Ok, I'm very new and have only just started learning but I'm trying to think ahead to save problems in the future.

At some point, hopefully soon, i'll be looking to upgrade from my old keyboard to a piano or digital.
I would, as most I think, prefer an acoustic over a digital. However, due to having children and noise therefore being an issue I have a decision to make.
Get a digital, or an acoustic with silent system. One more problem though, and it's the main one, budget.
Whatever I get to start with will have to be cheap. I'm talking a few hundred £ as opposed to a few thousand. So I was wonderning, as an alternative to digital, how much the silent systems are (in the uk) and how difficult they are to fit? Also, if I did get a cheap acoustic, then bought a better one in a year or two, could the kit, or parts of it, be moved to the newer piano?
I'm not a technician, or even had much to do with piano's in the past but I am fortunate to be technicaly minded and can work out most things mechanical or electro mechanical.

Or is all of this simply a silly idea, best left to a professional or abandonned altogether?

All opinions/suggestions welcome.

Thanks, Mark

I think for a few hundred you should be able to get a fairly decent older piano to play on, but for a piano with a silent feature you need to spend much, much more.

You say the preference for a silent system is because of children (I assume you are concerned of disturbing them,not the other way round ). Isn't there a time of day you could play when they are out or not sleeping?

At the moment it's quite hard to find time. I work 8am till 5pm. By the time I get in and have dinner, its time to feed the two youngest, then bath them then last feed and put to bed. I don't normally get time to myself until 8/9pm.
I just thought maybe installing a system myself may not be too expensive, though the cheapest system I have seen so far would be £600, which is of course more than I could get a digital for. Shame, would much prefer an acoustic.

No more thoughts on this?

Silent system (rough estimate) would be around £2k for a most basic model. They're pricey. You'd be better off buying both a decent but older acoustic and an electric keyboard. Make sure the keyboard has 88 keys and weighted though (gives better touch).

The Casio Px 330 has a pretty good feel to it for a digital. The piano sounds aren't bad either.