Hi,

Has anyone experience with the Wersi Abacus ? I've looked on the Wersi internet site, and I've downloaded some mp3 demo's. To me it sounds very, very good.
What are the main differences of this arranger keyboard with for example the KN6500 or the 9000PRO ?
And, last but not least...does anyone know how much the Abacus costs ?

Please your reaction...

regards, Bart

Here is an excerpt from a fellow who wrote me from overseas re: the Abacus - notice his preference.

Forget the Abacus, it's a load of rubbish (expensive rubbish at £4000+).
I heard it about 9 months ago at Brett Wales's house who is a Wersi demonstrator. His playing was terrible, the instrument was terrible and their video on the Abacus is also poor. It's a wonder how they actually sell any of these.
I have now sold the VA76 but still use my Roland G1000 and Ketron SD1. I was one of the first in the UK to own a SD1 and with the new version 2 software update it rocks! If you are serious about keyboards and would prefer a 76 note one, the SD1 is the best by far on the market. It's easy to use, has large sampled sounds (the saxophones, pianos, choirs, strings, organs and guitars are astonishing) and the styles, well, I can't find one that I don't like or isn't useable.
The hard drive is great, very quick. I've tried the vocal harmoniser that comes as standard and it works very well. I was quite surprised by this feature. It's far better than a Digitech vocalist.
I can honestly say the SD1 is the best arranger I've purchased and I've had quite a few over the years.

Bart...Regarding the Wersi Abacus, living in the UK I have attended a number of keyboard festivals where the Abacus has been demonstrated and also available to play. I think the sounds are very good and the live drums are excellent. It has had a CD Burner included if required which does bring the price upwards of £4000 UK pounds, which is expensive, but it has real draw bars and Brett Wales demonstrates it very well.
I think Brett Wales is becoming one of the worlds top performers within the Keyboard \ Organ scene.

Graham UK

I agree with everything Graham says. Brett
is a fantastic organist. I have seen him perform many times and he is,IMHO, a perfect replacement for Klaus Wunderlich. The Wersie organs/keyboards are expensive but the sounds, drums etc., are superb.

Take a look at Brett's web site "www.organfax.co.uk/players/brettwales.
html" You will see his extremely full
list of concert engagements for 2002 or take
a look at the Wersie uk site "www.wersie.uk.
com/abacus.htm" where you can download mp3's.

Incidentally, I am a committed Technics player but I can still appreciate other makes of fine instruments and talented players.

The Wersi Abacus, finally people have started to talk about a arranger that has been ahead of the game for some time now. The Abacus has an Intel CPU, Windows 98, CD burner etc., it's a computer actually. You can have a modem, video card, imagine having all your software in your board. It has a 61 key, and a add-on 76 key. It is a kb that you can upgrade for years and years. It is very expensive but expandability and upgrades keep you ahead of the new boards. The sounds are very life like and its' features are to many to list. The Genesis has been the new topic of conversation, but the Abacus has more and has been out for 2 years and like I said its a Windows based PC you can do what you want with it.

You can also get a cup of coffee during the many crashes that are SURE to happen during a performance that is too intense for the processor. Live performance and "total" reliance on a pc is not compatible yet - too scary. For every success story, I can give you three nightmares.

Now if you could upgrade it to WinXP, I would give it some respect for live performances. So far XP seems to be working absolutely crash free on my machines.
But with win98, I have to agree with Uncle Dave. Crashes are as common as snow flakes in a canadian winter. I can't imagine what Wersi must have done to win98 to make it stabler. If anything they probably made it worse.
BTW, can you upgrade the wersi to winxp?

Hi!
sorry to disappoint you but i play the Wersi Abacus fro three months now most nights a week and there were NO Crashes!
Please understand that the 'instability'o f Windows systems is mainly due to conflicts in the various software components installed.
if someone 'plays around'in a Windows PC by installing and unistalling software then problems will arise.My concern before byuing it was the possible Hard Disk problems but i have an exact copy on another Hard Disk 'just in case' .

What cosel says is completely true. In the case of a company like Wersi putting out a system like the Abacus they can fine tune drivers that will work rock solid. Unlike the rest of the PC world that has to supply hardware and software that has to work reasonably well with any combination of software and hardware, Wersi know exactly what hardware will be on the Abacus. Writing stable software for known hardware has always been possible, even under Windows. It is much of the reason that the Mac has traditionally been more stable than the PC due to the fact that there are much fewer 3rd party options for that platform so less potential problems to deal with.

Well, THAT makes perfect sense. Actually, when I think of it, the only time my pc crashes is AFTER I've added lots of stuff to the original configuration ( The way it is INTENDED to be used!)So, I guess, like anything else, a specialized system works better than a generalized one.