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Hey,

So I have been sitting on my hands from ordering a new DP for a couple of months and went to finally order an MP10 on Monday, just realised NAMM is coming up though and I should probably wait to see what happens there. I saw the Nord release but to be honest it's not really what I was looking for. Do people think there are expected competitors to the MP10 on the horizon. I'm going to wait till next week now anyway but I am impatient and curious Anyone got a hunch?

Mark

Any new DPs should be announced by tomorrow, all being well, at the start of the show.

As for the Nord, unless the specs say otherwise, it looks like a very modest rehash, with the addition of the sample library being the main new ingredient.

I too am trying to be patient. I would love Kawai to release an MP6II with UPHI and bigger sample sizes, but that ain't gonna happen. Korg still might wow us with an SV-2, and that would be very interesting to me. Kurzweil may or may not release the K3000 workstation. As for Roland and Yamaha, who knows?

I am not sure how many people here can provide anything but speculations It's James only who can say if Kawai are going to announce a new product but as you already know, he's not allowed to do so

What I feel is that Kawai are not going to replace MP10 this year, it would be probably 2013, however they may finally bring the ES6 successor.

I've read somewhere that Roland are expected to bring SuperNatural2 but to be honest I don't believe this is true. The current SN technology gives everything to people who are happy with the Roland sound signature as well as the PHA-III action, so except for some cosmetically refreshed HP-line instruments, I do not expect any major update to their SN-technology or keyboard-actions. V-Piano could get some varieties though. It's way too expensive currently and some people hated it, so I think they're already done with attracting new people. What they can do is to water down a little and offer it at a more affordable price, something between the 700NX and current V-Piano probably.

I strongly believe Yamaha are going to update CP1/5/50. Those are not bad instruments from a player's perspective, however in geek-terms they are lagging behind for being stretched, looped, lacking string resonance. Some people criticized them for not having graded keys. Judging by their previous history, I think they will keep the NW-stage action and will improve on the piano sound but barely so, probably decreasing the degree of stretching (but less than full 88 sampling), less loopoing, probably string-resonance added.

Korg have never appealed much to me so I don't care what they will do.

Wild speculation was all I was after Some interesting opinions there. It would be nice if someone could put a great action in a cheap-ish midi controller (Numa Nero aside). I would snap that up

There was a rumor going around about Roland putting out their Nord NS2 killer, which put V-Piano, a B3-type module and Jupiter (?) synth guts into one box. I suppose all will be revealed in 24 hrs or so.

I suspect that there will be some change to the CP5/50 before too long, but for an entirely different reason. The forums are full of people complaining about the obtuse interface, and in fact, some months ago, a salesman at a dealership told me that they hardly sold any of them because no one could figure out how to use them. If they're not selling up to usual Yamaha expectations, I would expect changes.

More recently, I saw a color Yamaha-supplied overlay placed over a CP5 demo unit control panel, designed to show people how to "easily" access the key sounds on the showroom floor... obviously an attempt to address this issue... but there I was trying to follow the color-coded 1-2-3-4 steps and couldn't get the desired results. The instructions on the overlay probably depend on the unit being in a certain state to begin with. Since that can never be predicted on a showroom floor, as you don't know what the previous player might have done, they probably should have made step one "turn the unit off and on again." But that doesn't sound so friendly, either... and I'm not even sure that would have completely addressed the situation.

I too am curious if they make any movement on the v-piano- would be great if they at least add some new variations in a software update- if nothing else. At this point, its like an orphan drug. for certain users- its probably the best thing out there but that market will expand glacially at this price point and the buzz is long gone. its way too heavy to move around, so it can only be judged on its in-home or in-studio sound quality. if they refine that through an update, they could give it a breadth of life, if they leave it be, i dont think you'll see them being built much longer. People who think they will just put the v-piano into a multi faceted keyboard are probably years too early in that- i think the processing power needed to do this is just too much for anything other than a dedicated board, unless they completely re-write the algorithms. Personally, i think they probably realize they got it right with the SN sampled pianos, and got it wrong with the fully modeled vpiano...

This is exactly how I deal with virtually every Yamaha keyboard / rackmount I've had the pleasure of interacting with. Try to do something simple like select a different voice, adjust the reverb, transpose, etc. and almost invariably the UI enters some cryptic state, necessitating a power cycle in order to preserve whatever remains of the user's sanity.

Though I will say that the P120 is pretty simple (if you avoid the Function mode). I'm not sure why a lot of their "toyish" offerings are way more complex than the P120 - I suppose it's the extra functionality. All the buttons and wheels festooning their stuff is just an invitation to performance disaster if you accidentally brush against them during play.

I'm waiting for NAMM too. The MP10 and MP6 seem too new for any updates. I'm hoping that yamaha updates the P155 though, that Korg finally updates themSP250, and that Kawai brings something entirely new to the show (cause I like there DP's). I wonder what may be happening on the home style digitals as well. I wonder if Yamaha will update their YDP line at all to add more sounds and capabilities? One more day... I cant wait because then I am going shopping finally!! Front runners right now are P155 and MP6. Or maybe something completely different!!

How are we going to find out what comes out at NAMM, by the way? Is someone going that can post a list of all the things that happen or do we need to wait for reporters from the media write it up?

People could just drop info in this thread if they spot it I guess.

As a side note, Piano manufacturers are clearly better at keeping a secret than synth and guitar manufacturers. There is a 32 page thread full of new stuff over at the guitar forum I frequent. That or there is not much new.

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Sounds good Dave. Will you do me a favor and play the NP2 and report back on how it compares with the NP1? I'm really interested to see if it's got more features than what's initially been reported.

I'm wondering if we'll see an updated CP1/5. They're definitely due at 3 years since initial launch. New samples inside it? How bout the next in the V-Piano series? Perhaps something along the lines of something to compete with the N1/N2. An SV2 would be welcome as would a new top of the line action to replace that awful RH3. Kawai and Roland seem good to go on their stage pianos.

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I agree Dave. I'll just hold on to my NP1. Nord has done a wonderful job keeping it up to date with incorporating Long Release, not to mention the latest piano samples. Without anymore storage, and the same action, it makes more sense to just hang on to my Nords for a while. Although I still may sell the NE3. To be 100% honest, I'm relieved that the NP2 isn't any upgrade for strictly piano/EP playing. The NP2, so far as the spec sheet shows, offers no added benefits or features over the NP1 for guys like us. I would like to have the split and pad functionality, but part of the draw to the NP1 in the first place was its very straightforward approach to being a dedicated stage PIANO.

This is the site I'm using to keep up with all the news from NAMM 2012:

http://www.musicradar.com/event/namm

However, we don't actually know that it's the same action, only making that assumption at this point. Right?

Meh! No keyboard tab, no synth tab.

Yeah true. At least it's full of pics and sorta easy to find. It'd be nice if the official NAMM site would have a announcement page by category.