August 5, 2008

Rating: 8/10

Bought to replace Technics SX P-50. To use on gigs and in the studio. I\\\'ve now spent over a week with this machine. Stage piano sounds: all pianos and e.pianos usable. Keyboard action: very light to medium. Doesn\\\'t tire the hands. Very portable - thankyou! Can use built in audio/speakers as monitors when piano output to main. Recorder ok and very useful for hearing what you/ve just been practising. There are rhythms and gimmicky sounds, if needed? Two year warranty - nice. The music stand design is poor, could easily be broken. Value for money - yes. All Casio have to do now is get rid of the gimmicks, add a kebooard lid, up-grade the body shell to aluminium or hi-tec composite (piano built into it\\\'s own lightweight case?)and Yamaha, Korg, Roland et.al.are no longer into stage pianos.

BeowulfX
March 11, 2008

Rating: 9/10

On the outside, it may look rather "simple" or bland due to its "space-saving" slim design. It's noticeable that it lacks a large LCD screen that more expensive digital pianos have (e.g. Clavinova, Roland etc.). But do not let the simplistic/minimalistic exterior design fool you into thinking this keyboard is a dud, because it can hold it's own in terms of a decent sounding grand piano patch/sampled sound and even saxophone sounds and a vintage electric piano sound.

The PX-320, like its predecessor (PX-310), is meant for home studio/stage use which is the reason why it also has a handy registration bank/memory feature for storing various keyboard settings (i.e. pertaining to use of split, layered tones, patch and rhythm settings) that can be useful for quick patch or setting changes while "gigging". The hammer-action feel of the keys are realistic, you can actually hear and feel the hammer action when you press and release a key.

It has a 128-note maximum polyphony. Using some tones/patch, however, the 128 note polyphony maybe limited to 64-note polyphony...and this is true in using "special tones" like MODERN GRAND PIANO, breathy ALTO/TENOR SAX and other panel tones that make extensive use of more complex samples. However, majority of the GM tones and even some panel tones and variation tones, do not limit or diminish the existing 128-note polyphony to 64-note-polyphony. So, nothing to worry about here.

It has adequate jacks for connection to a PA system/ decent pair of loud speakers (L/MONO and R line out), USB to PC port, MIDI IN/OUT and dual headphones and even a LINE-IN.

Some of the variation tones and panel tones make use of their own "effects" (i.e. reverb and chorus). The reverb and chorus effects each have 4 levels. As an example, you can manually set the reverb, say, to a "small room", "large hall" effect.

The keys are "touch response" meaning, they're pressure sensitive (most people would refer to it as "velocity" rather than "pressure"), the more force you apply in pressing the keys...the louder the sound you produce...and the lesser pressure you apply on the keys, the "softer" the sound (this is true in using all sound patches/tones, except the drum set patch).

It can play STANDARD MIDI FILES TYPE O AND 1. It can record into 2 tracks only and can also record in either SMF Type 0 or in Casio's proprietary music format. The CASIO PRIVIA package comes with a program CD which also contains an application that can be used to convert CASIO recorder music data to STANDARD MIDI FILES (i.e. SMF 0).

You can expand the number of built-in classic tunes or songs for possible practice or learning sessions by loading new songs via the SD card slot. You can also use the SD-Card feature as a means to make the PRIVIA piano a MIDI-file player.

I've tried using it as a "MIDI controller keyboard" and it works just fine. You'll need a MIDI implementation chart though which is included in the manual (appendix page).

The sampled Grand Piano patch, breathy ALTO/TENOR saxophone patches, flute and even the violin are amazingly expressive and even realistic. The onboard effects are limited to reverb (4 types) and chorus (4 types/levels). At least, CASIO has "toned down" the brass section from the old "harsh and loud" brass sounds to a more refined (slight softer) brass section sound.

The touch response is great and responsive to the amount of force you apply to individual keys. This is great for more expressiveness in playing music pieces or arrangements. Sadly, the PRIVIA series and most of CASIO's products do not have keyboard AFTERTOUCH. But I can live without it and in my humble opinion, the music does not really suffer that much without an AFTER TOUCH feature.

The key resistance is medium-heavy...not too soft (like those in synths and portable keyboard/workstations) and not too heavy (like some poorly made/designed upright pianos).

I compared the CASIO PRIVIA PX-320 with YAMAHA's DGX-620 but the 128-note polyphony, good hammer-action feel, some newer features and relatively cheaper price won me over to CASIO's PRIVIA.

If ever there's few other things/feature I wish the PX-320 had, it would have to be a PITCH-BEND WHEEL (very useful for guitar patches), a modest if not slightly bigger LCD screen and a numeric keypad button for easy selection of the GM tones/variation tones...instead of having to press the YES/NO button simultaneously with the GM/VARIATION TONE BUTTON to scroll down through various patch numbers to select the tone you want. THANKFULLY AND MERCIFULLY, the registration memory feature of the PX-320 should make recalling sound patches and other settings easier with just a click of a button.

I love the Grand piano, saxophone, steel guitar, some electric piano patches and last but not the least, I particularly love the 128-note polyphony and the SD card storage feature. The PX-320 is truly a better version of the older PX-310 in terms of added features and better piano sound samples.

It's a true "bang-for-the-buck" digital piano. It's worth the amount I paid for it and it can give the Yamaha DGX-620 a tough competition in terms of decent piano sound and hammer-action/weighted keys.