Hi All,

I have one month old CLP440 and I’ve noticed that the A (I think, might be B, I’m not at the piano right now) above middle C plays louder than the other keys. It is on tune, just has a more penetrating sound, not overly so just noticeably so. With headphones it is fine and on the non-piano sounds it is ok too, or at least barely noticeable.

Is this one of the joys of owning a digital piano? I’m guessing it is and I shouldn’t be too concerned.

I just want to make sure because if it is unusual I will contact the store for a warranty visit.

I’m asking here first because I’m hoping to receive fairly unbiased advice.

Thanks,
Matt

I had a note that played WAY LOUD, caused by foreign matter under a key contact. I was repaired by a local tech.

Maybe your piano has that problem?

In your case did the note sound too loud with headphones also? This isn't super loud just noticeably so, which could mean a smaller bit of whatever under there.

thanks,
matt

Since you say it's fine when using headphones, the only real possibility is that it's a problem (feature?) with your speakers or the acoustics of your setup.

Alternately, the sensor may be mis-calibrated or dirty or something but your headphones have a dip in their response there so it's not as audible.

It's not altogether uncommon to have problems with the sensors in your DP, but it's very unusual to have those problems show up in the sounds through onboard speakers but not your headphones.

For kicks and giggles, maybe try outputting the sound through the line-out into some speakers and see if it's loud there as well

I'll give that a try, thanks.

If the problem goes away with headphone, then there is nothing wrong with the key action or sound engine. What you have is a speaker that is more sensitive to that one frequency. Or it could even be a room resonance. You can test the room resonance idea simply by moving the piano a few feet out into the center of the room and turn it 45 degrees. But I'd bet on a speaker having a peak sensitivity at that note.

If you heard the problem in headphones I'd say it was a dirty switch or maybe the prototype acoustic grand they sampled has the same problem.

If it does turn out to be the room you need to cover any large areas of hard flat surface with either something like a bookcase or acoustic panels made for that purpose.

None of the built-in speakers in digital pianos are great. You have to add your own external speakers if you want the best sound

Thanks, I'll try moving it as well. Knowing myself I'll hook it up to the stereo and wind up buying speakers for it.

thanks,
matt

I moved the piano a few feet and it sounded normal. It must be some resonance in the room because after I moved it back I heard it again. Fortunately, it will be moved to its permanent location in another week or so. Hopefully no resonance there.

Thanks all for the help.

matt

I had this happen to me with my p-80 I got so frustrated one day that I took a hammer to the entire keyboard

only to find out that it was the touch sensitivity pad underneath
that contact probably went bad

it is a simple fix take it to your local keyboard repairman
or you may even get it fixed by an organ repair man