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Will this VST sound better than the built in CFX tone on my Yamaha CP4? Considering both would be played exactly the same way through a pair of decent quality speakers?

I have all necessary spec requirements regarding PC and a babyface pro.

May be a stupid question to most people, sorry if this is the case.

Garritan CFX I can get for £149 in UK now.

Mark

I just listened to the CP4 playing the CFX here. There's some reverb added on but I think I can get the picture of the base sound. I regularly use Garritan CFX Full. In general, I find modern external samples to be much better than onboard digital piano sounds.

I think switching to the external VST would be a huge improvement! Definitely different, might not be your taste... should make sure you like the sound first.

Edit: Found this clip too, much cleaner CP4 CFX sound. Still very confident in my preference!

I was playing a CP4 for about an hour this week. I like the CFX sound, it's crisp, bright, and doesn't have the bass-heavy, trebel-light character that makes volume difficult to normalize with the CFiiiS sample.

But, just like the NU1, the CP4 samples are extremely short, and don't sustain/decay very long. And I've always been so moved by good performances on the Garritan CFX patch that it's by far my favorite virtual piano to listen to.

So I think I'm a fan of this proposal (though I simply don't want to deal with a laptop and external sounds on my own, I really just want to turn on the DP and play immediately).

So I just listened to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeIK3xPN8vA

Does it really sound that good?

I have not heard anything as good as that before, much better than Ivory 2 it seems.

It seems that the Garritan CFX sounds really good!
Have you heard Philip Johnston's recordings? If not, you can find them on Youtube. He plays this library.
They are impressive.

I believe Garritan CFX would be a huge step forward. The playability is exceptional and the tone sweet.
You only have to find the right touch curve (VERY important IMO) and spend some time to familiarize with the other controls till you are satisfied with what you hear.
Definitely worth the effort, though.

Philip Johnston (he is a forumite here at Pianoworld) has rendered the Fantasie Impromptu with it - with excellent results indeed.

Edit: mwf, yes it does.

One thing to note is the sound of the beautiful, large recording room captured on the Garritan CFX samples. I think this makes it one of the best sounding VSTs for a concert hall sound for the money (there's some closer to half a grand in price that might be better). From what I've heard, many samples like the Ivory American D have less room (natural) reverberation recorded, giving it a very different target sound. People often put convolution (artificial, digital) reverb on these (and even the Garritan CFX), but I'm considering other VSTs like the Ivory American D for less reverb (often desirable!).

But the Garritan CFX has a lot of customization. You can adjust the gains of two different microphone sets: close and ambient. Some people turn off the ambient mics for the less reverberant quality. I personally think the EQ needs some tweaking if you turn of the ambient mics, but some basic EQ and other parameters are available for tweaking in the plugin.

There's also the fact that there's three complete, disjoint sets of samples called "perspectives" (each having close and ambient mic tracks): classic, player, and contemporary. I prefer the classic for the concert hall feel but the player perspective is more intimate, whose ambient mics are actually positioned where someone at the piano would be. Haven't gotten into the contemporary yet, seems more designed for integrating a piano in a more "contemporary" mix with other instruments.

I don't know what it is about Garritan CFX, but they really captured something real and viscreal about the instrument that comes across magnificently.

Philip Johnston's recordings really put me over the edge on considering it the best-sounding VST IMHO, too.

MWF - I have played a few instruments over the years but have limited experience with the piano. I will say the samples on Garritan CFX are very well recorded and that the sustain seems to go on forever. Here is a good player using Garritan CFX:

https://www.youtube.com/user/crypticfermata1

The Yamaha CP4 has the advantage of "plug and play". Plus the Japanese are so good at optimizing dedicated hardware-software, so the instrument connects with the player. I think most of that connection is reducing latency and jitter but I'm sure they have some other tricks up their sleeves.

COMPUTER - Because Garritan CFX is so large, a decent desktop computer is best; if you go the laptop route, I think you need a relatively new, "higher performance" model. A fast CPU, lots of ram, a large SSD will provide best results. But some people here are happy with older, low spec computers so this just requires a bit of testing.

INTERFACE - Since you already have the BabyFace Pro, you are ahead of the game. The superb RME drivers will help minimize latency and jitter right out of the box. I ended up buying that box.

SPEAKERS - Open-backed headphones are the easiest; I just run the two mics and no "special effects".

Getting speakers and subs set up is a bit more difficult because the room acoustics are a bear. For more complex pieces, not sure resonances and harmonics are perfectly reproduced with "sampling" or a limited-factor "modeling" software. Garritan CFX's built-in reverb can "help" there...

Gombessa - After tweaking my "daily use" laptop, Garritan CFX is "virtually" plug and play:

- turn on Kawai es100
- set computer to "max performance" (I just set the SpeedShift EPP to "0")
- launch Garritan CFX

The laptop is a Skylake i5 which I used for daily internet surfing, etc. I don't turn off the internet or antivirus or anything (although turning those off helps a bit it). Older, dedicated mid-range desktops are cheaper and run circles around laptops.

Gettin my laptop optimized is documented here:

http://forum.pianoworld.com/ubbthreads.php/topics/2625443/1.html

One thing to note is the sound of the beautiful, large recording room captured on the Garritan CFX samples. I think this makes it one of the best sounding VSTs for a concert hall sound for the money (there's some closer to half a grand in price that might be better). From what I've heard, many samples like the Ivory American D have less room (natural) reverberation recorded, giving it a very different target sound. People often put convolution (artificial, digital) reverb on these (and even the Garritan CFX), but I'm considering other VSTs like the Ivory American D for less reverb (often desirable!).

But the Garritan CFX has a lot of customization. You can adjust the gains of two different microphone sets: close and ambient. Some people turn off the ambient mics for the less reverberant quality. I personally think the EQ needs some tweaking if you turn of the ambient mics, but some basic EQ and other parameters are available for tweaking in the plugin.

There's also the fact that there's three complete, disjoint sets of samples called "perspectives" (each having close and ambient mic tracks): classic, player, and contemporary. I prefer the classic for the concert hall feel but the player perspective is more intimate, whose ambient mics are actually positioned where someone at the piano would be. Haven't gotten into the contemporary yet, seems more designed for integrating a piano in a more "contemporary" mix with other instruments. [/quote]

Very well put thank you, that is exactly what I was thinking.

Does anybody know if the CFX Lite can be upgraded to the full CFX?

Maybe the trade-up option:

https://store.makemusic.com/Store/?tab=garritan

Yes, you can trade up, I did it. Send an email request to support requesting a trade up and you'll receive instructions. The website currently does not directly support a trade-up. As a currently registered user you'll end up with both the Lite and Full products. It's like buying both products but for less.

Oops, my mistake. It does now!

Then the Lite version is a viable option, at 80 euros or dollars. Still not a small sample.

What i personally like about the full versions is the multiple mike options.
If you only want to play and have one really good piano sample than the lite versions will do !

But i've discovered so many options that makes the Garritan CFX also a great piano to cut through a pop mix, but still have this expensive quality sound that shines through.
Yes the full versions come with many different presets, but almost always to much to proof it's capable in a different direction.

But once you pick one of the three default sounds (classical, contemporary, player) and you explore the mike settings and advance settings so many fabulous sounds are at your disposal.
And one thing, althaugh the convolution reverb is great in many options, i like the ambient mikes the best for that warm and spot on room reverb.
You must have noticed, i like the Garritan CFX very, very much and it is one of those rare libraries that has it all.
I can hardly fault it for anything at all.
I am so glad i choose it over the competition, best ''digital piano'' choice i've made in a very long time !

Yes I've noticed you like the Garritan CFX, but you're far from the only one. I can't remember anyone expressing negative feelings about it.

Actually, I'd like to have a variety of piano sounds. I'd like at least one uprightish, sad, dark, cinematic, bluesy piano. I think I have that in the Giant, now that I've gotten better at tweaking it.

Then I'd like to have a bright assertive pop piano, but with a lot of timbre. An unlikely contender, Kawai Estate Grand, from Production Voices, gives me that, sort of.

I want a ragtime piano, and the Detuned preset of the Galaxy II Bluthner Baby Grand, takes me into that direction, but not all the way. I might be able to tweak it a bit more, towards the ragtime old Western sound.

It seems the Garritan CFX, even if it's only the Lite version, could meet many of my needs. It's very versatile, good for classical, pop, jazz, but maybe not ragtime. I've seen it has many controls to tweak the sound of it into different directions.

Is the Garritan CFX good for all types of music or just classical? I heard its not good for modern music like pop and rock, someone on sweetwater said so in the reviews section anyway.

Because the velocities and range is extremely even it is a very good pop piano indeed !!!
No it can't do a boogie woogie upright, because it isn't.
It's tightly tuned and full sounding, so a bar piano that can do ragtime and some blues, because the felt on the hammers is almost gone and pianotuners are to expensive for the bartender :-) is something the Garritan simply does not pretends.
But non of the other grand piano vst's are capable of that in my opinion.

To me the default classical preset is a tiny little bit woolie, but i have created extremely transparent pop piano's that i prefer over everything else i used.