Fran, Donny and I went to see the psr2100 today, and although I still feel it lacks any real "key feel"....it DOES seem to have a slight advantage over the 2000.
Is it possible that the new units have a more solid "bottom". They both feel light and spongy, but the 2100 seems to "land" better at the bottom of the downstroke. Maybe there is a better keypad under the key, and the spring action is the same. Maybe the new units are just tighter and they will loosen up with time. Maybe I am imagining the whole thing, and they are exactly the same. Who knows?

Anyone notice a significant change in feel after playing one for a while?

(dreamy background music, singing voice floating around)

"...there is a Yammy in your future..."

(end of the commercial)

Fran bought one that will be delivered on Wednesday. I give him till the weekend to tire of it, then it will probably makes the rounds to me...then Donny...then ??????

I am very surprised with all that has been made out of the key feel 0n the 2K that the Yammeister did not change this entirely on the 21K, When I played a 2k once considering it, I thought it had absolutely the cheapest key feel I had ever played. And I passed on it for that reason, could not even get into it enough to really try it I hated the feel so much.
Terry

------------------
jam on,
Terry http://imjazzed.homestead.com/Index.html

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?.... I could use a backup

I was in the music store yesterday, playing a PSR1100. The key feel was exactly like my 740 so they're probably using the same key technique which is to suspend the key at one end and use the natural springiness of the plastic. Also played a Triton - much better and more positive.

Bryan

To me the psr2000 fits perfectly. I had a lot problems in 740 using touch response. No matter how much I trained, it never sounded good. Allways one note here and there came out louder or were very quiet. So eventually I played without it.

But when playing a real piano, no problems. And in psr2000, no problems.

Key feel is in my opinion very good, or at least much better than in 740. It´s not a piano but good enough!

Hey Bryan,
There is a guy in the Buy & Sell selling a PSR2000. He is asking way to much for a used/discontinued PSR2000, so you would neet to negotiate him down, but here is a copy of the ad (if your interested):
"YAMAHA PSR 2000 synthesizer $1650
(416) 569-8195". It's in Canadian dollars folks. I think $1350 would be a more reasonable price.
Star

Anything over $1000US is still WAY too much for a used 2000. You can get new ones for that.

$1350 Canadian is approx $974 U.S.
Music123 is selling a NEW PSR2000 B Stock for $900 U.S. Not sure what the landed cost would be here in Canada.
Starkeeper


[This message has been edited by Starkeeper (edited 08-12-2003).]

Uncle Dave,

I played the 2100 and I thought maybe it had a slightly stiffer key feel than my 2000 does, but I also considered the possibility that the key feel on my 2k gets looser as it ages and gets played.

Either way, if there is a difference, it certainly isn't significant enough that I like it much better. It's even harder for me to get into the 2k key feel when I play it right after I've played my Motif or PA80.. For me, the key feel of the 2k is the absolute worst thing about the board. When I play it as a solo instrument ( which I do sometimes ), I control it with the Motif or the PA880 keys. Sometimes I just use it along with the PA80, and via midi I mix the sounds of the two boards to get a fatter or modified sound..

AJ

Hi Star

Thanks for the info but I'm not in the market for a new keyboard right now. Have to get a new roof first. That's big bucks

Bryan

Bryan,
Ditto for me as well. Now if only my wife would start working.
Star

Well, you know what they say. All a man needs is a car and a wife that both work.

Bryan

Goodbye PSR2100!!!Dave was right!!I emailed my reasons to Gary and Donny..I don't want to type anymore, maybe Donny or Gary can cut and paste my comments..Frank , see you had nothing to worry about...I am going to look again at the Roland VR760..{I need a toy},,

Fran, I think you'll love the VR-760 especially if you like to play Organ. The Organs on the VR-760 are superb imo. The Piano patch's are pretty good too. As are the Electric Pianos. The VR-760 has 128 note Polyphony and it even has a basic rhythm accompaniment feature although it is not an Arranger. Plus it has 76 Keys. The Drawbar Sliders and all those other buttons and knobs make it a real hands on Keyboard.

PS: Sorry to hear the PSR 2100 didn't do it for you. But there are plenty of other "toys", (no pun intended) out there to choose from.

Best regards,
Mike

OK - Here's Fran's comments on the 2100:

**I decided to sell the 2100[to Dave] for a couple of reasons. It isn't quite fast enough for me, while playing sequences.[ Too many extra button pushes, even with the direct access button, reading lyrics and changing parts ect]..I think the sounds with sequence playback are just OK, and not as stellar as my G1000..The 2100 lacks the realtime control I am use to, dedicated buttons that are not menu driven[this is the problem with the VA-76], I also use after touch, and expression pedal to bring in color sounds[not possible with the 2100]..As I mentioned , I prefer no modulation built into the sound ,I want to control this..There are some very good sounds on the 2100, but across the board, to my one and one half ears, the G1000 is much better.

I liked the harmonizer and I thought that was the strenth of the instrument..With your(Gary) EQ settings you set up for me, the keyboard sounding good with the internal speakers, but with a PA you could hear distortion especially with the vocals..when I used the flat EQ it was better thru the PA[I used a 12 inch PA system]..And the most important two negatives to me..the stinking handclaps instead of a brush snare on many excellent sequences I use...And the poor construction quality..I think Yamaha tried to put a lot of goodies into a modest priced keyboard at the expense of cheap construction.

The feel I could never get use to and the buttons do not seem sturdy...Gary these are my opinions and I know there are some work arounds, but it would not be worth the time spent to physically play the 2100 for me...Fran

UD & DNJ I am surprised that you cannot get Fran separated from his G1000. By now he most have earned a vast rate of return from it which he could share with his friends and buy a new keyboard. I bet if you got him a Yamaha 9000 Pro and painted Roland on it - he would take it!!!

Fran, you know you can always get around those terrible hand claps and dogs howling by translating to the appropriate drum instruments (GNMidi). Alternatively, you could use a laptop with the sYnerGiGS soundfont (something like $25) for Yamaha midis and the Edirol HQ Sound Canvas (bigger $s) for proper midis.

Frank are you saying , I can remap the drums collectively using GNMIDI to play Yamaha[with the right drum sounds]keyboards? If we did the remap would it change the way the edited sequences play on good instruments[Roland], or would I need to save as a seperate Yahmaha folder?

Frank,


Now we are using on our laptops a Roland SC88 sound card to play SMF songs. Its ok but some things just dont sound right, hence the search for a new sound card such as the Hyper Canvas.
But you do need a fast processor 850 or better. What do you recomend besides this for great sounding Midi files?

Fran, if you use something like GNMidi and you can figure out the difference between Yamaha and the Roland Drumkits you could then develop a translation table (note number transfers) and change all the midi files and save them with this new translation. Yes, unfortunately you end up with 2 separate sets of midi files - not good - but it works. You can save this translation table in GNMidi. It is still a big boring job but it can be done.

The easist is to use a laptop and have two software synths installed which use both systems, e.g., LiveSynth Pro/sYnerGiGS for Yamaha styles and midis and Edirol HQ Sound Canvas for Standard Midi or Roland Midis. You would also need a DXi Wrapper, Brainspawn, Project5, etc. Regular midis (Roland) sound fairly good on the LiveSynth just not as good as on a Sound Canvas (soft or hardware). At least you don't get the handclaps and dogs howling, etc. LiveSynth/sYnerGiGS have 2 sets of Drumkits (XG-Bank 127 and GM/GS-Bank 128).

I have both of these synths and they sound very good and take about 10 - 15% resources of a 2.0 GHz Pentium 4 Processor. If you take a laptop with you on a gig this could be a very viable option to using hardware modules like the SC88, etc.

DNJ & Fran, I should have added in my previous post that sometimes the problems between Yamaha and Roland Midis comes from the fact that the Yamaha styles or midis call up drumkits from Bank 127 (16256). If you have a regular GM/GS Wavetable then who knows what you would get, gun shots, birds chirping and so on.

To fix this you have to call up the midi in question in a sequencer like Cakewalk and change to the appropriate Drumkit Bank (usually Bank 128). Another big boring job!!!

The good news is you only have to go thru this once in your life.

General midi was supposed to eliminate erronous notes, but Yamaha seems to skate that issue and use whatever notes they want in their drum sets. It's a good thing that they use very logocal drum patterns in their own keyboards, because they do not fair well in the GM department. They've gotten better, but they are still behind ROland in GM playback.
I realize that sounds are evolving at breakneck paces, but GM is suppose to be GENERAL. Ya know? Same notes...same sounds for all. I guess they think they're above all that.