Dear All,

All of you that tune with ETD, please share your experiences, before I decided to get one of this. Thank you and I am hoping to get as much respons as possible.

Bernard Soetarman

You need to research old articles. There is tons info on this subject. You have four major choices: Tune lab, Reyburn Cyber Tuner, Verituner 100, Sandersom Accutuner.

They are all good.

Hi Bernard,

I am learning piano technology and tune my on pianos; I recently bought a laptop PC and downloaded the trial version of Tunelab pro and it is great. The first time I tuned my piano with it I was very impressed (the piano sounded better as well, although it was not what I would call out of tune to start with).

Best regards,

Rick

TUNELAB all the way.

I use Reburn (Pocket)for pitch raising (guess I like the prety colors and the "blush" when I get it). Use Verituner Pocket for the one-pass fine tuning. Have them on separate devices. My ears are still the most important. Ray Micsan - Alabama

There are many possible attributes which might make a given device or piece of software "best" for a certain user.

Among the attributes most useful to me are ease-of-use for a variety of tasks, so I have been using Sanderson products for 30 years. I understand the thinking behind these devices and find them simple to understand and use. Other devices might have very different learning curves, which is also very important to me. Other devices may be less expensive in terms of inital dollar outlay, which may be more important to some users than ease-of-use.

What you hear after using device is still for your ears to accept or reject and change, so the "quality of tuning" character of any device really might not be most important. And certainly such character will be a matter for argument!

Hello Ray,

I see you have both RCT and Verituner. Have you tried Verituner for doing pitch raise then fine tuning? Let me know your opinion. Have you done the same thing with RCT? Which one do a better job?

If you have to choose one, thay could give you a better sounding piano and works for most tuning job, which one you prefer?

Bernard Soetarman
Piano Technician

Hello Bernard; I have used both the RCT and Verituner for both pitch raise and then for fine tunung and they both do a good job in my opinion.
I have done a fine tuning comparison on two pianos, first with the Verituner, following insructions "by the book" using the "average" style. Then the RCT, advanced mode -OTS 4, the only "customizing" was NOT using their "Smart Partials", changing those to suit me. I was amazed at how close the tunings were. Am just a little bit more satisfied with the Verituner when doing the one-pass fine tuning. RCT does have that neat 10-Style Tuning Library, a template for 200 pianos. Ray

The Average function in VT, while pretty good, doesn't use the full power of the unit - the ability to use all of those measurements to balance between different octave types at the same time. Using the custom style function goes beyond the basic setup. (So does the custom equalizer on RCT - but the VT is the only one that can take advantage of more measurements.)

While the differences between the final tunings on most of the platforms are small, (between power-users aiming for the same results on bigger instruments) I believe the subtle differences that the Verituner finds makes an improvement to the quality of the final tuning. Also, when tuning smaller instruments, the differences are magnified.

Ron Koval
Chicagoland

I think a big part of the preference is just the user interface: how the thing looks.

You've got the rotating red dots of the Accutuner, on custom hardware; RCT has its spinning blades, and the three or four separate programs that work together (Chameleon, etc.); Verituner is easy to get started with.

I like TuneLab, because it has both the spectrum display (like an oscilloscope) as well as the phase display (moving blocks). The interface is both simple and deep: easy to use the first time, but plenty of power for the advanced user. I'm still learning new things about it, years later. And it's hundreds of dollars cheaper than the rest.

I particularly like its pitch raise feature. With the auto measure, auto partial selection, and timed note switch, it does a good job easily.

Give each a try, and see what you like. TuneLab has a free trial.

--Cy--

The RCT is new. Any reports on the new version?
It's suppose to tune based on the predominate partials and some other things. It's faster and more powerful.

Any of you also an aural tuner? After you tune with ETD, do you check the beat rates? Was that progress smoothly? How about the 4th and the 5th? Was that consistent throughout the piano?Since I am an aural tuner, the ETD that I want to get, should be able to help me to achieve this better, easier and faster. I could make it close, but I want to make it better and this is one of the reason I want to get the ETD. Up to this point I still tend to go for Verituner. Anybody wants to share their experiences?

I'm an aural tuner (25 years). I had trouble at first with an ETD tuning because I had to learn to tune to visual cues instead of aural ones. This learning curve slowed my tuning at first and was a bit frustrating. In addition, I could hear the shortcommings of the ETD tunings, especially on spinet pianos. I currently use Tunelab for overpull tunings where it really excels. I usually tweak the overpull tuning by ear to fix errors. When fine tuning, it's always by ear. ETD's seem to be very good at setting a smooth progression of thirds and tenths, but sometimes at the expense of fourths and fifths, especially on small pianos.

I do a lot of institutional tuning on instruments not so well cared for, and an ETD (I have both SAT and Tunelab) is a lifesaver when tuning these PSO's for festivals en masse. I never rely totally on the ETD and perform aural checks throughout. It is a huge help in the 7th and 8th octaves when you have 5 or more to do in one day.

I have both Verituner 100 and Sanderson Accu-Tuner III, and I use them for different things. Before buying an ETD for the first time last summer, I tuned a long time strictly by ear. Aural tuning is still my first love and what I enjoy most.

You do have to have a pretty good idea what you want an ETD to do, then read the online manuals and perhaps listen to what others have to say. If at all possible find someone who can demo each unit or let you try it.

I think each of the major ETDs has strong points that might make it the right choice. So, I guess I have to politely disagree with the premise of the thread's title. To me there is no "best" ETD.

Verituner will produce a high-quality tuning on most pianos, one requiring little or no alteration. For me it's usually the bass I have to tweak. Other variances I notice usually aren't enough to make any real musical difference. To consistently get a result you're satisfied with, you may have to learn about the custom-style function and how to pick a style to match a given piano. On the other hand, a lot of people just use the built-in "Average" style and are perfectly happy.

It's just my tentative opinion, but I think low-quality pianos with lots of confusing stuff going on sometimes cause VT's sophisticated multi-partial thinking to calculate more than it needs to, creating kind of a muddy end result. On a piano like that I often prefer -- if I don't want to tune it by ear -- to start with SAT III's more rigid basic tuning, then use its Double Octave Beat Adjustment to alter the stretch on the fly as I go. Often I'll tune the bass by ear or by manually referencing different partials with SAT. This approach does require good aural skills and a bit more time than just sailing through a totally-calculated tuning.

On basically aural tunings I sometimes tune the high treble or low bass while using SAT to manually reference different partials. The less clarity a piano has in those sections, the more likely I am to partner with the ETD.

If you want to work along with the ETD step-by-step, you should know generally how you want to do that. Verituner isn't really designed to work that way, although you can work through a whole section then check to see how it's doing. VT's real purpose is to calculate the best entire tuning possible, within parameters set down by either a built-in style or its unique custom style technology. I think it does that job very well.

It's also very easy to get started with. But, like the other machines, VT does require time and know-how to really utilize its potential.

Jeff

Jeff,

Could you tune only certain part of the piano with verituner?

Bernard Soetarman

Sure, no problem...

I know a lot of aural techs are used to direct-reference tuning. That is, looking at one specific partial match while playing two different notes. (one at a time) The Verituner isn't set up to do this in the normal tuning mode.

Understanding that the quality of the fine tuning is dependent on the number of notes measured may make a difference in how you approach this machine.

Ron Koval

It would be easy to let Verituner listen to some sample notes then just tune the temperament area with it. Like I said in the thread "For Veritune Users," I haven't done it myself but Verituner is certainly capable of doing a great job of just setting a temperament.

As far as just using Verituner to do certain parts of a basically aural tuning, say the high treble or low bass, that's when you're getting out of what it was designed for. If you understand enough tuning theory and Verituner's "Measure" function, it can be done. (See further comments, below.)

If you're thinking of getting Verituner Pocket and tuning this way is important to you, I'd check with Dave Carpenter and make sure VT Pocket's Measure function can do everything VT 100's can. I don't have the PC version, so I don't know. I'd be glad to help you ask Dave the appropriate technical questions if it's a serious inquiry. Or maybe Ron and David B. could help.

To say much more would probably require too much technical talk and Verituner-specific terminology, but go ahead and ask more questions if you want. Or, buy VT and join the user's forum. So far I haven't seen much interest there in this kind of thing, but I like to discuss stuff on the forum and will help you if I can.

Jeff

Ron said:

Just to round out Ron's explanation: One can use the ETD to reference one note or multiple notes already tuned, to see how their partials which coincide with the note being tuned line up. One can either tune to match a single partial exactly, or compromise tune between two or more partials. This technique can be approached in a number of ways, and really is a pretty involved subject ... something I'm still learning about.

The first thing is to have a good understanding of how each string breaks up into partials that create independent frequencies. Aural tuners use partials to tune, but they don't always understand much about them. I don't know how much this subject interests Bernard.

Jeff

Since we're talking about mixing Verituner with aural tuning, there is one more possibility I've thought of. I've never tried it, but it's something I talked to Dave C. about before buying the unit. Since getting the unit I haven't really seen the point of trying this, but maybe I should, just for the heck of it.

If you wanted to tune your own temperament then have VT calculate a tuning based on that, you could do it with the "Alter" function. I think this would be one way to go about it:

You would first aurally tune enough of the midrange to have the notes A3 through A4.

Then you would pick or create a style that would cause VT to calculate a tuning with the same width A3-A4 octave as what you just tuned.

Then you would play each aurally-tuned midrange note you want included, with Verituner showing you what it calculated for those notes. Using the "Alter" procedure you would then substitute your midrange, note-by-note, for Verituner's.

Finally, you would have VT recalculate the whole tuning based on your midrange. You could use all or part of the results.

As I say, I've never tried that so I don't how it would come out. It was an idea that fascinated me because of the unique way VT's custom style function can mix user-programmed percentages of different octave types. In particular, I thought it would be a neat way to tune the piano's upper half.

Jeff

Sorry to make one more post but, after thinking about it some more, I may've come up with a quick enough way to manually reference different partials while tuning the bass or treble.

If one doesn't actually measure different partials exactly, but only mentally notes numerical readings on Verituner's display dial, it should be possible to do most or all the things this approach requires, without taking too much time. A limitation would be accuracy, since one would have to visually judge distances between the smallest markings on VT's display dial, which are of whole cents.

I'm kind of flying by the seat of my pants, since I don't have a piano here in front of me to experiment with, but I'm certainly interested now to try this out.

Thanks, Bernard, for asking questions and getting me thinking about this again. I've edited my previous comments in accordance with my current thought.

Jeff

Jeff and/or Ron,

Can I use Verituner to check my temperament? It's like backward way of tuning with ETD. In case I want to check how close is my temperament when I tune aurally.

I just ordered my PPC and hopefully I could get it sometimes next week.

Getting closer to my ETD.

Bernard Soetarman
Piano Technician

Sure - the only "pre" step you might want to take is to make sure the endpoints are in the same place. If your temperament is A3 - A4, then make sure the machine setting you choose matches those two notes.

It's easy to use as a training aid as well. Tune each step THEN look at the ppc to see if you agree. Then comes the fun part - which is right? :-) Use your checks to prove your case, or find out where you might have gone a little wrong...

Ron Koval

Congratulations on your purchase, Bernard. I think you'll be happy with it.

Jeff