thing now, and they model amps and a couple of companies are trying to model guitars. So you get a box and it's trying to sound like Marshall, Fender or mesa boogie amps etc and a guitar with some kind of digital interface to sound like les paul and fender and a banjo and an acoustic guitar, 12 string, and also to let you change the tuning to drop D or whatever without having to actually tune the guitar.

How well do they do? Well, it's early days. They sort of sound a bit like a les paul, in the same way that some of the physical modelled pianos sort of sound a bit like a Steinway D. There might be something a tad artificial about them. Getting an electric guitar to sound like an acoustic or a banjo is a stretch. But you can see where they are going and why - and you can also see why a guitar player might think "This is great technology" - not because he has a degree in physics or comp sci - but because you put a box and guitar in his room that makes a passable attempt at imitating tens of thousands of pounds of real guitars and amps.

My question is, if these pianos are physically modelled then why don't they act like it?

Saying "it's because our customers don't care" seems flawed. They'll care about something that physical modelling can offer them otherwise, if they don't then physical modelling is an expensive waste of time researching and developing.

They don't appear to be trying to sell the piano to me, nor to this hypothetical customer who just looks at the spec sheet on digital pianos. I gave one example where for every other model of sample-based Roland piano from FP30 upwards, the more you pay, the more piano sounds (and other sounds) the piano has. Perhaps there are some other changes too like a more expensive action or bigger speakers, more polyphony and so on, but watch any video of a roland employee on youtube doing a demo and they are going through the different sounds. More is always better right in the eyes of this naive consumer. That's why the F130r is now the F140r. Or the LX15 is the LX17.

When the guy from Roland just sighs at you when when you tell him "I can't see the point in spending the money on this product" I suppose I have my answer.

The Roland pianos are more customizable than any other home DP of the major makers. None of the others allow for individual key tuning and voicing for all 88 keys. With the other makers, if you want to adjust the sound, you do so for all 88 notes simultaneously. Roland lets you do this for individual notes. And the point of a modeled piano is the behavavipr of piano's sound and not just the ability to customize. I agree, there is a lot of room to customize on the new Rolands.

As to all this talk about key noise, I experience no problems with noise whatsoever. The keys are quieter than other DP's I've tried. The new keybed is improved.

That's partially incorrect. Certainly the top end Kawai have individual note voicing for each of the 88 notes. See the CA67/97 user manual for example. Maybe other stage models have individual note tuning?

I have no problem with the PHA-III flavor keybed on my V-Grand. It works well, doesn't seem to have any issues, and has been field proven for several years of hard use as Jay mentioned about Roland pianos with that keybed in the schools across Canada and some here with V-Pianos have commented about.

It may well be that you are correct in that these newer keybeds would be an improvement. However, I find no fault with mine as it currently is.

Tony

I wasn't implying there is any problem with the PHA-III action, Tony. It certainly served Roland very well for many years. I was just thinking that Roland's flagship piano deserves its flagship action. I don't know if you've played the PHA-50 action yet, but it's really excellent - certainly a notch or two above the PHA-III and IV, in my opinion. Not worth getting too worked up about if you already own the V-grand though.

OK, thank you for the info, someone else?

I've bought LX-7. I practice with and without headphones. I practice scales everyday in each key, including chromatic scales, legato, staccato, piano, forte etc. Either I am very lucky or not sensitive to any unevenness. Therefore, I haven't reported any problem with keys. I think the keys are the absolutely best part of these pianos. But this is only my humble personal opinion. I can add that If I have to reduce volume to minimum (aeround 10-20 etc.), then I can clearly hear keys. Even then, I still accept the sound. Probably I realise that when you play on real grand pianos, you can also hear some extra sound, such as dumpers moving away from keys when using a sustain pedal.

My understanding is that the kawai ca series allow voicing of all 88 notes, but done simultaneously. I could be wrong, but I recall that if you choose to make the sound more mellow, you must do so for all 88 notes. The Rolands allow for changes in tonal character of each note individually. Like I said, I could be wrong, but that is what I recall.

What do you think about sound of the new Roland HP6.. models compare to previous HP5..?
Do you think that sound has improved a lot?

I can say for sure I don't like HP504. That was the first digital piano I played in my life and when I touched the keys for the first time and heard the sound, I called the sails person and said that something is wrong with this piano, broken or something After he tested it he said that everything is normal, I got sad and moved to Yamaha… But I didn't like sustain pedal on Yamaha, still don't like.

If some of you here say that HP603 is kind of improved version of HP504 I want to believe the sound system on 603 is better and more authentic…? Do you really feel big difference?
I didn't have a chance to compare the new models with the old ones since they had only the new ones at the store.

Yea, you can hear on my video that there is this normal sound and abnormal sound.