Linda,
A great review! Thank you very much. I would like to give my opinion of this keyboard now that I've had the WK3000 in my store for a few days.
First, I really thought I would not give Casio a second chance because of my past experiences with the company. Last week, however, a former sales rep from a different keyboard company came in to see me and he has become the Casio independent rep here in California. He brought in a WK3000 for me to try. I had seen one at a local Costco retail chain several weeks ago and it was not plugged into electrical so I didn't get to hear it. Looking at it, it didn't seem very different from the WK1800 except I thought it looked less confusing in it's button layout(I was right because after trying it I realized it is much easier to use than previous models). After I was shown around the board by my rep, I decided to try out all the sounds and styles. First I was impressed with the feel of the keys and the sound from the speakers. Loud and full of bass! The piano sounded really good but I didn't like all the reverb. I quickly realized I could turn off the DSP button and now I had the dry acoustic piano. It sounded really good and when I then discovered I could re-program the reverb effect and store it in a user location (600 and up) I was very impressed with the piano sound. I thought the electric pianos were very good but not as many choices as the Yamaha's have. The sax and brass samples are really good. The flute is very breathy. The drawbar organs with fast and slow leslie variations assigned to the mod button or wheel are great. Keyboard magazine stated that they rivaled the Roland VK7 and I have to agree. The acoustic bass and electric basses were good and so were the guitars but don't try to compare these with the PSR2100. If you are comparing them to the Yamaha DGX202 which sells for the same price as the WK3000 then the Casio does a better job in most sounds. The Piano will compete with the PSR2100 and so will the Organs but I like the Yamaha sounds better in the higher priced keyboards. But this is still saying a lot for the Casio, especially when you realize how inexpensive it is!
The styles left me with mixed feelings. The styles are generally very good and they've even done a nice job of using acoustic guitars being strummed in some of the styles, but in some variations, the ride cymbal and crash cymbal sounds could be improved. I think the Yamaha styles in their PSR2100 and Tyros of course have more authentic sounds and variations, but for $300.00 Casio has done a fine job. One thing I wish casio would have done is to show you on the screen or using lights above their buttons which variation you are playing. You can't know if you're using variation 1 or variation 2.
One thing I would like to mention is that on the WK3000, and I believe the WK3500 as well (I don't have these yet), there is no user style programming. You can download styles from the casio website and according to Linda you can make styles from Midifiles (I haven't found this yet, but perhaps this is something you can do at the Casio website but not in the keyboard) but you can't make user styles in the keyboard which is something the Yamaha PSR550 and up can do. The sequencer is a 6 track song sequencer which allows you to record the accomp and right hand on track one (however you can't record a layer sound if you choose a layered sound only the first sound will be recorded) and you can add 5 more melody tracks after the first track. One thing I noticed is if you record on track 2 first, there is no metronome function so if you want to go in and record your style on track 1 next, you won't be able to sync the rhythm unless you are outstanding at watching the swinging metronome figure on the screen (pretty hard to do, I actually tried it!).
I also want to mention to bluedbird that Yamaha does make a keyboard with a smart media card. It is the PSRK1 entertainment keyboard with Karaoke features, a mic and smart media for storage of songs you create and you download from the internet.
Keyboard magazine states that this keyboard rivals many keyboards up to $1000.00. If you need a 76 key keyboard with very good sounds, decent styles (however I like the Yamaha's better in products like the PSR2100 and I do realize the price is a lot more than the Casio) pretty good recording....by the way, there is no loop recording mode. You can record in real time, step time, you can even edit the note pitch and velocity, but the recording is linear not loop.......then this keyboard is a winner! After Casio came out with the WK1800, Yamaha reavaluated their PSRGX76 and came out with the DGX202. I'm sure after Yamaha sees the WK3000/3500 their engineers will be busy creating their next keyboard to rival this board. In the meantime, I'm excited to see this new board, I've ordered dozens of them for the holidays and as long as I have a good new Casio rep (the company never answers phone calls when I call and I get no customer support from them) I agree with all that this is a major player in the entry level and even for the advanced player keyboard.
George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California