Hi. A friend of mine asked me for advice on choosing a good digital piano for £300-400. As synth guy I don’t know much about pianos. OK, it must have fully weighted keyboard, that’s it. Any suggestions for new or second-hand ones models? It will be used at home for composing songs. Thanks

 

If your friend can stretch a little further, or buy used then I recommend the Yamaha P series
https://uk.yamaha.com/en/products/musical_instruments/pianos/p_series/p-45/index.html

I have the P-125 and sounds good, I am in no way a professional player but the action on those keys feels really good.

 

Haliax is correct. These may be the only digital keyboards with weighted keys in this price range, not sure.. I had one in the P series. Keys felt nice. Had a grand, an imitation of a Rhodes, vibes and strings. All sounded very nice for the money, but it was 3/4 scale keyboard, which is a little unpleasant for real players. I am lucky enough to have a Nord now. Costly, but worth it. Not sure what I did with the Yamaha. I think it's in my storage bin.

 

400 is a kinda meh range.... For just a little more you get much better instruments like :

https://www.thomann.de/intl/roland_...LCJjdXJyZW5jeSI6MiwibGFuZ3VhZ2UiOjJ9&reload=1

The P-45 is fine too, but the keys from the Roland are much better, and the P-45 has older Technique, the Samples are not as good, ect. But if the Roland is too expensive, you're good to go with the Yamaha. But I wouldn't recommend something cheaper than the Yamaha. At least new... Maybe there are better used models in your price range...

 

$400...I'd say, hold the money and save more for a Roland FP-10, their keys are much better than Yamaha's. and a little more than that you can get KORG D1, which offers top-notch keybed at an unbelievable low price (Don't mistakenly buy B1). And avoid Casio, since their keys are heavy and sluggish.

 

Now, the problem with digital pianos is that to reach a good audio quality and polyphony you have to spend a LOT. See Kawai VPC1, up above to Yamaha Avant Grand.

So, my search criteria was to neglect the sound, but it must have a responsive and HEAVY keyboard, THEN attach it via MIDI to a virtual piano (sampled or physical modelled it's a personal choice, doesn't really matters), because sound quality AND polyphony are far better than any mid price digital piano.

I asked for the lowest priced pieces, I tested Yamaha series P, Roland (dont' remember which one), then I came to a CASIO (what? the calculator factory? bah!)
I tested it. The sound, as expected, was not terribly good, but the keyboard was better than any other higher priced pianos.

I loved it: CASIO CDP 130.

It has a key downweight higher than a Steinway 290!
76g lowest, 68g highest. Actually, it's a bit straining, but it's perfect for studying.

Tested with MIDIOX, (the dealer was astonished, never had someone with pc testing pianos) it is very linear and responsive, you can reach 1/127 of velocity value (very rare).

It's much better than an old scrapped master keyboard that I had, FATAR Studio 90 plus, that was nice in keybord weight but horrible in dynamics, couldn't reach not even 10/127.

Price: less than 300$.

The only cons: it doesn't have repetition mech.

 

Yamaha DGX-660
Yamaha YDP-164
Yamaha P-45/P125

Choose one of them.

 

Heavy, yes. Sluggish? I played a lot of pianos, and some of them were high class (Bosendorfer, Bechstein, Steinway, Yamaha).
I don't understand what you mean. Actually, The Bechtstein was so terrible (but admittedly from the owner was not very well serviced).

I still enjoy my Casio keyboard, and I feel discomfort even when I play a Clavinova (from the same owner of the Bechstein).
Now I'm so used to it.

 

Last edited: Oct 16, 2020

Well, OK, you have a CDP - which use a different keyboard model with PX series, and I'm only familiar with PX's SHA-II keyboard. Though Casio calls SHA-II an update, I've been hearing comments saying that CDP keys actually feel better than PX keys, though noisier and less durable than later ones (which are still annoyingly noisy for me). Besides I think CDP series aren't in the market anymore.

And when I say "sluggish"...might not be so accurate, but I mean, while the keys do reset quickly - more quickly than Roland and Yamaha, however they will bounce up and down for multiple times after released; and if I want to repeat that note again, I feel that I'll have to spend more effort to make it first stop bouncing before press it down. It's really tiresome (at least for me) considering how heavy these keys already are. PX only of course.

 

I can say:

it's correct that is heavy, even too much for some, but it's perfect for studying;

as I wrote, there is no repetition mechanism (like another Roland piano had, candidate to purchase), so fast notes are not practicable, it bounces a bit but except repetitions you can play fast;

it's noisy, but most of them are, and it has less woody thud than others tested;

I bought it in 2018, and I practice daily, so far no signs of wear (that will come in anyway, one day or another);

it's sensitive and linear, something that not all keyboards of that price range have.


Summing up, I'm really satisfied with this weighted keyboard, even if polyphony (btw when you use external sound sources is virtually unlimited) and sound quality is barely sufficient.

 

@nmkeraj Why a nasty rating for this https://audiosex.pro/threads/digital-piano-for-max-£400.55857/#post-506673 ?

 

From what I know, digital pianos with acceptable keybeds, build and sounds cost around 2k euro (or slightly more). The actual key preference can depend on the individual and it's better to test in a shop (for example some Yamaha products use keys that are way too heavier, but some people seem to like them).

 

What nasty rating? I don't understand

PS
OK OK. I found it. It was a complete mistake. It might have been done accidentally while browsing on my mobile or so. Thank you for pointing it out.

 

Thank you guys for your opinions. They were very very informative I couldn't expect. Thank you. I have found out even about dual and triple sensor technology. Very interesting. I think my friend is after Roland FP10 because it features a speaker. Korg D1 is speakerless. Both models are made in dual sensor technology I am not a pianist but I wonder if it is the big difference between 88 and 76 keys for the player. Isn't it better to buy little bit shorter keyboard but in better technology or more featured instead of longer more straight forward piano? I like your comments!

 

No big difference, most classical pieces don't employ extreme ranges and can be played on 61 keys. If the piece is for two people, or the guy wants to employ range splits for different sounds, then 88 keys is better.
Still, the same company may employ different keys - for example some shorter Yamaha stage pianos use different keybeds than the 88 version.

 

If he wants to learn to play the piano, he needs 88 keys. Keyboards with 76 keys are mainly intended for synth players for whom the usual 61 keys are too few, or who need many splitting zones.

 

Actually my Casio CDP is heavier than at least Yamaha P and Clavinova, as I compared them.
For studying the heavier is the better is.

As No Avenger wrote it depends if you want to study piano, 88 weighetd keys is better, though personally for a period of time I studied classical pieces on a semiweighted 76 keys (and omitted the occasional lowest notes).

 

You can play most (or all) classical pieces (before the romantic period) with 76 keys, but there are very few models and mostly you find better models with 88 keys for learning piano. Like No Avenger said, they're mostly for keyboard players.

And because there are so few 76 keys models they are not really less expensive than 88 keys.

 

Thomann has it's own range of digital pianos that aren't bad and they are very affordable. A friend of mine started learning piano on this one Thomann DP-26 and he was very satisfied. If you don't have much money to spend they are definitely worth looking into.