Mainly for Pro work (No arranger keyboard restrictions) but can be used for those who like to be original, rather than follow a repetitive style.







Enjoy

Bill

Another KB you'll need an iPad?....is this becoming the NORM the should start including one in the package price.?

:Mainly for Pro work (No arranger keyboard restrictions)

I guess that depends on your definition of Pro, and restrictions!
DonM

It looks like a great keyboard. I have the PX-350 - found an open box special - and I can't get over how great the Concert Grand Piano voice is. It's really, really exquisite (The other voices range from very good to eh). And I just LOVE the key bed with the ivory feel. I'm spending so much time away from my PSR-S950 that she's getting jealous.

For $999, 88 graded hammer action, light weight, and all of the features the PX5S keyboard has, it's not a big deal to fork over another $500 to own an iPad. The iPad isn't a one trick pony. You can use it to watch funny videos in bed.

Bravo Casio.

It's not a big deal? a 50% increase in price? Yikes!

How would you feel if the PX-5S was priced at $1500 dollars, had a touch screen, and didn't need an iPad? It probably wouldn't be considered the bang for the buck it is now, that's for sure!

How did Roland and Korg manage to put fully functional, fast and reliable touch screens on arrangers that were little more than a grand?

We are being ripped off, and everyone seems to be fine with it!

iPad is not required at all. Ralph received the PX-5S just a couple days before the show and is simply using it to access stage setting

-Mike Martin
Casio

Well there you have it from the horses mouth. In my opinion, Casio is spot on with their new digital pianos. I'm really in love with my PX-350 because the keys and concert grand piano sound are really responsive. Maybe someday in the future, I will use it as a controller with Ivory II. As it is, it's pretty close to perfection.

I'm not in the market for the PX-5S. I think their demo is impressive, however. It's very light, it has 240 polyphony, the ivory feel keybed with progressive hammer action, advanced editing, the ability to play wah wah, clavinova.

If I were using it on stage, I would probably get the iPad because the LED does look pretty small - too small. However, I wouldn't think of it as the keyboard costing an extra $500. The iPad can be used for so many musical applications and so many other things besides being an extension of a keyboard.

I got the iPad under the mistaken assumption that I could do advanced editing with my Yamaha PSR-S950. Not true.

Beaky.......I've been considering buying the Casio 350 myself. But I've been undecided between that and the Yamaha series, particularly the 155 model (great sound but somewhat heavy to carry). Have you compared the two before your purchase?

In the meantime, I'm waiting for the PX-5S to make it's way into the stores, but the price is really up there compared to the lesser Privia models.

I didn't try the Yamaha, and I was set on the Casio for four reasons:

1. I read reviews that this was the best DP for under $1000 including a rave review in Keyboard Magazine.
2. The Yamaha acoustic grand piano is not my favorite.
3. The Casio uses high resolution MIDI to its internal sound engine and going out to any software that can interpret the 16,256 velocity levels as opposed to 127. I haven't heard if the Yamaha uses high resolution MIDI.
4. The Casio has the ivory style keys which I like.

But you do make me conscious that I didn't give Yamaha a fair shake. To tell the truth, I bought the Casio without playing it either. I had the PX-330, and I was unhappy with the quick decay in the mid-range. I heard that the PX-350 fixed this and delivered a much improved piano sound.

duplicate post. Won't let me delete.

Abacus and Beakybird, thank you for the heads-up; the PX-5S is definitely in my radar, especially if the street price will be really below 1000 euros.

Well, bottom line is, a non-touch screen keyboard can get the job DONE... but so slowly, it is hard to get to much on stage in a hurry.

And that's the main thing for me.

I cannot understand why Roland went backwards (even though I should be used to it by now!) and went to non-touch screens. I can get to the most arcane settings in no more than one or two screen button pushes on my G70. The BK-7m (and by extension, all of the BK's) you need to go through a ton of scrolling, button pushing, more scrolling, more buttons ad infinitum to get to things that are day to day stuff!

I guess it only took Roland 12 or so years to realize dropping the CS was a bad idea... maybe they can rectify this a bit faster? LOL

A touch screen implementation on any BK gear wouldn't be efficient unless the display screen size was increased 4 to 5x bigger then it is now first off. Or having an "optional" iPad connected be able to do touch screen duties....anyway as it stands now on the BK series it is what it is,....that ain't gonna change. YOU just have to be happy with the way it is or wait for the next wave of Roland series arranger KB's down the road.
Personally I can work with either method efficiently on stage.
For me I'd rather have "MORE BUTTONS & KNOBS" for All menu solutions.

One limitation of the PX-350 as far as being a stage piano is that there are only 96 registrations you can have. 24 banks with four buttons. You cannot create a name for the registration.

On my Yamaha PSR-S950, I can name a registration after a song and then look for the song name. With the Casio, you would have to remember that the electric piano setup for a certain song was stored in bank #17 button C.

I mean if you're mostly a pianist who uses a few other voices without transpositions, the Casio PX-350 is great. And I cannot say enough about how much I like the key feel and the concert grand piano voice.

I would hope that the PX-5S has more options as far as storing registrations.

I like it - best Casio demo I've ever seen.

There are 100 registrations( Stage Settings), all of which can be names. They all also contain all tone edits, custom effects, arpeggios and phrases.

Mike,

any news on the availability of the PAX-5S?

Donny... buttons cost money and add considerably to an arranger's cost. The touch screen replaces hundreds of buttons, and pays for itself many times over.

If you look at how small the G/E series' touch screen was, there is MORE than enough room for it on the BK9's front panel. A mere 4.5"X3.5"...

And unfortunately, the iPad apps for Roland do almost nothing other than what you can do from the front panel. There's almost NOTHING they do that is buried in sub-menus. Yes, if they functioned as a full featured touch-screen for the BK's, I'd buy one in a flash. But they don't. They are little more than a gimmick for the iPad-addled kids. Don't be fooled.

Here is a link to the discussion about the PX-5S in the Keyboard Magazine Forum.

Here is a link for the Keyboard Magazine review of the Casio PX-350: http://www.keyboardmag.com/article/casio-privia-px-350/150865.

... and here is a link to all the audio demos posted by Casio so far

I played the Casio AP450 fairly briefly recently, I think it's the latest keybed and sound source, and it was a very pleasant experience. I found the keybed nicely weighted with nice bounce-back, and the piano sound also very rich.

I like the possibilities of the PX5s. I'm one of the "piano with extras" players so having a full width keybed, decent piano sounds, then adding the richness available with the hex multi-layer system and 4 zones ... if I can bring in and take out zomes / sound with anything like the simplicity I have on my veteran Ensoniqs then life would be rather good.

In respect of the touch screen debate I also had a shot on a 73 key Krome. Touchscreen very good although occasionally some active areas a bit small for my fingers, I'd worry that if I had to change a setting fast I might get it wrong, on the other hand without the touchscreen I'd probably not be able to twiddle at all so maybe I'm being a bit churlish. I wasn't that struck o the keybed, I was concious that I kept scraping the side of my fingers on the rough edges of adjacent keys.

I fount the Kronos touchscreen VERY difficult to use accurately apart form the simplified Registration Select screen. Although the screen is much larger than any arranger screen, Korg try to cram in a LOT of stuff on each page, and the small font size makes text selection (sounds from a list, for instance) quite difficult to do even under non-stage use, and in the heat of battle, VERY difficult to use with any serious degree of confidence.

The Kronos division would be well advised to take a good look at the PA3x's layout. Or even Roland's G/E series. Utterly reliable (at least the Roland is, my friend's PA3x is less so, but that may simply be him abusing the keyboard by transporting it without a case!) and VERY difficult to hit the wrong button in the heat of gigging.

A nice person on Music Player Network (http://forums.musicplayer.com/ubbthreads.php/topics/2465083/20/This_Just_In_PX_5S) has spotted some manuals:

http://support.casio.com/manualfile.php?rgn=1&cid=008009154

I've had a scan .. I don't see that I can use any of the buttons to turn the layers on and off quickly but you can use the knobs or sliders to control volume. Also the phrase sequencer will play back smf0 midi files (which I didn't mention in my previous post because I figured this would be the case even though I haven't noticed that this was mentioned on any of the demos)(I reserve the right to be wrong here!)

I have a PX-5S on order; it should arrive within the next week. I think that it's one of the instruments with the best quality/price ratio on the market today, and it weighs just 24.5 lbs or 11 kg (a Tyros 4 weighs 14.5 kg).
Aside from the sounds, I intend to use it as a master keyboard, to control both the Kronos 61 and the Roland BK-7m. Being just 28 cm deep it should fit nicely under the Kronos and still be perfectly usable and readable.
Can't wait to try it.

In an upcoming firmware update sliders, knobs and pedals can be used as on/switch for zones or layers. Update coming in about 2 weeks

"sliders, knobs and pedals can be used as on/switch for zones or layers"

I like the sound of that! Thanks for the update

I meant to say on/off switches. Each slider/knob/pedal can do two things simultaneously. So you could use one slider to turn ON one layer while turning OFF another.

does anybody knows how to lower the volume of musics in wave format?

O novo sistema operacional traz essa função. Problema resolvido.