Hi...

i have put new Infos about KN 7000
on my Website. New Pictures are online too...

Greets
Thomas
www.thkmcs.de

Thanks, that KN7000 looks neat....and also looks familiar enough that the learning curve shouldn't be bad at all.

Marilyn

I can't find the panel memory selection buttons in the photo. . . Maybe they are display buttons?

I would sure like to see something written by Technics re specs for poly and that sort of thing. It's hard to be patient.

I do believe if you look carefully that they are now arranged in a circle on the right, maybe so you don't need to stretch from Set to 8 anymore, one handed rather than two handed programming maybe???

I think you are right, Alec. I would rather have them closer to the center of the keyboard though, because I often use my left hand with left hold working to hit the panel memory change just before a right hand key action. Hope my four way foot controller will work with the KN7000.

I have studied the KN7000 photograph, and compared it to the my KN6000. I think the following functions belong to the KN7000 buttons (with a little bit of guessing):

LEFT TOP ROW:
-4 Sliders for Main volume, APC/Sequencer volume, Mic volume and Audio file volume
-4 grey buttons for the Sound Arranger and Auto play chord functions
-Yellow button: something to do with loading from the SD card ???
-16 buttons which represent the Rhythm groups

LEFT BOTTOM ROW:
-The Demo song button, and the performance pads section
-Music Style arranger, one touch play, split point and Variation & MSA
-Fade in/out, Tap tempo, synchro&break, Fill in, Intro&ending and start/stop

CENTRE:
-The Display: same buttons as KN6000/6500
(although, it appears that there are 2 more buttons on the right side of the "other parts/tr" and "help" button)

RIGHT TOP ROW:
-18 buttons that represent the Sound Groups
-8 grey buttons: I really don't know what the function of these buttons is ??? Something to do with playing the audio files or SD card functions ?
-4 buttons: play, easy rec, program menus and disk load
-Yellow button: loading from the SD card ??

RIGHT BOTTOM ROW:
-Tempo/program wheel
-Transpose, R1/R2 octave
-Conductor with part select, and above it solo and techni-chord buttons
-Round shaped panel memory section, with above it 2 buttons for bank select
-3 buttons placed in a circle for selecting: Music stylist, favorites and customize

Maybe someone can complete this description with the missing information...

kind regards, Bart

I guess Bart has made some very intelligent guesses!

I did sneak a look on the stage but sorry to say did not write anything down, so can't remember in any great detail now. The black strip above the keys was maybe fabric and I think someone said it was a port for the bass, but maybe the bass ported elsewhere so cannot be sure about this. The demo was through large monitors, not the built in speakers.

However to the right of the black strip was a section with tape recorder like controls, play, stop, previous track, next track, etc and a little jewel door for the flash card. This also had a lighting effect which you can just see in this picture. So this section must control audio or files on the flash card presumably. This was the 'Star Ship Enterprise' looking effect.

One thing that looks like a negative to me is that the distance from the keyboard to the often-used FILL and VARIATION buttons, looks to be much greater than on KN-6x00. I often press FILLs and VARIATION changes with my left hand while playing chords. It looks like this has gone from a 1" reach to maybe 5-6" (from ~2cm to maybe 12-13cm). I can program my footswitch to do FILLS, but I like to change Variations fairly often too.

I think overall the "reach" to get from playing the keybord to the controls, quickly while playing to make a change in sound or rhythm, will be noticably greater than it is on the KN-6000 and earlier keyboards.

There are several websites around the net who start bring up pictures of the new KN700, mostly Germans as far as I can see.
But the written info is not any much "breaking news" yet, as far as I can see it is about the same as we see in the reports (also here at SZ) from the Frankfurt Messe earlier this year.

I'm not too sure if I like the new design at all, and certainly not the "edges" at both side of the keys.
The big panel may look great for those of us who like aeroplanes and spaceships, but will it be any good when playing the keyboard?
I guess this is questions who will be answered when the real thing is to be tested in my dealers store, in the meantime I'll continue enjoy my KN5000
GJ

yes, its the same info as the brochure that I reported from the Frankfurt show in March, so no new snippets yet...

The pictures appear to have come from:
http://www.pianoschmitz.de/elektronik/keyboard/technics/frame3.htm