Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards New Kawai CA-15 on KAWAI UK and Germany websites!

With RM3-II (not GF) !!

Availability: 2013 march.

New CA-15

Looks nice. Just one small side-note ; no audio input. So if you ever get bored of the standard PHI piano sound and trow in a laptop, you'll have to use external speakers. For the rest a nice package. Fits nicely in between CN-34 and CA-65 (save for the bit more standard PHI with 192 voices and lack of audio-in).

Well,
No USB either (You have to chose an audio interface with MIDI IN).
I think the cabinet will be just a good case for my Genelec monitors on the top of it - but I didn't expect to want to abandone them with CA65 or perhaps even with CA95 not.

So basically it's a VPC with a stand and internal sounds I wonder about the price though...

I find the Kawai UK website to be much better than the US website.

Basically it's a ca-13 with RM3-II thrown in as new feature. Price here with 21% VAT is € 1799

Manufacturer's price is the same as for CN34 (see price chart under "specification" of both). That is about the same as VPC with stand and additional music rest.

My question is, wether the sustain pedal is continous, and is it the same as on CA65?

The CA15 is a direct successor to the CA13.

I posted the following in a separate thread last week, but it's perhaps worth reiterating here:





Yes, the CA15 features the same pedal functionality as the CA95/CA65, albeit without the 'Soft Pedal Depth' and 'Half Pedal Adjust' Virtual Technician parameters of the larger models.

Kind regards,
James
x

Thanks, I'm guessing the price will be more or less the same across the EU.
I was mainly interested in this thing as a midi controller, but for that money I think I'll stick with the VPC.

Thanks James, didn't know about the other improvements, other than the new keybed. Are the new resonance and reverb effects the same as on the ES / CN34 series in quality ?

Cabinet is certainly nice - it's seems to be a CA-65 with reduced amp power, but same speaker and cabinet setup. Pity for the lack of audio-in - otherwise I would consider this an alternative to my coming VPC purchase. Don't want to put an extra speaker set around the CA-15 when I decide to add a software instrument . For the rest an nice upgrade from CA-13.

I don't need the internal sound system at all, nonetheless it has following advantages over a MIDI Controller as the VPC:

• It has a key lid
• It has a decent music rest
• It has a decent looking wooden stand
• It has fixed pedals
• Children and guests could have something to play on occasionally (when they don't have your laptop at home)
• I also guess there will be a broader demand for a cabinet instrument on selling.

Nonetheless, it is a pitty that USB (with MIDI out) and a line in are lacking.

These are in the first line just built in small annoyances to support higher and product sells. (Admittedly, these are better than random beeps and noises and muted keys with SW shareware demos because there are some options as workaround.)

Wouldn't a model that had it all (I mean a good standard level of sound development, conectivity, practical design and keybed) be unbeatable?
Or is there something I am missing?
One has things that others lack. They have different prices, of course, but many people don't want to pay the extra money-for-nothing or, in fact, chooses to pay just-a-little-more for a significant improvement.
What we have now is a bunch of models with mixed performances and prices that just confuse the customer.
Make it clear, make it good, make it last, make it clever, then I'll shut up and give my money to you.
Oh wait, it's all about someone becoming a millionaire.

With Key-off release did You mean let-off simulation?

Then one more PRO with CA15: key off MIDI velocity (s. manual)


Fine, Half Pedal hopefully means full continouos pedal velocity implementation (MIDI included) - If this is true, this is a point which could be stressed out all Kawai models implement continous pedal. (As we have just seen by lower Casio Models it is not common that half pedal is a continous implementation.)
This is important especially with SW instruments: with a jumps in pedal velocities are damper and pedal noises very rude - you turn them off completely with VintageD e.g.)

For this reason it would be interesting to know how many velocity steps are there. (For all models).

Temperament, I think I can shed some light on this (for the CA95 at least, but I assume it should work the same for other models with "Grand Feel Pedal System), as I recently investigated the CA95 pedal implementation due to some compatibility issues with software pianos.

The CA95 sustain pedal sends 25 different MIDI velocity values between the whole range of 0-127, in fairly equal steps of about 5. However the trigger points are not evenly distributed about the whole physical pedal range (as I assume to be the case with other continuous sustain pedals), but rather concentrated in an area near the pedal up point. I suppose Kawai has implemented it this way with the philosophy that the whole range of MIDI values 2-126 should be the half-center pedal range, and everything below the range would be damper up/pedal down (so nothing noteworthy should happen there, much like in a real grand).

In detail this means:
At the physical pedal up point no MIDI value is sent. Only after a short physical pedal travel (the initial slack) where the point of contact of damper lift rail would occur in a real grand, the CA95 pedal sends MIDI value = 0. The further travel range where the dampers have reduced damping capabilities then fires off all the MIDI values. At the point where the dampers in a real grand would lose all contact with the strings, the CA95 pedal sends MIDI value = 127. Over the whole remaining bit of pedal travel until the pedal bottoms out (no effect on sound on real grand), no further MIDI values are sent.

This can work well for halfpedaling if the receiving software is programmed accordingly to accept all MIDI values as part of the half pedal center range (the CA95 internal sound module obviously works fine).
However, unfortunately it does wreak havoc with any external software trying to calculate pedal noise volume from the time between the pedal up and pedal down MIDI events (or an implementation similar to this), as the travel distance is shorter between those two events on the CA95 as would commonly be expected. Thus the calculated volume result is way too high (for example in Galaxy's The Giant or the new virtual piano suite from VI Labs - True Keys: Pianos), or it doesn't work altogether like in Ivory II, where no pedal noises can be triggered at all by the CA95 pedal.
Moreover, in case it works the pedal down noise is already triggered at the damper disconnect point, before the pedal actually physically reaches the bottom - which also means it is triggered on every single pedal use, even if the pedal is not pushed further until physically reaching the bottom at all. In combination with the miscalculated pedal noise volume this obviously gets obnoxious really fast, so I tend to disable pedal noises completely in my software pianos.

So, while the Kawai CA95 pedal is definitely continuous and quite detailed at that (I think my old Yamaha CLP-170 only sent about 6 different values in steps of about 30), it is not linear continuous and thus does not completely work as intended when triggering a software piano.

I hope that at least the F30 pedal for the VPC is linear, since its sole purpose is to be used with software pianos.

Two questions I guess for 'Kawai James'...

1. With the 20 watt amp and 12cm speakers and 'New Harmonic Sound Engine', will the CA15 basically perform like a CN24 but with wooden keys and fewer voices? I rather like the CN24 and a version with an even better keybed would be interesting to me

2. Will the software curves defined for the VPC also work with the CA15?

Hey

I'm french and sorry for my english.
I'm also a beginner whith piano.

I was looking for the kawai CA65, and now come this new CA15.

Are they realy differents ?

The CA15 has no USB port, how can we use MIDI IN instead of USB ?

doume

Thanks, Aeons Holle for the very detailed informations.
(I could remember to have read about 24 velocity values, but couldn't find it anymore.)

Pianoteq has a wizzard for calibration of these velocities, and you can even define own velocity curve for the pedal travel.

My sold KAWAI CA-51 had sent only 8 velocity values in quite linear manner, but I couldn't configure VintageD with it to work properly - I guessed these discrete 8 values were too few for it to function properly.

I love the look of these spinet pianos. Maybe someday I will buy one. I also like the look of stage pianos. Can a man have two pianos and be happy?

You can have dozens of pianos and be happy
So you can choose the instrument accordingly to your mood and type of music.

Going back to Kawai, I don't understand why (it's to all manufacturers) they are putting the 12cm speakers to the piano... 16cm should be ok, but 12 is definitely to less...
The power is not so important as the size...

Dear Aeons Holle, could You share some Guinea Pig-experiences with True Keys Pianos? Would be nice.



By the way, could You share your experinces with True Keys and the CA-95? I am very curious.

Interesting (open) question....

Further, the most important question remains: do you listen to the SW-Instruments with Your CA95 over line-in? How the Sound Board behaves with them compared to the native sound of the CA95?

1000*Thx Attila