Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards Kawai ES7 vs. MP6

Yes, the APs are the MP6's Achilles heel. A little ironic, given it's a stage piano. Let's hope that when Kawai releases the MP7, or whatever designation they eventually give its successor, they don't stint on the most important aspect of its function.

Why? Because it uses PHI sounds instead of UPHI sounds from the MP10?

James
x

No, because the APs all have a slightly harsh quality, lack sufficient layers for subtly nuanced playing, and could benefit from an improved action/sound connection.

With regard to UPHI vs PHI vs HIXL etc., as you may be aware ( ) I have a real problem with manufacturers having cut-down versions of already limited sample sets, particularly in "professional" products. Compared to software, most DPs are so far behind the curve, sonically, that to further compromise them for market segmentation purposes is akin to snubbing the customer - particularly when no suitable alternative is offered. This is why I think Casio and Roland [edit: and of course, Nord] deserve a lot of praise for their policy of delineating their products mainly by feature sets, and rarely by sonic quality. No customer wants something that sounds inferior.

I have praised the MP6 for its layout, action, EPs and controllability. It's just the APs that don't quite live up to expectations for me - and that's a shame, because the concept is great. I just can't understand the thinking behind making Kawai's only portable stage piano sound deliberately less good than could be achieved at the time. Of course, that's just my opinion, but I'd love to see Kawai produce THE definitive stage piano (that doesn't require a two-year course in Olympic-standard weight training).

+1

It need hardly be said that product cycles for hardware DPs are MUCH longer than for software. Purposely using lower-quality sample sets will shorten hardware product lifetimes more and more going forward. A losing proposition, IMO.

B.

The action/sound connection that voxpops alludes to is a very important aspect of DP engineering, and something that might be a hit or miss because it is non-quantifiable. You can have great sound and great action, but that doesn't guarantee success if they don't have a well titrated relation. In this aspect I think the ES7 really shines in that it is realistic, a joy to play and very responsive to expressive playing.

BTW, how accurate is it to compare DPs based on ambiguous corporate terms? James' question exposes the core of voxpop's criticism in that technological segmentation only creates further dissatisfaction with certain products. A dissatisfaction that is both grounded on empirical evidence and, unfortunately, unfair marketing strategies.

voxpops, I wonder if this is a case of pre-judging the instrument purely on the specifications table? UPHI is superior to PHI, of course, but I do not agree that this immediately renders the MP6's piano sounds as weak. Moreover, am I correct in thinking that you have not played a Kawai DP that features UPHI sound?

As you note, the MP6 is an excellent all-round gigging instrument, with a broad selection of sounds to cover most - if not all - bases. Given your intended purpose (playing with a band), do you believe that the difference in nuance and character offered by UPHI vs PHI would ultimately be perceived by other members of the band, or folks in the audience?

Would the MP6 be stronger if it featured UPHI sound? Yes, of course it would.
However, would consumers be willing to give-up many of the other sounds in order to accommodate the much larger UPHI piano samples? Alternatively, would consumers be willing to pay extra for the larger memory required? Those are much tougher questions to call.

As it stands, the MP6 remains an excellent all-round stage piano, available at a very competitive price.

Cheers,
James
x

James, I don't understand how I can be prejudging it. I've owned the MP6 for quite some time now, and have formed my opinion about its AP sounds from playing it regularly, and from that alone.


I agree. I haven't categorized the MP6's piano sounds as weak, but slightly deficient in certain areas. And of course, this came up today in response to another post where the MP6's pianos, in comparison with the ES7's, were described by the poster as unimpressive. This suggests that the problem has more to do with factors beyond the samples themselves, since the core samples are apparently the same in these two instruments. But that doesn't get away from the fact that Kawai continues to ration the better samples. My point is that, given the limitations of all these sample sets (be they UPHI or PHI), it is doubly problematic to continue to put the older/less detailed/more compressed samples in pianos, when technological advances and memory availability makes this seem like paranoid market segmentation and/or ultimate penny-pinching.



No, I haven't. But I don't need to to know that I am getting less detailed, smaller samples - you have said so yourself! Believe me, if I could have hauled the MP10's 70lbs plus accessories, plus case to a gig, I would have done so.


I play with a band, I play with a duo, I occasionally play solo, and, naturally, I play at home. Firstly, I need to inspire myself when playing. A lot of what I do involves improvisation. If I'm not getting the feedback from the piano I need, I play less well. If I were to follow your argument to its natural conclusion, I might as well play any old keyboard that sounds vaguely like a piano, as no one would notice the difference. But they DO notice. I've had people come up to me after a show and talk about the piano sound. They also seem to prefer the sound of the Yamaha Grand that I sometimes opt to play in preference to any of my DPs.

I don't know how much difference there would be between UPHI and PHI, but there must be SOME difference, otherwise why the tiers? I play blues, jazz (not as well as I'd like), and classically influenced original works; this range of music - some of it very exposed in a live setting - is why I want the best possible sound - not a cut-down, make-do version of the company's flagship samples.


I would, and judging by the comments on this forum, 90% of the respondents have little or no need for the rather ancient rompler sounds in the MP6. Yes, there are tonewheel sounds as well, but they are problematic on a weighted keyboard, and there is only very limited drawbar provision.

If, as you say, the UPHI samples are much larger, I suspect there must be a noticeable difference in the way the two MPs respond when playing AP sounds.



Yes, of course! But how much, in reality, does some extra memory cost in 2012? I'm not saying there shouldn't be an MP6 with its slightly compromised samples - although goodness only knows why they have to be so compromised in this day and age, when Nords have 500MB available, Numa has 1GB, and Korg has multiple gigabytes - but at least provide a portable with a sensible (modern) standard of sample memory. I mean, how much total memory does the MP6 have - 64MB? 128MB? - I'd be surprised if it's even that much.


I agree, but there is a real risk of complacency at Kawai. We, as customers, are asking for better pianos. Witness the explosion in software; look around and see what's happening with sample sizes and memory allocation in other manufacturers' products.

In the end, I'm just saying that I don't want second best simply because someone has decided that people who need to transport their instrument regularly don't need quality sounds. It dismays me when people in the industry say that the audience can't tell the difference, and so the owner needn't bother! If you really believe that, James, you might as well ignore the new Nord Electro 4D, sell your NE3 and go back to your old NE2.

James, when you asked if his reason for disappointment in the MP6's piano sound was that it was not UPHI, he said, "No, [it's] because the APs all have a slightly harsh quality, lack sufficient layers for subtly nuanced playing, and could benefit from an improved action/sound connection." Separately, he expressed disappointment that Kawai doesn't put its best piano sound in a reasonable weight stage piano. Your reply seems to be be mixing his two answers. He finds the MP6 piano sound disappointing strictly on its own terms, not compared to anything else, including the MP10 (which he hasn't heard).

Personally, I was likewise not particularly impressed by the piano sound of the MP6. However, I actually have also played the MP10, and that piano sound did impress me. Whatever the difference is, the two happen to fall on different sides of my own "that's a really good piano" threshold.

Well, thank you for the insightful feedback chaps. I'm confident that your comments will be useful when planning future instruments.



Hey, I love the old NE2 - it's still a great board.

However I need the sample section on the NE3 in order to play the Mellotron intro to 'Strawberry Fields'.

Cheers,
James
x

mmmm, didn't we have this discussion many times before "manufacturers 'cripling' their DP sounds with too little memory, for whatever strange marketing reason that may serve". Also the argument to ditch the bread-and-butter , hardly interesting additional sounds of the MP6 for more memory for the AP has been brought up may times. The manufacturer keeps on telling us the board would become too expensive when adding larger ROM for the AP. Which really nobody believes here but themselves. Also a small price increase like Casio did when going PX330 -> PX350 is something customers seem to be happy to pay for ; when they get better action and sound. I do not believe the PHI in the MP6 is bad, but there is indeed better on the market and the additional sounds are a waste , if they could have made place for a better AP. The drawbar organs can stay of course - -they don't use sample RAM and I found them actually pretty good ! So AP+EP+Organ , ditch the rest and make AP at least UHPI.

The ES7 DOES sound better with the same PHI sample set. If it's the enhanced resonance effects and/of EFX unit (reverb) , I can't tell - but both AP and EP presets sound brighter and more lively on the ES7. Also the keybed is more responsive. So if AP/EP is your main thing and you're looking for a portable , the ES7 is worth trying. Not many presets, but they are a small collection of the better sounds of the MP6.

The MP6 is still a good instrument - not super great AP sounds , but as an all-round board. For pure AP playing the ES is superior and the only portable option from Kawai. MP10 is for people with their own roadies. Casio seems to have been listening to user complaints concerning the PX330 and upped their Sample ROM and keybed quality. Perhaps Kawai will do the same in the future. That said I am too very surprised that the ES7 doesn't have the UHPI, since the higher range of Kawai has already shifted to HIXL. It would have been a great sales argument against the Casio series , which now will eat into the potential Kawai customer base in this segment. If I could get proper audio-in with a SW piano , as intended, I wouldn't bother - but now that I seem stuck with the PHI sounds I regret the absence of the better generation of PHI AP's...

Although all the people who don't believe it are also people who have no experience actually figuring out what these things cost, and no knowledge of the underlying architectures these companies are working with.

I'm really curious to learn what Korg did in the Krome, how they got 3.8 gb of data (albeit compressed) into a low cost instrument, giving them a 2.8 gb piano sample. They seem to have managed to do something no other MI manufacturer has figured out. I understand the Kronos... streaming off SSD using Linux underpinnings. But I don't know what they're doing in the Krome to get that capacity.

Does the Krome not use similar PC-based architecture (essentially a DP powered by a netbook)?

Is it 'instant on', or does it require some time to boot-up, like the Kronos?

James
x

I don't know. From what I've read, the architecture is closer to the M50 than to the Kronos... but that could be wrong, and for that matter, I don't know what powered the M50, either. Still, at $999, I would be surprised if the Krome included the equivalent of a netbook in there (or that the only slightly more expensive M50 could have included that when it came out).

At any rate, I think it's safe to say that the Krome does not have an SSD in it. And if it were indeed possible for them to stream from cheaper kinds of flash, that would make you wonder why they put the SSD in the Kronos to begin with. Though I guess it's possible that 4 gb of the kind of flash they would need in the Krome is cheaper than an SSD, but 16 gb (which would be what they would have needed in the Kronos) would not have been.


In between. I read it takes just under a minute to boot up. So not instant, but much faster than a Kronos.

Just give me a good audio input and I'll manage with my > 512GB SSD powered Laptop software instruments in addition to the build-in sounds ! That's where I'm feeling really crippled for the moment, not the amount of build-in ROM. I don't want to put all the stuff back that was ditched for the sleek and convenient solution of a DP with build-in audio hardware (exit studio monitors / stands / audio interface / extra cabling and power supplies). It is meant for the living room after all - not my studio...

Feel like crying in the wilderness; am I the only one who though of such a setup as a nice way to combine a DP with a SW solution in a setup that is as simple and elegant as possible ? And the only one that judges the audio input as unfit for such a purpose , simply because it's not good/clean enough ? Had I know that - I would probably have made another choice and gone up the ladder a bit to HIXL or similar (waited for the secret Kawai board ;-)....

Despite that I'm enjoying the ES sounds - the piano's are really not that bad with the new processing and combined with the keybed nice to play. You notice it misses something compared to the more expensive HW or SW solutions, but not so much that it is really annoying or anything. Audio-in is now only for play-along mp3 player input (?) with not too much care for quality of sound. In my case I won't use it at all for now...to bad; would have been the answer to the endless ROM/RAM discussion , at least for me.

Interesting, so it appears to be reading data from somewhere, then?

I recall one of the Korg engineers explaining to me last year that the Kronos' boot time could be reduced by adjusting the startup configuration (i.e. which instruments are loaded automatically). I wonder if the Krome's faster boot is due to the smaller amounts of data (and number of instruments) being pre-loaded?

James
x

I've only ever asked for the best that the company already produces - not some new architecture or SSD system.

I would be very surprised if the Krome was not using something like an Atom processor with some kind of fast-access flash memory. The start-up time is about the same as the netbook I use for VB3. The Kronos has to fire up six different engines and load larger chunks of data - the Krome has substantially less to deal with, and so can get itself in shape in around 55 secs.

JFP, can you use a pair of (attractive) powered monitors to route your laptop through, and just ignore the ES7's inputs?

You also don't ask them to do it without charging more for it!

Also, JFP, have you tried other ES7 units to check whether it is a problem with yours or a more general defect? I told you I didn't experiment such problems, but I'm beginning to suspect I may not have your higher audiophile standards.



Having reasonable expectations with what is in the end a piano emulation, how would you qualify the AP sound of the best HW and SW you have tried? If the ES is "not that bad", I guess the best HW would be "not bad" and then only a SW instrument could qualify as "good"?