Learning to play keyboard.

Oleg Luzhny

Hey!!

I want to learn to play the keyboard. I am a complete beginner.

I read through similar threads but I still have a few questions.

With a budget of €200-250, which one of these would you buy and which is the best value?

http://www.thomann.de/ie/yamaha_ez_220.htm
http://www.thomann.de/ie/yamaha_psre423.htm
http://www.thomann.de/ie/yamaha_psre333.htm

If I could spend a bit more, say €300-400, which of these would you buy and which is the best value?

http://www.thomann.de/ie/casio_ctk6000.htm
http://www.thomann.de/ie/yamaha_npv60.htm
http://www.thomann.de/ie/casio_ctk7000.htm

And, is a keyboard in the €300-400 price range a HUGE improvement on those in the €200-250 range? I don't want to spend more money if I don't really need to.

I definitely wouldn't spend more than €400 though, so please don't post just to say that buying a keyboard for €200-400 is a waste of time and that you must spend X amount of € if you want a keyboard of use. (I've seen this is similar threads)

Also, I may be interested in playing piano some time in the future, I don't know for sure but it's a possibility. (I'm just saying this as people have asked the OP (the person beginning to learn keyboard) this in other threads)

If any one wants to recommend another a keyboard, that would be appreciated too.

Thanks in advance.

rcaz

Don't bother with any of the first three, they're toys... I don't know about the second set of options there though. Go to a shop and play on a few and get a feel for the things you're looking at buying, if possible bring a keyboard-playing friend along to give you a better opinion.

I won't tell you that you need to spend €X to get a good keyboard, but what I will say is, good things cost money. No point being cheap about it if you're serious about learning this thing. A cheaper instrument will make playing less enjoyable and learning more frustrating. And €400 is very cheap in terms of keyboards (I don't mean that €400 isn't a lot of money, just that as keyboards go, people can't reasonably make good instruments and sell them for €400.)

You should look for something second-hand. I got a pretty decent digital piano for €300 second hand, and it's doing me alright to this day. It's not fantastic by any means but a similar quality new instrument would have been nearer €600. You might get lucky and score an absolute belter of a deal, or you might just save a little bit of money, either way you'll come out better off than spending your budget on a new keyboard.

martinedwards

Trio did have a hit back in the day using nothing more than a silly toy Casio with a built in caclulator....

but generally budget keyboards are, as rcaz says, just toys.

infact I agree with all his post.

take a friend and buy used.

Malice

Just to confuse things as well you could look at MIDI controllers rather than keyboards as such in case you want to start messing with software synths. I picked this up last month and am slowly getting to grips with its capabilities.

Oleg Luzhny

Thanks for all the replies. I'll look into buying a used keyboard/digital piano.

What about this though? This surely isn't just a toy. It's RRP is €549.

http://www.thomann.de/ie/casio_ctk7000.htm

Also, what about one of these or another digital piano around the same price?

http://www.thomann.de/ie/korg_sp170_s_bk.htm
http://www.adverts.ie/pianos/digital-piano-yamaha-p-85/1629201

rcaz

Those last two you posted, now you're talkin'!

Much better stuff there. On a completely superficial level, you can kinda tell a 'serious' instrument from a cheap one by how they look - those last two you posted have way less 'things' on them - less buttons and sliders and knobs, less conspicuous speakers, less 'voices' or 'styles' or whatever you want to call them. And their keys are made to look like real piano keys. It's easy to add loads of sounds to a keyboard, but it's harder to make it a well-playing instruments, so you see companies boasting about how many different sounds your keyboard will come with, when all the important parts are cheaped out on. How many times do you think you're gonna use all those 'Synth Brass Ensemble' sounds?

So if you could get a second hand one for around the upper end of your budget that doesn't come with a ton of ****ty extra sounds, you're probably on to a winner. If you could stretch to the €500 I'd jump at that Yamaha you linked to on Adverts (Yamaha make some really good pianos anyway, both acoustic and digital).

TL;DR: if you can, get that Yamaha, it's deadly.

kessler182

rcaz wrote: »

Those last two you posted, now you're talkin'!

Much better stuff there. On a completely superficial level, you can kinda tell a 'serious' instrument from a cheap one by how they look - those last two you posted have way less 'things' on them - less buttons and sliders and knobs, less conspicuous speakers, less 'voices' or 'styles' or whatever you want to call them. And their keys are made to look like real piano keys. It's easy to add loads of sounds to a keyboard, but it's harder to make it a well-playing instruments, so you see companies boasting about how many different sounds your keyboard will come with, when all the important parts are cheaped out on. How many times do you think you're gonna use all those 'Synth Brass Ensemble' sounds?

So if you could get a second hand one for around the upper end of your budget that doesn't come with a ton of ****ty extra sounds, you're probably on to a winner. If you could stretch to the €500 I'd jump at that Yamaha you linked to on Adverts (Yamaha make some really good pianos anyway, both acoustic and digital).

TL;DR: if you can, get that Yamaha, it's deadly.

+1 on the Yamaha, i've played the P85 before and for your needs it would be perfect. I could be wrong but it looks like the seller accepted 400 in his first reply, definitely worth sticking in a bid for that amount

Oleg Luzhny

Thanks for everybody's help, especially rcaz', I really appreciate it Thanks for steering me in the right direction and away from those cheapish keyboards I mentioned first. If I would have bought one of them, I would've regretted it in a year or two.

I think I'm gonna buy the Yamaha P95 B. It's around €543 on Amazon. It's a newer version of the P 85 and it's only a bit more expensive than the P 85 on Adverts. I know you might be able to get the one on Adverts for less than €500 (Even though the seller says that he won't accept offers below €500 - It says this when you look at the Ad on the mobile site but not on the desktop site for some reason ) but I'd like a new piano anyway and since the new piano isn't that much more expensive than the used one, I'm going to buy that.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B003MQLYM2/ref=s9_simh_gw_p267_d0_g267_i3?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1S8WQ8MP1DGVTH3Z7QBB&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=467128533&pf_rd_i=468294

Thanks again for ye're advice and for encouraging me to buy a "proper" piano/keyboard.

kessler182

Best of luck with it

Oleg Luzhny

I was going to buy the Yamaha P 95 but then I saw this: http://www.thomann.de/ie/yamaha_ydp_135_r_limited_edition.htm and I'm now leaning towards that. Instead of having to buy the stand and pedals for the P 95, I could just buy this instead. I also prefer how the YDP-135 looks.

Would I be right in saying that the two pianos are the same technically speaking? If they are, then I'd say I'll buy the YDP-135.

http://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical-instruments/keyboards/digitalpianos/p_series/p-95_color_variation/?mode=model

http://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical-instruments/keyboards/digitalpianos/arius_series/ydp-135r/?mode=model

The only difference I can see is that the P 95 has 4 more voices but I don't really mind about that (Should I?).

Thanks.

Dr Gradus

Well it depends whether or not you need to have the portability of the P95. It's quite easy to get around.

However, I'm pretty sure that YDP is a little older than the P95. There's certainly a YDP141 and YDP161, and although I havn't played the one you have found there, I have played these more recent models (at least I think they are more recent) and found the keys and touch sensitivity a little plastic for my liking. I'd go for the touch of the P95 over the others, but a lot of that can come down to a matter of preference.