This has been on my mind lately. As other members have pointed out, the Casio's poly drops when playing some of their voices that contain "more layers". Such as specific voices having a poly drop down to 16 notes due to the size of the voice.

Well I got to thinking, and is there a "definitive" answer as to whether Yamaha's DGX, and YPG series do this as well? They too are 32 note poly, but unlike Casio's manual (who are nice enough to say, hey! poly's gonna drop here), in the Yamaha manuals for the DGX and YPG series, no where can I find what the actually POLY is per voice.

Anyone know?

Squeak

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 07-18-2006).]

Hi,
An example DGX-305. Taken from one of my sequences:
voice - notes used
Jazz rhytm - 1 note
Brass section - 3 notes
Sweet tenor sax - 3 notes
Drums - 3 notes
Nylon guitar - 3 notes
Live grand piano - 3 notes
Rain - 1 note
Jazz organ 1 - 3 notes
Vibraphone - 2 notes

If I played 3 notes on vibraphone there would be a polyphony drop. Obviously, some of the voices use 2 poly. I suspect:

All live, sweet and cool voices - 2 poly
All organ sounds - 2 poly
Vibraphone - 2 poly
Jazz rhytm (yes, it is an acoustic bass and cymballs combo) - 2 poly

The real poly drops to 16. So what? It's a 450 euros low-end keyboard.

On the other hand, YPG625 delivers the same 16 true poly too, shares 99% of the DGX-305 sounds and costs 800 euros. The only obvious difference to DGX-305 is the 88 GHS keys instead of 76 lighweight. It is an expensive low-end keyboard.

I did not take into account the styles because every one style is downloadable from internet. BTW are there as many downloadable styles for Casio as for Yamaha? Do the beginner users need all the features that casios has?

George

George,
Thanks for replying... It's not a pissing contest. I was curious if Yamaha's were the same. I just don't think it's fair to black ball Casio for this and glorify Yamaha if they do the same thing.

And yes I strongly feel that (even beginners) the extra features on the Casio would be VERY beneficial. I can't tell you the countless number of times I've seen users upgrade from beginner models because they've "outgrown" their current keyboard.

A keyboard should also have room for the user to "grow". If the user starts to look into basic voice editing and wants to try it.. guess what the Casio has it, if they want to get a basic understanding of organ draw bars, gee lookie here, Casio has drawbars so the user can familiarize themselves with them and their functions. If the user wants to dig into effects and get a better understanding of what the different parameters do--they're in luck because the Casio's oddly enough have good effects and many adjustable parameters for the user to use and "learn from".

I just feel that Casio's having these extra options are a greater benefit to the player for when their skills improve, and when they want to venture into those areas the keyboard already has those features. Then they won't need to "upgrade".

I've always said to customers when I was selling keyboards is that "Buying a keyboard is like buying a child a pair of shoes. You have to buy a pair that's not too small, but just a tad bigger so they have room to grow". I apply the same concept to keyboards -especially beginners-

Squeak

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 07-18-2006).]

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 07-18-2006).]

Squeak,
I agree with you on most of your points.
Here is what I think after 5 years playing with inexpensive electronic keyboards:

1) The first thing a user needs to grow is more polyphony. Insufficient Polyphony is probably the most obvious disadvantage of inexpensive keyboards. As you know I am into composing music. At first my arrangements were pretty simple. As I got used to my DGX-305 I began composing songs with more complex arrangments. In the example I mentioned above, it is a rock'n'roll song. When I hit three notes on the vibraphone, the "rain" voice drops out and the effect is lost. So I have to reduce harmony-fill notes.

2) Quality of voices. In my opinion, 30 very good quality voices is better than 15 very good and 400 bad to worse. However, a beginner user will show off when they say their keyboard has n hundreds of sounds.

3) I didn't mentioned the issue with the quality of the keys - In my opinion lightweight keys should be the minimum requirement to a keyboard.

Voice editing and drawbar organ sounds interesting

BUT

On the other hand, Imagine the novice user, a person who have never touched an electronic keyboard. If he/she got an entry level keyboard, they could get confused by some of of the features. If you visited the Yahoo DGX group forum, you could meet with many people who have trouble to understand the basic operation of the keyboard.

To summarize: As I said in another topic "L'apetit vien an manganeant" - Appetite comes as you eat. I outgrew each of my keyboards in a year and a half. That is the time Yamaha need to deliver the next DGX generation. Unfortunately, I don't feel like upgrading because of what I said in points 1) and 2)

Good for them. This proves that their interest in keyboard has increased.

Squeak, If I were you I'd count the keyboards as photo-cameras. If you get into taking photos you will need a better camera. You can hardly sell a semi-professional DSLR camera to a person who has never touched a camera.

Best regards,
George

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On the other hand, Imagine the novice user, a person who have never touched an electronic keyboard. If he/she got an entry level keyboard, they could get confused by some of of the features. If you visited the Yahoo DGX group forum, you could meet with many people who have trouble to understand the basic operation of the keyboard.
---------------------------------------------

Keep in mind though the Casio WK's and the upper end Privia's aren't Casio's "entry level" models

I totally agree with you about the poly--EVERY keyboard on the market could benefit from more poly! I also agree about the number of good sounds compared to hundreds of poor ones as well. The thing is that with the new WK's and Privia's--you're not hearing the "old Casio" anymore. Other's here have even agreed that even Casio has a few signature voices of their own that shine.

Squeak

Oh my! I forgot to mention one more very important point

4) All keyboards, regardless of being low, mid or high end, should have line outs.

Phones out delivers poor quality when recording. That's the reason I dont share my songs with SZ users.

5) the same applies to midi ports.

I am not a die-hard Yamaha fan. I heard some recordings of the previous Casio models and I admitted the WK3700 sounded better than my present keyboard. If only the new casios had 64 poly I would switch brands immediately.

George

George,
You are SOOOO right about the audio outs, and midi jacks! I'm pissed at both Casio and Yamaha for dropping this simple (inexpensive) yet so common feature.

Squeak

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 07-18-2006).]

George, I believe the example you cite is related to the MIDI channel limit. As stated in the YPG-625 manual: "By default (factory settings) the instrument ordinarily functions as a 16-channel multi-timbral tone generator,"

I believe the Casio 10 voice polyphony (for some tones) refers to actual voices played on the instrument in real time. If my interpretation is correct, I feel this is inadequate. As best I can determine, on my YPG-625, every tone uses one (1) voice of polyphony -- including the XG piano/string sound (though the Live! piano and ensemble strings dualed up sound much better). All the tones are stereo. Eg. You can hear more piano bass coming out of the left speaker, and more treble coming out of the right speaker. Yet, the 32 voice limit still applies.

I think of these models more as live performance instruments. If you want serious sequencing, I think you go to a computer.

From what I understand, reading this board and a couple others, the stereo piano sound on the Privias have a 16 voice limit. There would be some serious drop outs on some pretty simple songs. "Send In the Clowns" is one that comes to mind. (The piano arrangement that everyone plays.)

Rick

I think that both Yamaha and Casio are very good in their respective targeted markets.

Speaking as someone who had been in music retail for 30 years, who plays out, loves music and who teaches, I will discourage anyone from buying a Casio who is a beginner or any other level. Why? Many adult hobbyists are lucky to manage playing with both hands. Most will be started with single finger chords and most will continue with that. They want to have fun making music, they're not going to Carnegie Hall. Even if they think they want to learn 3 and 4 fingered chords and eventually buy a piano and play it fluently, it will not happen if their life depended on it.

So, I feel in all the discussions on this particular topic that I have ever seen, I do not recall that the most important subject has been touched on. Most hobbyists will be playing with one finger in each hand. Then when the minor chords come along they play with 2 fingers.

Yamaha and Casio have different easy play fingering systems. I always try to help a beginning student by having them get a Yamaha because they become accustomed to one fingering system and a OS that is similar on all of their instruments. If they want to upgrade, they can get a $3000 Tyros 2 or a $15,000 Clavinova at some point, and their playing will not be disrupted. It makes for much easier sailing.

How far up can one go in the Casio line? A few hundred dollars? Then what? They want to upgrade and then they have to attempt to learn a whole new easy play fingering system? I will not put my students through that extra agony.

Most adult hobbyist will never sequence, care about playing with drawbars and will have to put in plenty of effort just to understand the basic operation of the arranger controls, which is why they are interested in the first place. They want to be able to play live real music.

While these comments are leaning more towards older adults, I still believe the same thing for children and younger adults. Why subject them to one way of learning, and then want to change them?

Scott
http://ScottLMusic.com

I would never teach that easy finger[non musical] system...If you have an arranger student..still teach proper chording..When I taught students[arranger students], I used the Pointer system[books]..The ideal was based on third inversion chords..but made simple by using your pointing figure to the root of a chord , you thumb two steps to the right and your pinky three steps to the left,,As in the C maj chord..Pointer to the C, Thumb to the E, and pinky to the G...

Then no matter what board they advance to ..they have basic chord structure..They can also be taught piano play with out the false chording [one finger]..They will adapt to proper teaching of the piano..