Took the 4 day old PSR2000 out on its' first gig yesterday. It was nervous, I wasn't. Actually an easy low key venue as I've been playing there quite a while now, so I figured this might be a good way to break in the 2000 without freaking out. Spent the morning importing some of my fav jazz styles from my KN5K board as well as setting up some custom Registrations on the 2000 which allow me to play in more or less acoustic piano mode over the entire keyboard, yet play in split mode with one octave duplicated. Very cool approach I never implemented on the KN5K because it didn't recognize (in split mode) those dammed rootless chords I like so much. I love it that Yamaha does. Setup went relatively smoothly abeit some initial minor frustrations of not being able to do this or that. Once I glanced in the manual, I was able to figure it all out though. Arrived at the gig (happy hour at a local upscale senior village) with KB in hand. While I was setting up, a few of the regulars noticed the new PSR KB, perhaps because they had been so used to seeing my KN5000 with my logo name 'Scott Yee Entertainment' emblazened on the front (used to cover up the Technics logo name). A couple of people even asked if I had changed my name to Yamaha. My ethnic background is chinese (I'm 4th generation american), but people often mistake me for : japanese, hawaiian, fillipino, or even a euro-asian mixture. . . so when I perform a hawaiiain tune, I'm from hawaii, a country song, I'm from tennesse, a latin tune, brazil, but, I still haven't been able to totally convince the audience that I'm Polish yet, even though I do polkas too . . . Hey, I aim to please everyone! Everything went pretty smoothly. Not many glitches. If they came, I just covered them up with light hearted humour. They seemed to enjoy the spontaneity of it. Used the Vocal Harmonizer on a couple of tunes too. I didn't miss having the physical slider controls of the Digitech Vocalist Workstation (which I use with the KN5000) but I didn't put the vocalizer thru any heavy paces either.

OK, here is my latest evaluation of the PSR2000:

Plus':
- cosmetically pro looking board: no brightly colored buttons to make it look like a K-Mart special.
- EXTREMELY lightweight and portable.
- Internal speakers impressive sounding. Excellent for smaller venues and sounds great as a monitor for larger ones.
- decent sounding built in vocalizer with plenty of harmony options.
- chord recognition: very good to excellent - a number of modes and recognizes jazz (Bill Evans) type rootless chords. Chord recognition quick and responsive.
- good cross section of styles (except swing jazz: real wimpy, sounds like Band in a Box)
- Styles have separate drum & percusion drumkit sections. cool!
- some terrific rich sounds, especially the LIVE/COOL sounds carried over from the top of the line 9000pro/PSR9000.
- overall sounds/styles are warm and pleasing and work well together. The sounds are well balanced and the drums really kick, but not overly so. This maybe because due to high sampling rate and/or the awesome 1920ppq pattern sequencer timing resolution, Most Styles are tasteful and not overblown! Some people have complained that Yamaha styles sound too simplistic. I disagree. Afterall, the purpose of an arranger auto-accompaniment is to enhance YOUR performance, not dominate it.
- Awesome 1920ppq sequencer timing Resolution, at least that's what's reflected in the owners manual in the sequencer's screen window. I know of 'no other' hardware sequencer on the planet which even comes close.
- Very quick (1-2 sec) loading time of user style files from floppy diskette.
- The biggest PLUS - the PRICE! This may be the 'best value' in a mid line arranger keyboard produced ever.

Minus':
- Keyboard initially felt a tad spongy, but I actually now have grown to like it. Seems to help me play with creative expression.
- Acoustic piano sounds not as good as the 9000pro, KN6500, and SD1, but certainly acceptable, and better sounding than the PA80 & Roland's pianos (just my opinions of course because this is such a subjective matter). I also think the vibes sound a bit thin. I prefer a fatter warmer sound.
- Built in swing & jazz styles suck: they don't swing and breath very well to me.
- Mic volume level: You must press a button to go into a submenu. Would prefer a physical volume slider or knob instead, or at least direct access via MAIN screen window
- Limited Foot Pedal support. Only 2 single foot pedal outlets. Would like to have seen din plug jack to accept a multiple 7 pedal foot controler pedal unit . . but now that I hear that the Yamaha MFC10 'midi controled' multi pedaled foot controler will work with the PSR2000, then this may be a good workable solution.
- Manual is basically quite good but there are some 'feature details' which are not made clearly evident. The manual certainly is a big improvement over some of the badly translated (into English from Japanese or German) manuals I've seen in the past.

Ok, enough from me, I'm anxious to hear feedback on the PSR2000 from others now.

- Scott

[This message has been edited by Scottyee (edited 11-17-2001).]

Hi Scott,

Glad the 2000 is working so well for you.
I agree with a good bit of what you say here about the 200O. I've had mine almost a week now and I can easily access and use any function available on it, and I have already played around with user voices and styles, so I'll offer my 2 cents with a review ala Ketron AJ's format in his review of the SD1, KN series, and PA80 a few days ago. Since the questions have come in recently about the PA80 I'll give my comments on both as well on another post.

Enjoy,
AJ

Scott, regarding the Vibes voice, you might play around with the effects. They can make a big difference and sometimes what the factory guy who set the defaults likes may not be the same as what you want.
Just a suggestion. . .
DonM

On a related topic, I finally tried recording with the sequencer. In other PSR's you just select the Digital Record Mode, Song, New, and start playing. With the 2000, you must first create a New Song, then go to the Record menu, unless I'm doing something wrong. It's not a big deal, just a little different.
DonM

The creation of new registrations threw me off a bit at first too Don. I finally got the hang of it though. I have to think a little more in terms of actual computer functions I think when saving files or accessing certain things on this board. Still, I find it for me a bit easier to operate than the PA80 though. I had to read a lot of the rather lengthy manual to be able to get around on the PA80 and still sometimes occasionally I have to go back to the manual because at times it can baffle me a bit. I'm a musician, not a computer tech and although I understand computers ok and have a good basic working knowledge of them and midi stuff in particular, at times I can get thrown off when all I want to do is play music( almost brings back flashbacks of the Star Trek line, " Damnit, I'm a doctor Jim " ).

I've barely touched the 2000 manual yet and I can already use all of its features without a hitch. Even though it has many more functions than the 740 did, and things operate somewhat differently, I still understand the way Yamaha has things laid out better I guess.

AJ

Hi Scott,
great review I enjoyed reading it.
Eric

I am thoroughly enjoying my 2000, but there is one feature, very different from my PSR540, that I think should be added to the Minus' list.

Yamaha is using LEDs to signal which style pattern is selected and also to signal the status of the 8 registration banks. A RED LED has one meaning, a GREEN LED has another. They also use this RED/GREEN distinction in the LED above the Start/Stop button to indicate the 1st beat of a measure. This interface, fine for most people, is NOT FINE for color-blind people. If I look closely, I can just about distinguish that one of the four style buttons looks different from the others. But there is no way I can figure out which of four flashing beat indicators is different from the others. And there is nothing in the visual panel to indicate the first beat of a measure. In many styles, this doesn't matter since it is obvious where the first beat is. But it isn't always obvious in every style. I do hope Yamaha can correct this problem in the next OS upgrade.

Hi Joe: You make an excellent point. My Technics keyboard uses a 4 LED system to keep track of beat/time. The first LED flashes RED for beat 1, the second LED flashes green for beat 2, third LED green for beat 3, and fourth LED green for beat 4. This way, even if you are color blind, you will at least see the lights flashing from left to right. When I first got the PSR2000 (though I'm not color blind), it took a little while to adjust to ONE flashing LED light changing to red on beat one. I've adjusted to this now, but I definitely would have prefered the 4 LED indicator approach, because that way you always know exactly WHICH beat in the measure you are at.
- Scott

Hi all. I could not understand why Yamaha have to make stuppid changes in each new keyboard. When talking about the beat indicator LEDs, the PSR 8000 was excellent, the PSR 9000 looks funny, with big, wide LED's, and PSR 2000 is the worst. Why can't they stay with one way? Do somebody out there remember the old PSR-6300? Remember how easy it was? Everything so clear. Lately all manufecturers decided to put everything into an LCD screen, and nothing onboard. The PSR 8000 used to have song rew/ff/pause buttons onboard, PSR9000 deletes this feature. PSR 8000 doesn't have a TEMPO DIAL, no "Touch" button onboard. In other words, every new model brings a lot of new features, ant deletes some others. Is that normal? Instead of making better and better, they making crazy?

Before the PSR-2000 arrived, I thought it will be a great keyboard, meaning most features of the PSR-9000, minus the sampling and other stuff like that which people like me arne't interested in. But I'm a little disapointed. The Drums are far not the real ones as the 9000. It's the basic drum kits of the old PSR-630. I think that even the PSR-740's drum kits are more real than the PSR-2000.

One thing, I asked Yamaha a long time ago, I was first happy to see. To put LED indicators on the registration memories. As Roland, Technics and others are doing. But while trying it out, I got more upset and disapointed: who needs red and green lights? Are this traffic lights? Why couldn't they make everything simple like the competitors? When will Yamaha have make a keyboard all people should like it?

PSR-2000 deletes a nice feature from the PSR-740: Count Intro & Simple Ending. Adding stuppid features, like a demo of each sound, is not a good "trade off"...

I don't want to put this keyboard as garbage. In overall it's a nice keyboard, And maybe I would buy it soon. But if, and I hope that, Yamaha is reading this board they should know what's bothers me...

Hope next keyboard will be better (Not just the same, with changing color LCD... as PSR 550...)

Sorry for my English, hope everybody understand. Comments? Reply!

On this point, I think I disagree. The "instrument" demos will certainly be helpful to salesman trying to demonstrate the instrument, but, as a new user, I also found it enlightening to hear the demos of the various instruments -- many of which I have never seen or heard before. The demos not only displayed the sound of the instrument, but also put that sound in a context where that instrument was appropriate. That helps users understand on what kind of music or songs that instrument might go well. Over time, I'll see if the novelty of this wears off. That is why I started this with "I think I disagree."

I do question the usefulness of the "tutorial" built into the machine. It may be useful in selling, but do owners need this all the time? Why couldn't the tutorial functions be provided on a floppy to be used when the machine is new or when needed. I would have prefered that memory space be used for storing more "user" styles or registrations.

Hi,

About Beat indication, are you all forgetting that PSR 2000 has in the Main screen a Beat indicator using numbers for beat 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4...? and also a measure counting, changing at the first beat ?
So, for the same purpose there are two methods: one led with two colours and numbers in the screen.

Regards
Carlos Rodrigues

Carlos: Thanks for pointing out the LCD beat 'changing number' indicator on the main screen, but...

I find watching the pale LCD numbers 'changing shape' more confusing than helpful. I MUCH prefer the four LED (red for beat ONE, green for others 3 beats) approach better. Seeing a 'fixed size' illuminated LED moving left to right just makes more sense when you're trying to get into the rythmic groove and find the downbeat ONE.
Just my opinion. - Scott

Scott and the others,

I find all this discussion about the beat indicators rather interesting. I never need to watch the beat indicator to tell if I'm on beat one or not. That is why the good Lord gave me ears. They tell me where the beat is. For those of us that play with a live drummer and bass player there never was a beat indicator. Quit whining and use your ears. You should never be so engrossed in what you are playing that you forget to listen to the music.

Tom

Sam,
The count intro, simple endings, etc., are not gone. You must select them from the screen though. A little less friendly.
DonM

Forgetting? No, I hadn't even noticed that! That beat indicator is in the Lyrics section of the main screen and I hadn't noticed it. That solves my problem. Thanks a bunch Carlos!

Tom, I do have ears and can easily hear the first beat for most styles. But I encountered some styles, with only a piano playing softly in the background - no bass, no rhythm, no strumming -- , and it wasn't at all obvious where the first beat was.

OK

[QUOTE]Originally Mic volume level: You must press a button to go into a submenu. Would prefer a physical volume slider or knob instead.
----------------------------------
Scottee, The 2000 does have a mic. volume knob on the rear! Go Figure!!
Why didn't they put it on top so you could reach it.
Nobby


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[This message has been edited by Nobby (edited 11-20-2001).]

Tom: what did you say about 'using our ears' again? I couldn't quite 'hear' you.

Nobby: You're right about the mic knob being on the back of the keyboard, but please remember, this specific mic knob is really only to be used for making initial mic 'input' settings. After you set it, you just leave it alone. All futher mic level adjustments should be made using the mic volume level control which appears on the PSR2000 screen.

BTW: I now 'take back' my initial complaint about having to go into 'submenu' screen to access the mic volume slider. I recently realized that you can easily set things up to have ALL the PSR2000's volume balances (including mic volume level) appear on the MAIN Page all the time. By just pressing the 'Balance' button, The MAIN page will then permanently display all the PSR2000's volume balance levels (until you want to change it). You are now able to both view (at all times) and adjust the volume levels (at a moments notice). Life is GOOD!

"FLASHBACK"..................

Hmmmmmmmmm funny how things change in time!

(originally posted by Joe Waters)
I do question the usefulness of the "tutorial" built into the machine. It may be useful in selling, but do owners need this all the time? Why couldn't the tutorial functions be provided on a floppy to be used when the machine is new or when needed. I would have prefered that memory space be used for storing more "user" styles or registrations.
----------------------------------------

Joe I totally agree with this.. One keyboard I've owned that did this was Casio MZ-2000.. Bluezplayer remembers this too. The "help" was on a disk. They didn't take up space for this.. If you didn't understand something you just loaded in the disk and selected what you wanted to better understand. I also think the internal demos are pointless too.. Granted they help the salesperson demo the board, but what use do we get out of them? I think these should also be on a disk as well. This gives more room for sound and features (something we all want)...

Squeak

Scott,
Glad you are enjoying your PSR2000. I bought mine in the beginning of August and have been enjoying it every day.
So far, for how I play, the styles have been acceptable to me. I have only my PS55 to compare it to and that only had drum not styles to back the tunes up. I had tried the 550 and 740 before I bought this (untried and unheard) based on the suggestions of this group! I try to play at least an hour every day on it and learn at least one new thing each time if I can.
I also understand about the color-blind situation. It is difficult to design an interface to accomodate everyone. I built a web-based system for a client and the interface had color coded indicators to let them know the progress. It turned out my main user was color-blind! He joked about it at first but I also included the words right next to the colored buttons that would indicate the same thing! Pretty much like the main screen indicator counters.
I like the OTS link on the styles and have used that very often to change beats/instruments in a song to make it sound more alive. Even the fill-in when switching makes it sound like I'm doing more than I am.
On the negative I would pick the intros/endings since most of them don't really match my songs but once in a while I get lucky with them. I mark all of my music when to switch styles/instruments/breaks, etc. and than helps as well.

Squeak,
I liked your suggestion on the tutorial on diskette. (or more than one) and use the memory for improving/adding other functionality. I also agree with Joe that it is a nice feature to get a "feel" for all of the instruments and how to use them.

Really enjoying my 2000,
- Brian

Wow, I can't believe it's been almost a year to the day since I first purchased the PSR2000. Ok, maybe I'm a pound or so heavier now, and you might spot a gray hair or two (if you look hard enough), but as far as the PSR2000, it's still sounding and performing well (for all my gigs) as terrific as ever. It's really weird to re-read my review after a full year, to discover that my impressions about it haven't changed really changed all that much. I STILL think its sounds and styles are terrific, especially now that I got it totally tweaked (for me), and outfitted with all my own custom styles & song registrations, and have the MusicFinder database filled with my core (yet ever changing) song repetoire. The cool thing about keyboards these days is that you can customize them to reflect exactly who you are.

Some people have critisized Yamaha's styles as being too simple, but for me this is one of the reasons I especially like them. Instead of arranger styles which overwhelm & draw attention away from the keyboard performer, Yamaha styles provide 'just enough' window dressing to highlight YOUR LIVE keyboard performance instead of distracting from it. The BIG thing I like most about Yamaha style patterns are its fills. The purpose of fills are to provide a transition mark from one variation to another. A dynamic sounding fill lends interest and drama to a style transition. A rhythmic drum fill (kick, snare, and/or toms) is typically played in pop music to 'introduce' each new section of a song. Some arranger keyboard manufacterers (especially Technics & I've even noticed this with Ketron, though not as much) emphasize more melodic insturmental fills (piano,strings, guitar, horns, etc) and subsequently downplay the drum part fills. I prefer hearing a tasty drum fill allowing me to play whatever instrumental fills in myself live. Too many instrumental fills played by the auto-accompaiment arranger are frequent give aways that can quickly destroy the audience's impression that you're playing with a real live band. On the other hand, drums fills (snare, hihat, cymbals, etc) placed at key positions throughout the song provide impressive realism and energy that really make the song 'come alive'. It's my feeling that Yamaha styles excel in this department. Ok, a year with the PSR2000 has approached. Is it time to purchase another keyboard yet? I'm not sure , but my love affair with the PSR2000 definitely isn't over, at least not until the fat lady sings.

- Scott

That lady sang a loooong time ago to me !
Glad you're still happy, though!

I'm with You Scottee!!!
Still a great board!
Nobby