It’s here, you guys, P-525!

SouthPark

You're most welcome C.D.

HZPiano

CeDur It's not as limited as I was afraid

I'd recommend checking the low side of the range as well, in other words how consistently velocities 2--10 and up from there can be played (1 being reserved for the silent key press).

As you say, with PHA-4 all of this works right away without any need for corrections/adjustments.

Cheers and happy velocity responses,

SouthPark

P-525 anchor leg -- 10min 14sec

CeDur

I have such a dilemma right now. I've just tested P525 and P515 side by side and to my surprise, I slightly prefer NWX over GT-S 😮 It's easier to play softly on the former, maybe after some time I would adjust to lighter GrandTouch-S, but, well. Not what I was expecting. I've spent around 20min on each.

I really like sound of both via internal speakers, the clarity of CFX sample really shines in that scenario. No difference in that aspect between the two. Played a few chords on ES920 standing next to Yamahas and while I prefer Yamaha sample, Kawai speakers, while not as 'loud', might be better quality-wise. Headphones - well, I'm so used to Garritan, VSL and Production Voices CFX that P5x5 sounded 'meh', so with headphones I will use VIs 100% of time.

Unfortunately there was no FP90X in the shop, so I played some LX (705 or 706, not sure) with PHA50 and PureAcoustic engine. I liked that action the most. So easy to control dynamics, both ppp and pound it hard to fortissimo. While the sound might not be as nice as Yamaha or Kawai, I think via internal speakers it might be sufficient.

Eh, I would like Roland action and features with Yamaha sound and Kawai speakers. It would be perfect. For now, it's P515 vs FP90X for me.

HZPiano

CeDur

If playing using VSTi pianos through headphones is the main use (say more than half of your playing time) then I'd say the action is the main criterium.

So if you like Roland's action best, this may shape your decision most.

I think go back to the store once or even twice, play your shortlist more/longer, and see what happens to your preference. Also make sure you do know which LX you played assuming it had PHA-50, because if I'm not mistaken the action in the 706 is another tier up from PHA-50. The 705 indeed does use PHA-50.

Hope this is helpful input,

Cheers and happy further testing,

CeDur

I just called the shop. It was LX706 indeed, so not a standard PHA50 :/ There are places where I can try FP90X, but then they don't have Yamaha. I'll be using that board 90% of time with VIs. I just need internal speakers and sound engine for that 10% to not have to carry PA system and laptop (like some wedding ceremony etc. or when vocalist comes for practice).

HZPiano

CeDur

Good to have that sorted.

If you liked the action in the LX-706 then PHA-50, although not exactly the same, is still likely to be a strong candidate for you.

I'd suggest to give it (the FP-90X) a thorough tryout.

Cheers and happy weekend,

SouthPark

Just set these in-the-works ones to "loud" - but not too loud to avoid damage ears (hearing).

I like the P-525 sounds.

sprach-zarathustra-mod-snippet-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.wav

sprach-zarathustra-mod-snippet-take2-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.wav

SouthPark

Just did this one a moment ago hehe -- a touch of WOTW semi imp. Just probing a bit. And see what I can do with it later. A bit forceful in strength - down on finesse/elegance - but at least we still have a little bit of WOTW and some P-525 sounds heheh.

touch-of-wotw-semi-impro-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.wav

CyberGene

SouthPark are you demonstrating particular aspects of P525 with your latest recordings? If not, how about moving them into a dedicated discussion where your music can have better exposure to a larger audience?

BnW

I've been experimenting with MIDI playback a bit. The AUX pedal can be assigned to song play/pause, so since I have the 3-pedal unit, I plugged in the stock pedal into the aux port and now have a dedicated 4th pedal for that.

Looks like there is no possibility to have a metronome count-down before the song starts, so I guess the only way to have a countdown is to add that to the midi file. There is some delay between pressing the pedal and the playback starting, so trying to count "manually" at the song tempo and pressing the pedal on beat 1 doesn't work either.

It's possible to mute "R/L" tracks for individual Right / Left hand practice. Looks like R track is midi track 1 and L track is track 2. So far I've used this feature so that the R track has the whole piano score and L track has the "vocals" (so a flute or whatever the person who made the midi has playing the vocal melody). So when playing alone I can have the "vocals" on and if someone were to sing along, the vocal melody can be turned off. Of course it doesn't remember whether you have the R/L muted at power off - so needs to be turned back off every time.

I got a Sandisk Ultra Fit USB thumbdrive that's barely bigger than the USB connector, so that it can be left in permanently and I don't have to worry about knocking the thumbdrive and breaking the USB port.

So in my opinion the MIDI playback works well enough that I don't have to resort to using an external computer, but as always, there are a couple of nuisances.

SouthPark

Thanks for sharing those details BnW.

About the delay in startup ….. I got to get around to checking out other yamaha dig pianos aside from the P-515 and 525. I know that for onboard recording, these two instruments have a noticeable audible delay for the very first note struck -- for one-push record mode. That's the mode when the unit doesn't begin recording until the first note is struck. Unfortunately, this went under the radar at yammy.

Will be interesting if the one push record glitch occurs for other instruments as well … eg. N3X etc.

Fortunately, the recorded midi recording won't have the delayed first note. The glitch is in the response of the system. The one push recording simply makes the first audible note delayed by some amount of time, much more than 4 milli-sec delay, which can be offputting for some people.

SouthPark

More of the stock CFX sounds from the P-525 to listen to here. A couple of semi-imps in .flac form.

d-adjusted-semi-impro-tinker-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.flac

d-semi-impro-tinker-take2-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.flac

ShigeruKawai

So what's the verdict? Upgrade from P-515 to P-525?

For connecting to the computer or playing music for Youtube (not live), which is better?

SouthPark

They're both excellent pianos - the P-515 and the P-525. After the Yuja incident, where she started to play heavy-handed, I did a sort of heavy-handed with the P-525 on bosie setting earlier today. And just a moment ago, decided to have another casual crack - and do some heavy-handed forceful stuff on the CFX setting. Will keep working on it - and whack in some nice counterpoint etc later.

ipkfm-semi-impro-short-take2-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.flac

And from earlier today -- bosie setting:

ipkfm-semi-impro-short-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-525.flac

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