Hey everyone,

I've played piano my whole life, but haven't worked much with keyboards. Now I'm at college and desperately need a nice keyboard for our campus club. Weighted keys and a pedal are very important.
We are using club money, so we have no more than $1000 dollars.

I found 3 for sale on Craig's List: Technics PX30, Korg SP-300, and Yamaha P-120.
Are any of them any good?

Thanks!

All of these are discontinued, but I know that Korg and Yamaha usually make good stuff. Korg now makes the SP-250 which I haven't heard much about, and Yamaha's P-120 has been replaced by the P-140.
Even heard good things about Technics as well.

But for under $1,000, you should be able to get a pretty nice *new* piano. Look into the Casio PX-800.

...If you are looking for a slab-style piano (portable) the newer Korg SP-250 should be under $1,000 as well.

This is in many ways The Golden Age of
the Piano. Just as now every home can
have an inexpensive pc with the kind
of computing power that was once reserved
for research labs only, today every home
can have an inexpensive dp with grand piano-like
performance. Furthermore, dp's need
no tuning or maintenance, are very durable
and reliable, can be moved by one person,
have volume control so that you can play
anytime and anywhere, and have many
extra features that acoustic pianos
don't have.

You can get a good, new dp for less than
$1000 that will have grand piano-like
performance. For example, the Williams
Encore can apparently be had for less than
$600 online, including the optional
factory stand, aftermarket pedal, and
shipping.

If you're willing to buy used, you can
get great bargains, because a dp is
essentially a computer with a keyboard
and speakers and thus is priced much
like a pc, that is, a used one loses
value fast like a used pc. For example,
a 10 yr. old dp, like a 10 yr. old pc,
is worth little maybe a couple of hundred,
but it will play not much different from
brand new ones costing thousands. And
it's a buyers market with used pianos,
because the number of players in the
general population is small and so
any piano is difficult to sell. Furthermore,
there's no place for a seller to unload
it fast, because a piano dealer won't
buy it and a pawn shop will give him
almost nothing for it.

All three pianos you listed will have
grand piano-like performance. Offer half
or less of the asking price--provided
it's in perfect condition; test all
88 keys with and without the rt. pedal--and the
seller should grab for that because
chances are he won't get anything better.
Technics dp's are no longer sold in the
US and are apparently no longer serviced
by Panasonic--but these are quality
instruments and should last indefinitely--
and so you shouldn't be paying more
than about a couple of hundred for any Technics
dp.

Since this is for club use, it doesn't need to be new. You may want to visit your local Guitar Center to buy a used instrument there.

Yamaha P120 came out with P90 (no builtin speaker version), which is still preferable by many. so, if it's used and in good condition, you might want to check it out and consider it. the previous owner should have a FC3 pedal with it, but make sure you get it together with the pedal or even better with a stand. P120 was around $1000-1200 as new, so that you should be able to get a used in around $500-700 now.

Technics had a broad range of DPs including some fantastic ones (I don't know the PX30 specifically) but be aware that they were discontinued a long time ago, so parts and service will be near impossible. May never be an issue, but if it is you're probably hooped.

As others have said, it should not be difficult getting a relatively recent (or even new) DP for $1000. Especially if you're looking for a portable.

You can get some good deals on used digitals, but new is usually more wise when it comes to digital pianos if at all possible.

Buying a used digital (or any) piano is kind of like buying a used car. It can be a toss up on reliability, but you sometimes luck out. The main advantage would be letting someone else take the hit of depreciation. Some cons would be possibly not knowing who owned the piano last (or before them), how they played it, and how they took care of it. You have no idea if whether or not it was toured from place to place (which can be hard on a weighted piano), or if anything was ever spilled on it. Things like that can be compared to not changing the oil in your car regularly enough. It might not cause any problems now, but it could effect the longevity in the future. Also, some people play very heavy-handed, which can be hard on the actions. Yamaha has been known to have problems with the actions breaking down, but in actuality, no manufacturer is immune to it.

If you go to test a digital piano, try to play each note one-by-one from ppp to fff, as some imperfections in the sound and action may only surface if a note is played repetitively. I had a Yamaha YDP-113 that I bought new and treated very well, and the F above middle C became intermittently sluggish and stiff. You really wouldn't notice it unless you were playing very lightly, and even then it didn't always happen. Something a buyer might not notice unless they focused on each note individually. Imperfections in sound can include (but are not limited to) a single note sounding at full volume even when slightly pressed (caused by worn or dirty contacts), or a key or group of keys sounding fuzzy, or not playing at all. Things like this may only be intermittent problems so try to play each key several times at different volume levels.

It would not be a bad idea to play the keys with the volume down or the piano off either, to listen to any squeaking, clanking, or otherwise potential mechanical problems with the action that you can't feel.

Hope this helps.

I can't agree with that statement at all. Would you say that a 10 year-old computer is going to run very much like one you buy now?

One of the reason olders DPs can be had for so little money is that improvements are made year after year. Each year you can get something better, new, for less than the year before, at least for under $1000. And the number of notes that continue to sustain is now up to 64 polyphony (actually 32, using two channels) on at least some of these under $1000 models.

Buy something new, and be sure it has a warrantee that will allow you to take it back and get it replaced if anything goes wrong.

Actually you can buy Casio PX200 for less than $500, and it has 128 polyphony (single channel).

Right. 128 seems to be replacing 64 as the new standard, and thank goodness!

I bought my first digital, a Korg C-800
console in 1989 for $1700. My neighbor
now has it and it's still in perfect
condition. It has 16 note polyphony,
but it sounds better in many ways
than today's digitals, because there
is less circuitry and software to bog
things down. You can play anything on
it from concertos to rock. I gave it
to my neighbor in 2005, because at that
time it was more than 15 yrs. old and
essentially worthless, but it's still
a fine piano.