Am I the only one that think this sounds incredibly sweet to be software?

NI Elektrik Piano

The Tyros has good electric piano sounds in my opinion, but this sound is, at least in the demo sound clip I gave, just way beoynd what the Tyros can do in my opinion...!

Best regards,
YamahaAndy

[This message has been edited by YamahaAndy (edited 03-13-2005).]

Yep it sounds great with all the expressivness and emotion I recall from Rhodes. I just bought a M-audio Keystation Pro 88 which seems to have the clunky feel of a Rhodes action, so it should feel right for me. Have you be able to load up your NI version yet? I wonder if they are doing the samples using velocity xfades or just how ? I sure hope we don't have to load numerous articulations. Any idea yet?

Thanks

Danny

[This message has been edited by pianodano (edited 03-13-2005).]

Yes I have been able to load it up with a crap sound card and played a little on the PC keyboard. It was dry and somehow sharp and not at all like the the demo. I think it was because I tried it with my PC speakers! I thought I could imagine that the deepness was really there and I remember I wanted to be able to try it with a better audio interface and through my Mackie HR824 speakers. I also remember I was a little dissapointed by the rest of the sounds, I remember it was really only the MK1 that I thought was exciting...

The instrument is very simple, you just load the voice (MK1,MK2 etc) from the DVD and play remotely via MIDI. It is fast. You can also add effects... No articulations or any difficult about it, really straight forward. It is like playing NI B4...

Hopefully I will get the RME Fireface 800 this week and then I will be able to analyze the sound of it in detail. I am a huge fan of electric pianos and want to learn what I get from something like the NI Elektrik Piano. I will compare it with the Yamaha Tyros to get a good picture of on what kind of a level it is. However, I have already got a feeling that it will win over the Yamaha Tyros, at least when it comes to the MK1 sound.

Cool that you want to have the true realism of key feeling as well, that is really important! I will try playing on three different MIDI connected keyboards in order to really get a clue of what it feels like playing the NI Elektrik Piano... I will report my findings...!

Hi YamahaAndy,

Thanks for your reply. I will be looking forward hearing what you think with a decent sound card. I bet it will sound great through your 824's. I must say that I love my pair. BTW, I know you ruled out the DM24 with IF/FW, but I really believe Tascam will do the right thing shortly and release the update so that the IF/FW will run at 96K. The mixer is a joy yo use for me because I have a lot of outboard effects. I add some effects "in the box", send some out of the box via track busses to outboard effects and usually send everything back in the box, plus I have plenty of inputs to keep every thing plugged in at all times. About 6 mos back, I finally got the DM24 controlling Sonar including the auotmation (either in the box or DM24 automation). The only disappointment I have ever had with Tascam is that it took over them over a year to release the IF/FW. I almost bought the MOTU/w tdif but I am glad I waited. The set up works flawlessly. I am now just about ready to get the UA Studio pak but it seems like a lot of the guys are having trouble with it over at the Cakewalk forum. My whole system is running so well I am really afraid of introducing anything that could screw it up. I would be very interested in knowing if you have any thoughts on this.

Thanks,

Danny

[This message has been edited by pianodano (edited 03-14-2005).]

Hi Danny,

What did you ever do about your Tyros? Did you ditch it and get something that works well with Sonar or did you just learn to live with it or ?

The reason I ask is that I too have run into the brick wall of the Tyros not being very suitable for use with Sonar. In fact, it does something really irritating; some times Sonar or other software, sends a message that it interprets as "turn on tremolo" and it makes some of the right hand voices go "wonky" and bad sounding by adding tremolo to them. If I want to simply use the Tyros as a controller for softsynths, I can just remove the midi cable back into the Tyros and solve the problem, but it's a real PITA!

In any event, I agree with you that the Tyros is not well designed to be used as a midi controller with software sequencers on a computer.

Thanks,
Tom

------------------
Bigger is not always better

Hi!

Yeah I finally chose to go analog. I did it for a number of reasons, the nr one reason was the price. The price wouldn't have been so high if I would have been able to record @ 96 KHz with the Tascam. But I also wanted to be able to play virtual instruments at 192 KHz sampling rate because such samples will be reality within a couple of years. The second reason was that I thought I wouldn't at least now start mixing manually and therefore wouldn't lose anything with a high quality analog mixer with high quality mic pre amps, since there would be only one A/D conversion in the signal path on the recording. I plan on MIDI mixing in the computer with my keyboard tracks and the audio tracks manually in the computer, but if this will be efficient enough remains yet to be seen. It will have an impact on the recording process and that might become a problem but I thought in that case I could buy a programmable USB MIDI controller. I also imagined doing digital mixdown, but when I started thinking about digital outboard effects it became way too expensive for me. So I thought on this kind of a budget I get much sound quality for the price even though I go analog and I thought I would still be able to work pretty flexibly. But I admit it would be nice with digital mixing automation together with the sequencer.

Regarding the UA Studio PAK I don't know so much about it yet, I know what it does, but I haven't tested it or read any reviews of it yet so I think I cannot comment on it at this moment. But effects are very important and getting great effects at 192KHz speaks for itself.

I myself won't go with Cakewalk. I think it is not as robust or powerful as Cubase SX. I have tried all the versions of it. To me Cubase SX seems a little more professional working with and the Nuendo package from Steinberg really tells me they have deep knowledge. The SX v2.2. should be pretty stable.

BTW, I bought a new hard drive today, a Maxtor Diamondmax 10 @ 300GB and SATA, NCQ. I will spend 10% - 40% (30GB - 120GB) of it max and it will be a dedicated drive. It is faster and quieter than a lot of SCSI drives and is great value for the money right now. Everything will be fresh when my studio is finished.

Danny, I would like to know more about the UA studio PAK. Well, a friend of mine is waiting for me to visiting him so I have to run now...

Best regards,
YamahaAndy

Hi Tom,

Hope you are doing well. Yes I still have the Tyros. I sure have spent a bundle trying to get away from it though. I use it for inspiration and developing ideas mostly now. Sometimes I will cheat and dump a style drum part into Sonar and then map the part somewhere else. I just had to face the fact that it was not able to be the centerpiece in my case. (if I may say that). I bought a real bass (what the heck I played one years ago and it definitely works better than the mega voice stuff, bought a set of Electronic drums, bought a Hammond xk3, TC Helicon Voice Works and am now quickly accquiring sample libaries. My favorites so far are EWQLSO (wow) and Real Guitar. I am just thrilled with the last 2 mentioned and they are both very easy to use. They sound real to me. I am really anxious to accquire Collosus by EWQL.

YamahaAndy,

Nope, I will stick with Sonar. Very very happy with 4 Pro. Problem with Steinberg is that it's now got Yamaha's name on it. Yamaha has insulted me enough already. I was really planning to get a C3 disklavier Grand when the recording room's done, but oh well. BTW, I ordered eletrik piano. Can't wait. Lots of info out there on the Studio Pak. Here's a link http://www.kellyindustries.com/software/universal_audio_uad1_studio.html


Regards,

Danny


[This message has been edited by pianodano (edited 03-14-2005).]

In my experience, the good software instruments are always better than the good hardware sound modules. Especially when you consider that all they put on the hardware is 128 - 512 mb of sound compared to tens of GB on software.

Chony

Thanks for the link Danny! I have now read a lot more about the UAD-1 Studio PAK DSP card and it is a very interesting peace of hardware! I even listened to some demo made with the UAD-1 and I thought it was pretty tight and clear. Some guys thought it is the best plug-in that they've heard. For the price I think it could be worth it when comparing with other plugins, because you pay for a faster CPU also! But in my opinion it is still a little expensive if I for instance compare it with the RME Fireface 800. I would choose another RME Fireface 800 instead of the UAD-1 for the money, because I need it much more. It has got only 5.5 in reviews at zzsounds.com, seems to be some problems with it, maybe PC/Cakewealk/Cubase related. That's interesting because in the professional reviews I read they didn't mention any problems, maybe they have been lucky with their test plattforms.

One of the good things about the UAD-1 is that it supports 192 KHz sampling rate. That is really sweet because in the future when you want to run virtual instruments at 192 KHz through high quality effects it is important that these effects run @ 192KHz also. I read that the reverbs are good in it and I think reverb is the most important effect! So yeah, it might be good, but currently I would spend in another RME Fireface 800 for the money. If I can make my plattform more powerful I will do it before I start adding great plugins... But it sounds like you would really need the UAD-1 Studio PAK.

BTW, here is a link to a page where they used the UAD-1 in the demos:

SOS demo doctor

Best regards,
YamahaAndy


[This message has been edited by YamahaAndy (edited 03-14-2005).]