hi all,

i apologize in advance if i sound clueless about keyboards. i'm a horn player (wannabee piano player)

i just picked up a roland fp-4. i noticed only the piano sample sounds right across all keys (left of middle-C). everything else (E. Piano, Organ, etc), produce little/muffled sound (even at higher vols).

btw, this is with the built-in speakers.

called roland, they tell me it's normal i.e. natural sound/frequency of the samples/instruments. anyone else have this issue?

is my noobness showing, or do i have a lemmon on my hands?

thanks,
S

Check in your manual for the factory reset procedure, and see if performing that will make things right.

Snazzy

much thanks for the prompt response, snazzy. the roland rep took me through the reset drill, it made a difference, but not dramatic.

will flip through the manual and see if there's anything else i'm overlooking.

fp4 owners, please chime in. would hate to send it back, cos it seems like such a cool toy.

I think you will need to find a way to more accurately describe the problem

How muffled is this? Is the effect subtle, something only a musician would notice. Or this the effect obvious enough that anyone would notice? If it's obvious to anyone then something is wrong.

All of the sounds within an octave of middle C should play at about the same level with variation of pitch (of course) and timbre varying about as much as the main grand piano sound. Stated another way: There should not be a obvious discontinuity as you move across the keyboard but you expect a gradual change and timbre and physical key weight.

my apologies for the bad explanation. stems from not knowing much about keyboards at all.

basically with the e.piano or organ, i strike the (first 15 or so) keys and hear nothing -- as though there was no power. then, i get a stuffy sound until about middle-C, after that it sounds like a "normal".

with the piano sample, everything is fine. responsive across all keys.

roland rep mentioned something about 61 vs 88 keys, keys/frequencies being out of natural range of some of the samples, etc.

Certainly lower notes on the keyboard, especially electric piano and organ can sound a little murky, but it seems the key contacts are fine, since the piano voice responds over the entire keyboard.

I'm not familiar with the FP-4, although I've used the FP-1, FP-9, and had one of the first FP-8 in the country.

Is there a store nearby where you can try another FP and see if the E-pianos and Organs give a similar response?

Snazzy

I had a similar experience with my FP4. I apparently was messing around with some of the settings and all keys below middle C were silent. You might try as suggested a factory reset which solved my problem. It easy to find in your manual.

Hi there,

I have a Roland FP4, you are right the piano sounds as you would expect but then the e piano, organ etc sounds softer than the piano at the lower notes. But when you hit the notes quite hard, it is louder but only slightly. This is perhaps for the lowest 2 octaves or so? I actually mainly use the piano sound so haven't noticed this to be a big issue for me. I suppose if you have played on a pipe organ before then you may be expecting a thundering base, like the pedal notes. There was an interview on the radio the other day about a virtual organ that a famous organist has developed. I heard it on the radio and was blown away, it sounded just like a real massive, very good pipe organ and then better!

OK, this may sound overly simple, but there should be a Balance knob you can turn to the left or right. If it is turned more to the right, there will be more volume on the higher notes. Perhaps this is skewed and it has more of an effect on the other sounds? Perhaps you can adjust this on the other sounds so compensate. I have an FP-7, but I assume the FP-4 has the same feature.

musico,

you hit the nail on the head. this is EXACTLY what i'm experiencing with lowest 2 octaves.

if it's "normal", then i guess i can live with it. i bought it mainly for the piano sound + form factor.

just wanted to see if other fp-4/7 owners had the same issue i.e. while i still have the ability to return/exchange.

thanks for your feedback.

morodiene,

the balance knob/volume does help a lot. that said, i may end up rarely using the organ/e.piano sounds on the board.

out of the box, did you have the same problem i.e. e.piano/organ, etc in the lower octaves? it was so dramatically worse than the piano, i was convinced i had a broken keyboard.

cheers.

Actually, I bought it mainly for its piano sound, so I haven't played around much with the other sounds other than the harpsichord. I'll check it out when I'm in the studio and see if I notice this problem as well.

hi morodiene, did you notice the same with non-piano sounds on your fp-7.

checked again with roland support. they had the same behavior. consensus is, since top 2-octaves are out of the natural range of the organ/strings/etc, you get what you get.

note-to-self: stick with the piano sound. which i must say, is amazing.

thanks again for all your feedback.

cheers.

I haven't made it into the studio yet this week, sadly.

But I am very pleased with the FP-7 overall. The only drawback I've experienced is that there's a screw loose inside and so it buzzes every time I hit a certain note due to the onboard speakers. If I hook it up to my stereo, there's no problem.