Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards What is Hissing,Shimmering,Distortion-? sound in MP11,etc

I am currently trying out a Yamaha CP4 [for 2 weeks now & using only cheap headphones], but I would prefer to get an MP11 because the action is better. The dilemma for me is that the MP11 has more of a hissing,shimmering,[buzzing?] sound than the CP4 & I can't figure out what's the source of this problem & whether it can be eliminated.

I have heard this problem on many digital pianos using my headphones & other headphones ; & also without headphones.I am only testing acoustic piano voices.

Maybe this problem is caused by reverb,or distortion?
I notice there still seems to be some reverb in all brands of digital piano voices even with all reverb settings off.

This is not continuous background hiss,but only present when a note is played,especially when several [usually higher] notes are played.Problem is worse with reverb added.

Yamaha digital pianos throughout their range generally have the least of this of this hissing sound,followed by Kawai,which may a little better than Roland [RD800,RP401R]& Casio being the worst.
[I also think I prefer the Yamaha voices/tone as more authentic than Kawai,followed by Roland,then Casio.]

Maybe this can be eliminated by adjusting some [gain]settings?
or eliminated by using PianoTeq?

When all the CP4 EQ sliders are increased: this does cause distortion, which seems somewhat similar.

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NOTE: I actually only played the Kawai CS10 [GF action] & CA97 [GF2 action] [& CN25],with apparently pretty good headphones,because an MP11 was not available; but they all had this hissing sound.

Hi Roark h1, welcome to the forum. I think what you hear may be just the realism in the MP11/CS10 piano sound. The strings in an acoustic piano allow to hear a whole lot of overtones, some of them very high, and some even sounding a little "inharmonic" (especially in the lower range of the keyboard). I am not speaking of sympathetic string resonances here but of the sound of single notes. In many digital pianos the sound spectrum of individual notes is trimmed and 'smoothened' so you may not used to the kind of realism you hear now. If you have the possibility, sit down at an acoustic piano and compare!

That's a good observation : clash of the harmonics/overtones combined with inharmonicity ; [& I had considered] this may be part of the explanation.

But I hear this hissing sound in the Casio PX-860 & PX-350 & not in Acoustic Uprights & Grands.

Roark, im a bit intrigued by post. Im not sure i understand. I cant seem to hear any hissing, shimmering, buzzing on any of my boards (3 different brands and good headphones).

You mention there seems to be some reverb in all brands of digital piano voices even with all reverb settings off. I don't find this on any of my boards including the CP4 - same as what you have. Maybe G6 and up by default but that is normal and still not reverb. I also tried to reproduce the harsh sound by cranking reverb up to 127 and fiddled with Dry/Wet but still did not hear anything hissing-like.

I just tried that and no distortion at all - at normal volume level of course.

Anyway, I'll try to help you via comparison on my boards, but again, not sure I fully understand the issue.

Were you using headphones? Do headphones cause distortion?

Yes, Shure and Sennheiser headphones. No distortion. I can create distortion if I use ridiculous EQ and volume settings.

I see that on my CP4 the hissing problem seems to mainly happen when 2 adjacent [1/2 or whole step] notes are sustained together; & the hissing problem is especially prominent when the sustain pedal is held down during a scale especially chromatic.

This all seems to point to a clash of the overtones [possibly producing combination tones] as the best explanation.

Apparently increasing the EQ sliders just makes the effect louder; & I do this because I haven't found some other way to make the CP4 acoustic piano voices quite loud enough thru my headphones---any suggestions?

I still don't know why this hissing is more of a problem with Casio,Roland or Kawai as compared to Yamaha; and why I don't notice it on Upright & Grand pianos.
[PS: On the Rolands, besides the hissing, I hear a sound like a metal 'tine']

On Monday I will check the Roland & Casio sounds again at a nearby Guitar Center. I would have to travel an hour each way to audition the Kawais again [for a 3rd time].

roark_h1, assuming you are in the US, it may be worth giving Kawai America a call, and discussing this topic with my colleague there, Alan. He's very knowledgeable about keyboards and digital pianos, has experience playing a variety of boards from the major manufacturers, and may be able to offer some explanation for the sound you are hearing.

Kind regards,
James
x

I don't hear this hissing sound on my Roland V-Grand, and would be curious to know if it is heard on the newest models such as the LX-7 and LX-17 or their HP6xx counterparts. I can't say that I have noticed it on other DPs I have owned (or maybe I just attributed it to the electronics and did not pay much attention to it), but then maybe now that it has been pointed out, I might. Next time I am in a store that sells DPs, I will have to check it out.

Tony

I have experienced this as well on the MP11 and have asked Kawai about it - but no response as of yet.

What I've found is that this is audible without headphones, but difficult to hear without the isolation of headphones. With headphones it's terrible. Without headphones it contributes to a lot of dirt in the audio.

What I've also found is that it seems to be mainly due to changing the "Topboard" to anything other than "Open3" in the virtual technician. You should be able to easily reproduce the problem by doing this:

+ Select any piano.
+ Go into virtual technician and page down to page 3/3.
+ Change the "Topboard" setting to anything other than "Open3"
+ Put the volume at a reasonably high level
+ Play a major third or fourth anywhere above middle C

You should hear this noise as a clearly digital distortion. It sounds to me like it's some bad representation of "beats" between the tones.

If you change the "Topboard" back to "Open3" the noise will go away.

That's my experience.

Otherwise I'm really happy with the MP11, but sad that I can't really use it on any setting other than "Topboard" at "Open3" (simulating removed).

Just tried the above on my CA97, with headphones. No distortion/hissing etc at all, just the piano sound.

Tried the above with both speakers and headphones. I'm not hearing any distortion, although I hear the beats (which I also hear on my acoustic grand).

Nothing here in my MP11. Tried lowering and raising the lid and no hiss, shimmering or distortion. Using Sennheiser HD650 headphones.

I'm seriously considering getting the MP11 myself - mainly for home/studio, and primarily for accompanying my vocals during practice with headphones.

I use the CP5 now, but would like something with a heavier, more substantial action.

I currently use the AT ATH-M50Xs. Not as flattering as the Senn 650s for digital piano, but hard to beat for hearing imperfections in the vocals.

I will definitely listen for this noise when I play it again at Pierre's Fine Pianos. Although this is the first I've heard of it.

OT- if any users take the MP11 out for the occasional gig - what case do you use ? The CP4 would still be my primary gigging keyboard , but I would consider the Kawai for certain gigs if the load in were easy. Thanks.

direct recording to USB stick providing samples of this noise:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10200420/Audio-000.mp3

I'm sorry Tim but I can't hear it. I have slight Tinnitus in my ears and that does not help.

Your recording volume on my computer for that mp3 is kind of low. I have the volume of the recording maxed and my PC volume at 10 and I am still not hearing it at all.

Some suggestions:
a) If you can play the same chords for all lid openings the same way then we won't focus on the playing and more on the sound.
b) If you can also tell us what lid setting is at the different seconds of the recording then that would help us too.
c) Please save the recording as a .wav file so that we can hear all of the detail you are hearing.

I really want to hear what you are hearing because I do not hear it on my MP11. I am using my Sennheiser HD650s headphones and they can get plenty loud on my PC.

Listened to this on my Sennheiser 598s and via my JBL LSR305, and neither one did I hear any distortion, hissing, or anything abnormal.

May I ask what your experience with acoustic pianos is? Sometimes people who do not have an intimate knowledge of what an acoustic piano sounds like end up with unrealistic expectations of the digital attempts at replicating that sound.

For whatever it's worth at this point, the latest Kawai MP11 update (v 1.16) released in May, 2019 appears to have addressed most, if not all of the noise that I was hearing. In at least some of the cases the noise was really made worse if any digital compression (inside the MP11) was applied to the processing. The noise was still present with v 1.15; however, so far I haven't experienced it with v 1.16.

I'm not completely certain that this noise was the same thing that 1.16 fixed; however, here is an excerpt from the 1.16 release notes:

"– Improved: Removed slight reverb noise which could occur when a piano sound was played with pianissimo in rare cases."

I'm grateful to Kawai for continuing to support the MP11 with updates.

@morodiene, Thanks for your response and trying to reproduce. I understand that you mightn't have heard the noise in your test cases - or that somehow your instrument did not generate it the noise. Perhaps there were other settings that needed, such as some compression that I mentioned above, to be there to trigger the noise. In any case, I am reasonably familiar with what an acoustic piano sounds like.

Hi Tim, I seem to have missed this thread from April and you have taken the recording you had down.

But is this the noise I hear clearly in this track and is especially prominent at the 30 second mark.

Schumann's the Poet Speaks using MP11SE

I have now entered the world of VSTs and have not touched the internal MP11SE sounds in months and the above is an old recording of mine. But the noise I hear was one of a collection of reasons I moved to VSTs.