I hesitate between a Roland HP305 and a Kawai CA63.
I tried the first piano, the keyboard for me, the
sound too.
I have not tried the second. It seems more complete and
has different rhythms in addition to the metronome and allows listening and recording mp3.
It also has different lessons, are they interesting?
Do you have more specific ideas to help me?
Thank you

J'hésite entre un Roland HP305 et un Kawai CA63.
J'ai essayé le premier piano, le clavier me convient, la
sonorité aussi.
Je n'ai pas essayé le second. Il semble plus complet et
possède différents rythmes en plus du métronome et permet l'écoute et l'enregistrement en mp3.
Il a aussi différentes leçons, sont-elles intéressantes ?
Avez-vous des idées plus précises afin de m'aider ?
Merci

I preferred the CA63 for better keyboard but that's a personal opinion. The Roland's keyboard is also very good and the sound is comparable. Some people praise the SuperNatural piano with no looping and stretching. I think you will not get wrong with any of them. If you are however thinking of using other sounds than just piano patches, Roland has better ones. Those in the Kawai are bad in my opinion.

I'm sorry, are you saying you tried the HP and liked the keys and sound?

If so you might want to take a look at the Roland LX-10F, it reportedly has better speakers.


I believe some have reported issues with MP3 recording on the CA63 (recording level is too low).

The Roland LX-10F is too expensive for me!
I also like playing bossa nova, cha-cha,
ballads, swing, ... and I thought that rhythms
could be interesting. Are they easy to use?
Otherwise, the lessons in the Kawai are they well made?

I can not try the Kawai in my area, but I can
buy internet

Yes, the rhythms are quite easy to use and they sound great, being such an improvement over the good old metronome (actually, they are integrated in the same function). The selected rhythm also can be saved directly with the complete sound registration.

I'm sure Roland has a lot of friends too. Anyway I'm not going to mix in that discussion (I personally anticipated on the supernatural technology, although just didn't like the HP307 after testdriving it, so I went for the CA93). For what it's worth, last Friday I heard from Kawai that currently the CA63 is selling faster than they can produce... and that's not surprising, given that it's a bargain i.m.h.o., especially for people with a budget of about 2kEuro.

It really would be helpful if you could try to find a place to play both of them and compare for yourself. Kawai is often a lot of work and inconvenience to find a place to audition and buy, but is an excellent candidate and the CA63 is a good solid piano at a good price. The CA63 will give you Kawai's latest RM3 keyboard (without escapement however) while the HP305 will give you the previous generation PHA-II keyboard rather than the latest Roland HP-307 keyboard. There are few posters that claim that Kawai has a better sound engine than the Kawai, however. And, Roland does offer you much more sounds.

If you want to save money and are looking for rhythms to play with, then you should check out the Roland FP4 or Fp7 which include the session partner with 80 different types.

Well, it was only a couple of weeks, when I was in the middle of the same decision. I can not give you a direct advice, but I can report about my decision process:

- So far I was playing a Yamaha CVP 35, about 20 years old

My personal history and playing style:
I am an amateur player for 27 years now. Having learned classical piano on an accoustic piano for 4 years, I lost interest at the age of 16. Restarted playing at the age of 19, playing pop, rock and jazz including singing. My favourites cover 70s music like Billy Joel, Elton John, Supertramp or current e-music like Air, Archive or Goldfrapp.
I love to reduce opulent arrangements to just piano & vocals

My requirements
- Sounds: 70% piano sounds, 25 % E-piano sounds, 5% others
- Top-notch keyboard, best with ivory touch
- Cabinet style, best black (actually my wife's requirement)
- Speakers included
- No software solution, because I am an 10-minute-in-between-player.

Budget for upgrade: up to about 2000 EUR net, keeping in mind about 400 EUR for selling my old one, still happy to save some quid.

My shoot-out-list from the specs point of view:
- Kawai CA 63 (about 2200 EUR)
- Roland HP 305 (about 2000 EUR)
- Yamaha CLP 340 (about 1950 EUR)
- Casio AP 620 (about 1400 EUR)
- Kurzweil Mark Pro 2 (about 1200 EUR)

A couple of weeks I went to a big music store to test play:
- Kurzweil: the vendor told me, that they had serious issues with the Kurzweil reliability and kicked them out of the display. I kicked it out of my shoout-out-list.

- Yamaha: Although I used to play a Yamaha (AE) keyboard for 20 years now, I absolutely hated the rubbery touch. Ditched it.

- Roland: Frankly, it was my favourite from all the internet sound files. Playing it in real-life was not bad, but a slight disappointment: the touch a bit plasticy and the sound a bit artificial.

So, it was down to two and the big surprise, the Casio was still in the game. After lunch, I had a final and it had two winners:

- the best piano of this circle for me is the Kawai: the absolutely best keyboard and a rich, even sound.
- the best buy of this circle for me is the Casio: an absolutely great keyboard ( from my point-of-view underrated in this forum ) and a very realistic sound with smooth morphed changes between the velocity levels. And, important to me: terrific E-piano sounds. A slight minus for the speaker system, which sound a little thin.

So, I ended up buying the Casio for 1400 EUR including bench and I am happy with it. Maybe I will spend another 200 EUR for a 2:1-speaker system.

Again, this is no direct advice to buy this or that. But the decision finding might help others.

Greetings from Germany

Great post. Casio offers amazing value for money and has been improving their game steadily every year. Could you tell us more about the differences between the Kawai and Casio keyboard? What is the difference between absolutely best and absolutely great in concrete terms?

Kawai keyboard: the long wooden bar mechanism is feelable. The single keys are a bit flimsy, but that should not sound negative at all, but it feels realistic to reproduce a mechanical instrument.

Casio keyboard: I did not realize the sideward shifting, that some forum members mentioned in other Casio keyboards. It made a very steady reliable impression. It has a pretty touch, lighter than the Kawai (which makes it better for E-piano playing), and you could play it with fine velocity differences.


The touch of the ivory surface feels very similar and precious in both keyboards to me. By the way: I do not see the extra value in wooden keys, if the plastic keys have the same weight and weight allocation. The part, that you touch with your fingers is not wood anyway, but some (artificial) ivory coating.

thank you for this information.
I also tried the Casio AP-620, but I find the keyboard too
slight or even a little soft.

I know that by giving you my impression I might put you in the perspective of following external suggestions, but very frankly speaking the action of the ca63 is radically better than the roland phaIII (which barely has an extra sensor as opposed to the aged phaII, just so you know). Miles away.
S

I would have loaded the van with a CA63 for my daughter had it not for the K3 and RX2 she (and her Grandma) tried on the dealer floor.
With my non-playing/amateur hands I could not detect a differing feel between the CA63/K3, I’d say the sound was extremely close to the AP.

My search was between the CLP340/HP305/CA63, but ended up with the P155 (for other reasons). In my mind, these DPs mimic their acoustic counterparts real well, you’ll have to handle/listen to them and pick your preference.
Also check the mechanical assembly of the mid/upper-level Yamaha/Kawai/Roland keys, even on the mid-level Yamaha P155 the XYZ dimensions/tolerance/spacing are impressively even/consistent. Unfortunately I cannot say the same for Casio, up to the PX-330, some were even broken (granted my samples may be skewed, taken from Guitar Center and BestBuy).

Good luck and enjoy.

Finally, I ordered a Kawai CA63.
Normally, I get the piano in the beginning of the next week.
I give my impressions.

Hello

I received my piano CA63.
I am very satisfied. The keyboard is much better than the Roland HP305. The sound is very different from
my old Clavinova, it may be a little less
well as that of Roland.
I have no issues amp or speakers.

There are lessons in the internal memory (Burgmiller,
Cerzny, ..). Do you have the reference of
corresponding partitions?

Thank you in advance

Congratulations for your new piano!
Try changing the touch response to heavy and tell me how you find it. For me it made a huge difference. I think the standard touch is too light and creates a feeling of jumpy and unrealistic velocities.

zblod,

Indeed, congratulations on your new CA63!



I'm sorry, I do not fully understand the question you are asking.
Would you like information (notated sheet music, perhaps?) about the built-in lesson function songs?

Kind regards,
James
x

Excuse me, I do not speak English properly.

There are lessons in piano (Czerny, Beyer).
I'm looking for these sheet music.
Can I download them?

Soon, I'll try changing the touch response. I give you my impressions.

Thanks

zblod, please do not apologise, your English is absolutely fine.



CA93/CA63 instruments sold in Europe (with the exception of the UK) include the following built-in lesson songs:

- Burgmüller 25 (25 Etudes Faciles, Opus 100)
- Czerny 30 (Etudes de Mécanisme, Opus 849)
- Czerny 100 (Hundert Übungsstücke, Opus 139)
- Beyer (Vorschule im Klavierspiel, Opus 101)
- J.S. Bach: Inventionen
- M.P. Heller: Sonatinen Album 1

The notated scores for these lesson books are sold separately, however these are standard piano exercises, thus it may be possible to download such material in PDF format.

Kind regards,
James
x

zblod, I'm interested in Kawai CA63 too, but I can't try it before buying, because it cannot be found in my town
So, could you tell us how much noisy is the keyboard compared with the other you've tried (HP305 for instance). We are waiting for other comments on your new DP.
Thanks.

I am completely satisfied with the keyboard. Can play
rapidly with many nuances.
My children also use an acoustic piano are
also very satisfied.
The keys are less rough than those of Roland
but is better.
The sound of Roland is very good, also that of Kawai.
However, I seem to hear a kind of
metallic crackle at high volume. Maybe
Normally, this might be the effect of resonance.

Liverpool,
one of the reasons I bought the CA63 was because I couldn't stand the noise of the keys on Hp305s or Yamaha clavinovas. You can still hear the noise of the keys (as you would on a real piano), but for me the noise of the keys and the sound reaches my ears at the same time so it doesn't distract, Using headphones, I don't hear the noise of the keys at all.

I would really recommend playing on any dp before you buy though just to make sure, since it is an expensive purchase. My nearest shop that had a CA63 was about 100 miles away, but I traveled there twice just to make sure that I was sure with my purchase.

Regards,
Andy T

AndyT, there's a Kawai dealer in the beautiful city of Norwich.

</offtopic>

There's one in Cambridge too, but the problem was finding a CA63 in stock and set up, rather than a dealer.

Andy T
</offtopic>

Ah, I see.

Cheers,
James
x

COME ON JAPAN!