I Want to Buy an Excellent Digital Piano!

Copy of the reply to the other Post

Hey there, Lucia!

Welcome to the site and wishing you much fun and a pleasant stay.

Salerno is a magnificent city, still human-scaled, which I often revisit.

I was born in Vietri sul Mare, but for a lifetime now I have been living here in Rome, also a beautiful city, but not human-scaled!

Regarding your question, if you enter "digital piano" into the search box (top right, where you see the little green magnifying glass) and activate the search, you will see that the topic has already been discussed in several threads. I hope this satisfies your curiosity soon.

Bye and happy studying !!!!

lucia wrote:

I would like some advice on the type of digital piano that comes close to the performance of an acoustic piano, meaning one that offers the pianist a faithful reproduction of the sensations experienced when playing a real piano, especially in terms of touch. I am not interested in special functions except for the built-in metronome so that I can practice. I know it will never be an acoustic piano, but I would like it to reproduce the simulation of an acoustic piano with the same effects... sostenuto, string resonance, key release... etc.. furthermore, I wonder if buying a high-end used digital piano can be risky. Thank you

The search is not simple; as for me, I tried a few a few months ago in an instrument shop, and (at least as far as I am concerned) although some Korg models are excellent but cost around 700/750 euros new (and used they can be found for about 450/500, which isn't much anyway), and others from different brands, I found a "compromise" between cost and keyboard quality, and I chose a Casio CDP 200r. Casio always makes you think of games, accompaniment keyboards, and nothing more, but I chose this piano mainly because it has weighted keys similar to an acoustic piano relative to the different registers; in practice, the keys in the bass register are slightly heavier than those in the middle and treble registers.

The sound is not bad, but obviously it cannot be compared to the sounds of virtual libraries like East West, Vsl Library, Ivory, Sampletekk, etc... but for the cost involved, it can do (personal opinion). The flaw of this piano is the noise the keys make even at the moment of release; it is a mechanical issue. Personally, I am thinking about how to modify the situation since, after all, it is not an acoustic piano and I don't risk doing serious damage.

I use it for technique (small preparatory exercises for piano technique); I bought it expressly for this reason, but I also use it to write and play "freely," because I have an acoustic piano that needs tuning, but it has been at least 10 years since I last played it because the people in the apartment building don't understand that instead of hearing stadium trumpets, an acoustic instrument is a godsend. However, a non-negligible factor is obviously the person playing it; I don't know how to play, I say that clearly, but the moment I know how to do something, I will be very happy to play it without using headphones, which I use regularly (so as not to annoy anyone).

The piano I am talking about, the Casio, can now also be found for 250 euros; it came out 2/3 years ago.

Anyway, the best thing (we are back to that) is to try them as much as possible personally. If there is a shop in your area, spend a few hours there; you must absolutely like it immediately. The weight of the keys, the touch, the sound—you can verify those immediately—but you must also pay attention to this problem of key noise; digital pianos have this flaw. Now, I don't know if there are models where this flaw is minimized; let's see what others say.

Certainly, the typical characteristic of an acoustic piano (not upright), double escapement, is not possible; furthermore, the typical point where the key of an acoustic piano, after being pressed, can lower a bit more until it reaches the end of its stroke—in digital pianos (at least for me) I haven't encountered this feature, and I don't think it is available.

There are hybrid acoustic pianos, however; they cost much more, and you just insert headphones to automate acoustic isolation and allow the digital function; I am still talking about upright pianos.

Piccinesco wrote:

Certainly, the typical characteristic of the acoustic piano (non upright), double escapement, is not possible; furthermore, the typical point where the acoustic piano key, after being pressed, can lower a bit more until it reaches the end of its travel, in digital pianos (at least for me) I have not encountered this feature, and I do not think it is available.

There are, however, hybrid acoustic pianos; they cost much more, and you just need to plug in headphones to automate the acoustic isolation and allow the digital function; I am always referring to upright pianos.

The simulation of double escapement has already been made available for a few years on many digital pianos. Hybrid acoustics are those equipped with a silent device, but from what I have been told, the piano will no longer be the same. In any case, even if it had not made changes to the weights, I would have always preferred to buy a digital piano rather than having my acoustic piano modified...

A few months, maybe a year ago, I saw a website showing the modification of an acoustic piano; in that case, a MIDI controller was applied, practically making it like a silent piano.

There are also pianos designed with the silent mechanism, equipped from the factory with this device.

I also purchased a Casio CDP 200r piano a year ago (price 500 euros); as has already been said, I use it solely to have the possibility of playing every day since I have an acoustic piano at home (which needs tuning) and I brought the Casio digital one with me to my rented house at university =P in the end, I think these digital pianos can only be functional for the purpose of playing every day (besides the clear advantage of being able to play whenever you want without disturbing anyone); to play classical pieces of a certain depth (I mention, for example, the 1st movement of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata), obviously the digital one "flattens them a bit," but for study purposes it can work. regarding the problem of the very annoying noise of the keys, I personally place headphones on my ears (I recommend AKG) and in this way you won't notice this problem. in my opinion, they should have improved the sustain pedal, in my view it is not suitable... it feels more as if I had pressed the sustain pedal of an acoustic piano halfway.

I repurposed a MIDI pedal that I had had for at least 15 years; I placed it on the floor with double-sided tape, otherwise the difficulty becomes doubled.

Result? In the end, I am so used to doing things in an uncomfortable way that certainty and stability, even in this area, have seen me little inclined, almost causing more problems, absurd.

Anyway, regarding the noise of the keys, I didn't mean that it bothered me, but that it would bother others; that is the problem, it makes a real racket especially in fast pieces. For the person playing, the problem almost doesn't exist, as they are "soundproofed" in their headphones, but for those not listening to what is being played, it just sounds like a mess; try playing even randomly with the volume at zero, it's deafening.

ahahahah it's true, in fact every now and then I test it: "what I listen to vs. what my roommates listen to" is the effect; for my roommates, it's like an annoying earthquake in progress =) let's just say that fortunately, by closing the room door, even that problem is resolved, then if I realize I'm being a nuisance, I'll play some exercises or slower pieces.

anyway regarding the resonance pedal, based on what you're saying, so it can be changed and you can find a pedal that holds the sound longer? because as mentioned above, it becomes a problem when you want to play pieces where the pedal is dominant (in the case of the digital one, I am forced to keep my foot almost constantly on the pedal and lift it very little) but the problem is that then when you go back to the acoustic pedal, you have to readjust your foot for a moment =P

For the acoustic, no problem, I haven't touched it since 2001.

Instead, playing the digital one without the pedal until some time ago, I got into the habit of writing pieces without using the pedal; the sound is drier, less muddied

due to a poorly distributed use of it, and for the moment it's fine like this, also because I have tried with some pieces, the sustain is too prolonged even if the waltz tempo played is not

exactly slow.