Yes, the DPBSD Truepianos v1.5.0 test concluded with a poor verdict. Yesterday I tried the current v1.9.5 demo and it was nothing to me to bother with. (In old times for 5 Ys. it was the very first piano sound I played with a MIDI keyboard and this first encounter was a true revelation. Interestingly, the timbre I found even now piano-like over the whole range, but after playing it some seconds you get all the problems which Dewster analysis is showing: stretching is obvious, a very audible phenomenon even during real playing.) Sympathetic resonance was non-existent for me, no much have changed since DPBSD test. (You cannot wait too much from a 100MB sampled instrument, but it passed our topic's test at least!)

I tried the current demo of Sound Magic Imperial Grand3D too. It has many of a piano characteristic implemented, but with many very unnatural rudimentary implementation details (reverbs, pedal behaviour).

Pianoteq stands there with no serious concurrency. Playability is superb, but it's piano sound I would describe as correct, but far from being a beautiful piano sound - not nearly as good as with some good quality sampled pianos, Galaxy e.g. (Even VPiano sound was not convincing.)

There must be a difficult to measure but subjectively very important distinguishing sound quality mark.

I can now better understand the strategy of modeler SWs, why they are packaging their SW-Product into whole phyiscal instruments: with SW alone it is no much room left to earn money. Even Pianoteq can charge only 100-400$ for their SW, setting some upper price limit.

What I could see as desirable, would be updateable modules within the cabinet of DPs. You could change computer parts (CPU, Memory, Motherboard, Sound Card all of them as a unit) AND SW separately, because the other parts (action, amplifier, boxes) are not amortising that fast. You have already standard interfaces to build on (MIDI; audio, sound cards).

I am wondering, how many LINUX-Based solutions are working within the DPs currently on the market.

The only software DP I know of that is working with linux is PianoTeq. And it works with no problems.

I actually emailed TruePianos and asked them to get me a linux version back when I was starting out. They have one internally that works fine, but they have never sold it. They were willing to sell it to me, though, so if anyone wants it I bet you could contact them directly and work something out. I didn't end up getting it.

To play Ivory or Galaxy on linux you would need kontakt or one of the other player programs for linux and as far as I know there are no suitable options. If there are, I'd love to know about it.

I'm not sure whether Kontakt, for example would work within wine.

I think the issue with pianos on Linux is that they often require iLok for copy protection, and that is not supported on Linux (although Muse has a special arrangement which supports iLok on the Linux-based Receptor).

Another reason to hate and avoid the iLok.

I did a bit of google just now to check it out and it seems that some people have decent success running Kontakt under wine. There are also tools to play or convert .nki files natively in linux but I doubt that all the little scripts that give you stuff like sympathetic resonance and repedalling work. Maybe I shouldn't be a doubting Thomas, though.

My main computers are all linux-based so maybe I'll try a couple of these with Vintage D to test the concept. I would not at all mind ditching windows on my piano computer.

I didn't mean LINUX-compatibility of SW pianos but the internal architecture of proprietary Digital Pianos - I suspect that these are internally based on a Linux computer in their cabinet!

All kind of much simpler HW (like my tiny Lynksys router) hapen to be Linux computer running some dedicated tasks with the application logic. Some or the better part or just all of the DP manufacturers could have it in this manner...s.Dewster's remarks to Linux Attila