What keyboard??

I'm very happy with my Yamaha p90 , my friends perfer the kurzweil, If had to do it again I would look for a keyboard that has full control on velocity, although vst's take care of this but if you were to use only the keyboard it would present issue

Whoa, that's some controller...  the high velocity prefix stuff is extremely interesting...  14bit resolution of velocity vs the 7 bit we have today.  If pianoteq supports this high resolution velocity too, it'll be a huge leap in terms of playing realism.

This keyboard velocity is calculated on the fly and not just speed of key at the bottom.  That makes me wonder if it can also send individual key damper position.  Individual key damper position is extremely important for playing jazz.

I'm too excited.

I use a CME UF8 with the CME GPP3 pedal unit. It's not perfect but as frar as I can see the best of the 88 note pure midi controllers, although I have not yet tried the Studiologic. The CME UF8 is particularly well made and there is an optional audio card which work well via firewire.

Fatar (who make studio logic keyboards mechanisms) advertise a wooden keyboard but I have not found a midid controller that uses it. I am led to believe that the Kawai MP8 II has a very fine keyboard but I can't justify almost £2,000-00 for a stage piano that has so much stuff I don't need. I think the CLP 280  also has a good keyboard but same applies: has so much stuff I don't need.

I am a classical pianist and a teacher anad I have become amazed by this development. I started with Stenberg Grand 2, then moved to Ivory which I still use pending purchase of Pianoteq whcih I hope to buy next week. My last piano was a Steinway D (1993) and I will alter in the year buy another acoustic grand when I have space, but in the absence of space and a high end concert grand Pianoteq is superb.

NB I probably wont buy a Steinway next time either, Steingraber are technologically more advanced and Bossendorfer and working on a portable electronic keyboard with a real grand piano action - let's hope it's midi.

Thanks for your reply. I also don't want to pay for features that I won't use; it's mainly the quality of the touch and responsiveness that I am interested in. I will investigate the CME uf8 unit.

Bossendorfer CEUSmaster:

http://www.boesendorfer.com/index.php?m...mp;lang=en

Development status, October 07
We currently have three prototypes in use for professional onstage and studio application. One of them is currently located in London's renowned Airstudios. There, Stephen Duffy is working with the CM on his new album for the Lilac Times.
Artists such as Paul McCartney and Phil Collins have also expressed great interest.

For private, home use, a "Sound on Board" version is currently in the works, which includes built-in loudspeakers. In this respect, our in-house audio department, which is meeting with great success in the hi-fi industry, is highly beneficial. Loudspeaker placement, in addition to hardware components such as the amplifier and sound processor, will prove critical.

Equally important is the feeling while playing. Whereas on an
acoustic piano the action's hammer strikes the string, this impact must be artificially simulated on a digital piano. Since we use a genuine concert grand piano action, including felted hammers, only the strings require a substitute. We are thus currently testing various materials. In an authentic piano, the hammers meet with progressively greater resistance as the pitch increases -- the strings become shorter and thinner. Thus, this factor must be taken into account in order to achieve a grand piano feel while playing.

The sound will likewise be recorded again. In cooperation with our partner Vienna Symphonic Library (VSL), the CEUS Imperial will be drawn upon for the new sample library, starting at the beginning of October. What's unique about the recording methodology is that the CEUS is able to play the notes at any required dynamic level without the aid of a pianist, and this at 127 different volume levels.
This means that the pianist no longer needs to be taken into account while miking, and microphones can be used where the pianist would otherwise sit, where the mikes actually belong. One must consider that the microphones are extremely sensitive and that every single noise is recorded -- even noise made by the pianist's clothing -- which necessitates compromise. With CEUS, all that is history.

I was in the same boat; I had a decent controller, but wanted something with a much more accurate touch.  I recently spring for the doepfer pk88, and so far have been very satisfied.

Doepfer understands what it's all about as far as keyboards go; just build a high-quality controller with the best action possible, and leave the whole stage-piano aspect out of it.  Why bother paying hundreds of bucks for the sound hardware and samples when you don't even use them?  The action on this keyboard is also the best I've seen yet; I spent some time at the Frankfurt Musikmesse playing around with the casio, CME, and yamaha keyboards before I committed to the pk88, but wasn't really impressed with any of them in comparison (though some of the casio models came close).  I was particularly interested in the CME keyboards, but was disappointed to see how wobbly the keys and knobs were... the overall unit construction was good for China, but bad by any other standard.

The key action on the Doepfer is extremely fluid, but also sufficiently stiff without being too hard.  As a bonus, there is apparently some jumper you can flip on the internal MIDI board which puts the keyboard into "piano mode", which will not send out a MIDI note on message if a key is pressed down very slowly, as is the case in an actual piano.  I haven't messed around with this feature yet, as I don't really care, but I like the fact that they pay attention to the little details like this.  Also, I don't gig, but I do like the bulletproof case.  Doepfer says that you should keep the original box should you need to ship it, but if you feel the unit, it's hard to believe that something should happen to it.

The only big disadvantage of this keyboard is that it only supports a double pedal; the lmk2 & lmk4 models seem to support multiple pedals, though.  At the moment, I only have a single pedal anyways, so this isn't a big deal to me.

I have a CME UF8 and find it acceptable but would love something a lot better.  I recently broke a key during a gig and had to search to find technical support (but I succeeded there--they were very helpful and emailed me a service manual.  I fixed the key myself.  I took the thing apart and found that the hollow plastic keys were glued to the metal key bed with super glue so the fix was pretty easy.  What impressed me was that after removing the aluminum case and plastic end pieces the insides were extremely cheesy. 

Another of my chief complaints is the velocity settings are very limited (and reading other threads the new replacement CME UF80) has velocity issues as a main complaint.

Finally one of the reasons I bought the CME was because of the firewire accessory board.  After trying the board with my Mac, I learned that drivers for Intel Macs were not available for the firewire board, so I returned it.  CME support on this matter was non existent except for some knowledgeable members of the CME forum who said hang on.  That was a year and a half ago, and I believe that the drivers are still missing.

I bought a Fatar Studiologic SL-990 Pro, it cost me around £230 two years ago. For the money, I think it is excellent value, and very capable. The next model up has graduated weighting of the keys, getting lighter from bass to treble, but I don't feel the lack of that in my model.

Physically, the unit is very strong and heavy, ideally you have two people to move it. The advantage of the weight is that you can play without inhibition! It is necessary to invest in a very solid stand, nothing flimsy is appropriate. I used a QuikLok Double Tier stand which was £80-odd; it was solid, but I had to put in a couple of wooden spacers to get exactly the right height for myself and my piano stool.

One necessary alteration for the SL-990 I found is to the Pianoteq velocity profile. Here's mine:

As you can see I have narrowed the range; also you need to adjust the Dynamics slider in the Pianoteq window to match your playing requirements.

I also use the CME GPP-3 triple pedal; importantly, I had to use the USB interface to update the firmware before it would work properly - now it's fine.

I'm moving the topic for here:

Perhaps it's quite silly, or just my hands or energy along the day, but I noticed several times that my Roland F-90 Digital piano, a real quality hammer action, seen more soft in some days and more heavy touch in others.
    I refer to the touch feeling of heavy or light, changing from one day to another. I heard there are some cheap controller that get light as get age, after hundreds of hours of use.  It's not the case of Roland pianos.
    But my Roland "change" from heavy to light and heavy several times. Not the velocity sensibility adjust, but the sensation of weight in the keys.
   
    Maybe my hands just got a little crazy, or just body energy difference along the day, I really have this sensation.
 
    Had anybody noticed something similar with other digital pianos?