I do not know much about pianos except what I have read on here trying to figure out what to buy my yr old son. Everyone keeps talking about one layer sampling is it important to have multi-layering? If I bought a acoustic piano I wouldn't have multi-layering. I like the Yamaha YDP160 and YDP223 and they both have single layering does any Yamaha console dp's have multi layering or is it unimportant.

Denverdave,

On a piano, the waveforms generated by the strings vary continuously from ppp to fff. In other words, you have a nearly infinite variety of tones being produced.

Digital and software pianos handle this in different ways. From:
- Ignore the problem exists and only provide one sample per key.
- A handful of samples per key - this is the most common.
- Add in software approximations to allow for more differences in the tone.
- An extreme case is Vienna Instruments newest software piano. Vienna Imperial has 100 different velocity samples for 1200 total samples per key.

Casio has gone from 2 samples to 3 and is now using 4 samples with interpolation.

Yamaha has 1 sample in their low end models. More expensive models have more than 1, I think up to 4, but I'm not sure exactly how many.

Some people are very sensitive to the variation in tone - to the point of claiming that digital pianos all sound like they are being played mf.

Rich

I think the YDP160 has 3-layer sampling. I'd prefer that one.

Note: Your post says "my yr old son". How old? If he's quite young, the layering might not be a deciding factor. Price might be a more important one.

Too late! You should have started his classical music training in the womb!

He's hopelessly behind now...

You may be confusing two similar terms. "Multi layer sampling" record the sound of an acoustic piano when the key is played soft, medium and hard and then depending on how hard you strike the DP's key the prober sample is re-played. This is the kind the "layer" you want. Does a beginner need it? Only if you can afford it. the #1 most importent feature is the feel of the key action.

The other "layering" is what you rightly noticed that acoustic pianos can't do and that is play two instrument sounds at the same time. That is not something you need but just about all DPs allow this.

the dynamic sampling layer or level is the term discussed here. 1 level of such sampling may mean that only 3 possible outcomes of each key strike, while 2 levels would mean 6 outcomes of each key strike and so on. the more such layers, the smoother of transition of a sequence key strikes from ppp to fff would be. acoustic pianos naturally have that already by how they are built.

I don't understand what you mean when you say "1 level of such sampling may mean that only 3 possible outcomes of each key strike ..."

I'm confused by that entire post.

Sorry for the typo my son is 8 years old.

sorry, guys! i wasn't thinking straight at work when writing it. '3 possibilities' isn't correct, rather whatever number of velocity variances a key strike may imply at 1 level. but the principle was right, and the more layer/levels, the smoother of the sound from ppp to fff. at 2 levels, the number of velocity zones of dynamics becomes 2 and therefore the sampling divisions would be doubled too. so on so forth...