Here's a link to a WK-3000 User page in New Zealand with a link to the manual (originally provided by me):
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~edmin/

Hope this helps (By the way, the WK-3000 is being sold by Costco stores)!

Michael

So....Gary,

How did you like the Casio WK-3500?

Looked at the 3000, and pretty much agree with just about everything that George Key posted. It's not in the same league with the 2000/2100, but for the amount of money, especially for someone that's not out there entertaining, it's a great board. The piano sounds were Ok, but just OK, even with a bit of tuning. They didn't have the depth of the Yamaha higher priced models. The guitar and sax sounds, at least to my aging ears, were not even close. As for styles, they were kinda' busy, but some were quite good and very dancable. Overall, for a low end board, I would have to rate it quite high, much higher than some similar priced boards from other manufacturers.

Thanks for the post Linda,

Gary

It was nice to see the manual. So it appears they dropped the user style recording, and replaced that with 16 slots to import styles.

Squeak

Just had a listen to the demos.. Man after listening to the first one I'd say it has MZ-2000 all over it. That board sounds just like the MZ.. Ohhh how I miss those MZ saxes. When I do buy a new keyboard if I find a mint condition MZ for sale, I'd buy that one over the PSR-1000/1100 any day. The MZ even has the edge on the 1100 as far as I'm concerned... Never wanted to sell that board, but do to space limitations I had to... Casio did one hell of a job with the organs on the 300/3500.. I can't believe they put drawbars on a keyboard for less than $400 Even though it doesn't record styles, you can still midi sync a drum machine to it. My only complaint is that Casio could have a done a little better job with the drums. I don't know, maybe it's me, but I always felt the toms left a bit to be desired..

Squeak

I wonder how the new Roland's (EXR-3, EXR-5) will fare against these new Casios? They are in the same price range. I bet Roland never expected competition coming from Casio.
Starkeeper

Hi all, I'm new here. I just tried the WK-3000, 3500 and 691 Casios out... they sound incredible! I currently have a Yamaha P-150 which is a great 88 key weighted keyboard but which is not multitimbral, so one of the new Casios at sub $400 seems like a no brainer. However I have a question or two (some, perhaps silly) that maybe someone can help me with.

1. I've narrowed my choice down to the wk3500 and the ctk-691, solely because the modulation button on the 3000 seems like a real bummer. My biggest question is, is there some way I could route pitch bend and modulation wheel midi data to the 691 using my Yamaha, which of course has two wheels? I use a Midi sequencer on my PC and have a Creamware Pulsar sound card. THere must be some way I could configure this, so I could still use that sweet Rotary on the 691 (because if you can't turn it on and off, what a shame!). If I could do this somehow, the lack of PW and MW on the 691 wouldn't hurt so much. And I could save 200 bucks. Anyone?

2. Are the speakers on the 3500 better/stronger than the 691?

3. How useful is that disk drive, really?

4. Does the lack of two output jacks (L and R) on the 691 really matter, given that the one it has is Stereo?

5. Are there any other glaring features that make the 691 inferior? From what I understand, the only diffrences are: 61 keys, has only one output jack, no disc drive, no PB and MW, no dedicated drawbar buttons. But the sounds, the memory capabilities, and everything else are identical. Right?

Alright, thanks in advance!

The CTK-691 doesn't have a Smartmedia card slot and the speaker system is only half as powerful as the WK-3000 & 3500 models (3 watts per side instead of 6). For an additional 100.00 I think the WK-3000 is well worth the extra expenditure. Especially with all the extra data that Casio has made available for download, it would be great to be able to store it all on a Smartmedia card, along with a bunch of MIDI files. The onboard Flash memory is only about 1.5MB.

Hope this helps!

Michael

Thanks. Can anyone give advice about the other questions, particularly #1?

Impressive piano for Casio. INFACT! I think it sounded better than what KORG has!