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I have said this before, but it bears repeating - well done Jay! This kind of support from Roland in the forum is really "above and beyond".

Tony

I set my DP to auto-off after two hours. When I'm done playing for the moment I just close the key cover and walk away; if I come back soon I'm spared the 6 second bootup, and if I don't come back the piano isn't on all night. It's a minor convenience that I appreciate.

FWIW the Kawai CA97 also creates a new song when overdubbing, which is the previous song with the overdubbing on top, therefore preserving the original song if you want to 'undo' your overdub. This seems like a good thing to me?

I've given my reasons why I think it's a bad idea, and it is also a contrary behaviour to all sequencers I have used before. There is a step in the overdubbing process (note the word 'overdub') that I listed, which displays 'new song' but with no option to change this. It seems to me that the devs might have intended to give us an option at this point and forgot, else why add this extra step that does not allow you to do anything.

It's been ages since I've done composing, but from what I recall from my work on various keyboard workstations, when overdubbing I'm always presented with options after an overdub like: "CHANGES: _LISTEN_ | _SAVE_ | _DISCARD_" which seemed fine to me.

For what it's worth, I believe the benefits of a non-destructive overdubbing system (as implemented in Kawai and Roland DPs) outweigh the minor inconvenience of needing to re-select a song after overdub.

Kind regards,
James
x

Have you actually used multi-track sequencers in anger before? Have you repeatedly (and then repeatedly again) laid down track after track, and then developed each track as you perfect your sequence of tracks, be that three or thirty-three tracks, as you strive towards your multi-track musical goal?

The prospect of having to keep track (no pun intended) of which song number is which, for even just one three-track song is frightening. It wouldn't be so bad if you only have one person recording and overdubbing one song, but even working with two songs would be confusing, let alone a dozen!

And have you actually tried following the manual to see what steps are required to rename and delete songs on the DP via the few tiny buttons? ...you'd be there all day, every time you need to clean up the register in order to make space for more tracks, or to avoid getting confused as to which of the dozens or hundreds of songs contains the particular combination of tracks that you might happen to want to roll-back to.

In an ideal world, with a big-screen interface and a well-designed track management system, having a roll-back facility would indeed be a great feature, but given the lack of all those things in these DPs, not being able to 'over'-dub tracks is a recipe for a huge waste of time and resources, in my opinion.

An option to 'save over' or 'save new' would of course be the ideal solution, to keep everyone happy

[edit:] spelling mistake.

Kawai DPs with MP3/WAV record or overdub functionality present a 'Save to USB?' confirmation screen after recording/overdubbing, so I would be surprised if the latest Roland instrument do not follow the same functionality.

Kind regards,
James
x

The HP/LX series does indeed allow one to save a recorded song to a USB memory stick, so yes, you are correct that a roll-back mechanism of sorts already exists with these new DPs ...so we just need the overdub facility to 'over'-dub now then

Well, maybe it's a bad idea for you but frankly between destructive and non-destructive overdubbing I am pleased Roland has chosen the latter. How would I feel if I was overdubbing something for 100th time, being tired, and in the middle or at the end of session, I would just realized, I had used wrong track??? There is nothing worse than losing my creative work. I am very pleased with this functionality. It may be inconvenient but this is really minor issue.

If I am not mistaken, such DAW as Reaper has option to overdub a track or its chunk with non-destructive manner meaning you can listen previous and new version of it. It's I think still in the same file or session.

Reaper is a fully-featured digital audio manipulation and management tool with a massive visual interface. Yes, it would be great if the HP/LX series had such software and display, but it hasn't. It is a DP with a tiny display and very few buttons, so you cannot expect Reaper levels of functionality - purely because of the interface limitations. However, Roland could very easily change their 'New Song' display step to a 'New Song' or 'Overdub' choice. This would fit perfectly within the current HP/LX UX interface paradigm.

Roy, the comment on Reaper and other DAWs was a side note just to make a point that overdubbing of this manner is not an odd design of Roland pianos. Of course you cannot expect similar and such powerful functionality in DP as you find in professional DAW but it wasn't my point.

As to the main overdubbing issue, well it might be painful of course if we need to iterate through 30 songs and delete them and I feel you here; that's a pain in the neck. What you suggesting is OK but equally we are not hopeless. You could always copy everything to USB, browse it in a computer and delete what you need, quickly enough. You could initialize internal memory and copy back what's left to internal memory of DP. I mean it is a lot to do for a simple task but with the scale you producing your files, perhaps this way is much easier. I personally record everything using USB memory, at least I think I am

A bit off-topic -

If I'm not mistaken, it was in this very topic (although I'm not certain anymore, since it's been a while) that somebody said an acoustic piano shop in Copenhagen I believe, or somewhere, which had Steinways, only had some Kawai digitals, presenting it as a definite argument as to how only those digitals are good enough to stand next to acoustics.

Today I came across a shop in Frankfurt full of acoustic pianos (from baby grands up to full concert grands), from top manufacturers, and it only had two digital pianos. A Roland DP90SE and a Roland F140R. Should I follow the logic of the one who originally presented the argument...

Instead, I want to say they're all great instruments and we're lucky to have the chance to choose something that will fit our preference and budget from the bunch.

People make all kinds of claims in internet forums. the sad fact of the internet is that anybody can be who/whatever they want to be and nobody is the wiser. I would recommend that you generally take what is said here with a grain of salt, and also consider who is posting. Some people you will get to know over time and trust their posts for the most part. Others, well just ignore. Then, there are people here representing companies that make products being discussed in the forum. I trust both Kawai James and Jay Roland. They have consistently posted informative content, as well as bring problems raised here back to their respective companies. There are others I trust here too, but that has come from reading their posts over time and seeing a decent consistency.

By the way, I agree with your assessment at the end of your post.

Tony

Don't worry, I was just being ironic with regards to the mentioned (rather old) post. I just remembered it when I came across that shop today.

I wholeheartedly agree with your appreciation of Jay Roland and Kawai James, having after lots of reading on this forum, and not so many actual exchanges, formed a similar opinion. Every time I, or others have interacted with them, I found their input to be objective, fair, informative, and generally very helpful. I appreciate their input here and I really believe they give a lot more value to this forum.

I want to thank you, Jay and James, for your constant valuable presence here!

I was in a piano shop like that in Hamburg a few weeks ago. Good selection of acoustics and, like, three Roland digital pianos, two of them slab form factor.

This shop is listed on the Roland web site as a Roland dealer, mind. So I was half expecting to not only be able to look at his Feurich, Seiler, Sauter and others, but maybe also at the new LX models again.

And they had the nerve to actually, literally try to compare the sound of a slab DP with a 130cm concert piano... I mean, wtf?! That is not even apples and oranges, that is pebbles and melons...

In other news from the same visit: The Feurich are not the same since they are being manufactured in China. Sauter still refuses to go low end and a 116cm Seiler makes you wonder why others need >120cm for that bass. :-)

Hello Jay Roland,


Two questions that I would like to ask you if you do not mind:
1) There is this new version of MIDI called the High Definition MIDI new protocol that is planned to come out in the coming year or years.
In your contacts with Roland, have you heard anything about this new version of MIDI called High Definition MIDI and on its release date?

If not, has any other person on this forum heard of WHEN will the new version of MIDI called High Defintion MIDI be released?

2) I am new to the Roland digital pianos. In general, these HP603 and HP605 digital pianos, they will be renewed after how many years? I think they were released in 2015, isn't it?

Thanks for your feedback on these points.


Kind Regards
Michael

I'm not sure when it will be properly adopted, but I can tell you that what I think you're talking about (HD Protocol (unless there is something else in the pipeline)) is not MIDI. From http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2015/01/16/new-midi-hd-protocol-has-reached-a-milestone ...

"Technically, HD Protocol is not MIDI because it does not follow the MIDI Specification. While it performs the same functions as MIDI does, it is a different technology. Just as USB and FireWire perform the same functions but are different.

"We are aware that musicians may assume our HD Protocol is a replacement for MIDI, but that’s an unrealistic expectation which we do not want to encourage.

"MIDI is extremely cost effective and well suited for very low-cost products, while HD is not; and MIDI already handles most applications that people have today, so the added cost of HD can’t be justified in most products.

"We believe that HD Protocol does make sense for certain products, but what those products are will be up to individual manufacturers to decide and promote.

"We expect HD-equipped products to roll out slowly over time, while MIDI continues to be the primary technology for digital musical instruments for many more years. Hence, we need to promote each technology as a separate (yet fully interoperable) solution."

The new HP and LX models are from mid 2015, in stores towards the end of 2015, yes. In the past, Roland (as the other DP vendors like Kawai, Yamaha, Casio) have been on a three year cycle.

But previous Roland models were 2 years before those so maybe Roland will do 2 year cycle now.