trancedelicbluesman

Actually I was thinking of "Africa" not "Rosanna". I remember this info from a very old Keyboard Magazine issue. ETA: and the FM sounding "karimba" was from a Yamaha GS1--very expensive precursor to the DX7.

FWIW the main riff was two Yamaha CS80s (Toto had 2 keys players and they both played the Yamaha) and the solo interlude was done with Polyfusion modular gear.

Thank you brother. That is actually not a big deal to me as I could connect my XWP1, use it for my lower manual, and run it through the MZ's improved leslie sim. Thanks again for the response.

Yes I have downloaded the MZ manual, and searched the internet, but I still can't find the answer. How many instances of the drawbar organ can you have on the MZ? I gather you can have up to four hex layers, which is a step forward from the XWP1 where you can only have one. Does it work the same way with the drawbar organ? Can you have more than one at a time? Thanks in advance.

I didn't know Flavor Flav was the reaper...

Interesting video there. Where did you get the footage? Was that accordian sound from the XW? I am interested in doing a YouTube channel someday. Just for my own amusement if nothing else...

Last night I hooked up my xw to my zoom g5 which I already own; it has a rotary effect complete with overdrive and bottom rotor. I was pleased with my initial results but I feel a need for further tweaking. I did like the sound of it. Much better than the xw rotary and the zoom overdrive sounded authentic. I found myself playing the organ part from Joe Cocker's rendition of A Little Help From My Friends. Always a good sign when you start out auditioning a piece of gear and wind up just playing music.

I was just noticing in the Kountry Cuz video, his keyboard makes more "clack" noise than mine does. I wonder did I just luck out? In his review on Harmony Central Craig Anderton specifically said he liked the synth feel of the keyboard rather than just tolerating it; it has a bit of resistance (he compared it to a sponge) that he found enjoyable to play. I feel the same way about mine, whatever other issues I may have raised from time to time, keyboard feel has never been one of them. Since I originally bought it as a cheap controller I have kept it, and as I have learned its ins and outs (so to speak) my affection for it has grown. It certainly is a quirky beast. But I wonder, have different generations of the XW had different keybeds?

Nice. You say you "just held a chord" but I was hearing a pleasant bit of organ drone music with a subtle repeating melody. The different iterations did have subtle differences but honestly both pedals sound fantastic. Need I say much better than the xwp1 by itself?

Thanks. I have, now, and it does seem sweet. Even better, for me, might be the Lester G because it has compression; a real b3 has a bit of compression in the sound the more drawbars you pull and the more keys you press. I also thought the Tech 21 Roto Choir looked pretty awesome. That one is unfortunately out of production. You gotta love Mike Mathews of EH: https://youtu.be/A-rlX104mJg

Who uses them? Impressions? Preferences?

Bump Mr. Martin mentioned elsewhere that even players with expensive nords and hammonds use ventilator or burn pedals. So this is perfect.

And I sort of got the impression you took my criticism of the XW personally. Hence your rather heated defense of the unit.

Yes, I avoided using it because I didn't like the sound, OK? The headphones are AKGs which sound terrific in all other applications so I really doubt if other phones would have made a difference--or proper monitors with flat response, for that matter. As for the manual--I'll just say I have seen better manuals and leave it at that.

The phones are AKGs--pretty decent, I think. I agree that AlanK's manuals are really good. And what videos with Mike Martin Casio did post before they moved on to their next products were indeed helpful.

I was just noticing that I posted on this forum over a year ago. But I haven't posted much since, and the reason is simple--I never really warmed to my XW. And I never really stopped to analyze why. Plus, I misplaced the adapter for my 1/8 inch headphones. The keyboard has just been sitting in the corner propped on its side for a year. The adapter finally turned up the other day so I fired up the board and started noodling around on it. I found myself shaking my head. It just sounded muddy to me. Plus, it's really complicated to get around on--that hadn't changed. I really used to like the drawbar mode on my old WK3200. But the XW's drawbar mode just wasn't cutting it. As I said, it sounded muddy. And the solo synth was way too overbearing. Just unusable in my opinion. Then a light bulb went on over my head. Maybe some EQ would help? So I started perusing the manual, and what do you know? The XW has global parametric EQ that you can adjust to your liking, and the settings will be remembered. When Keyboard reviewed the instrument they commented there were a lot of lower mids in its sound, so I knew I wasn't the only one to have this perception. I cut the bass and the lower mids--and, lo and behold, the sound was much improved! The drawbars sounded a lot better, more like my old WK. The solo synth also sounded better--the preset "Moog Lead" actually sounded like a Moog, finally, though it never had before. Delightful! Some of the hex layers sounded more delicate and new-agey rather than mushy and lofi like they had before. Big difference. The piano was a lot clearer, too. Now, don't get me wrong. The instrument still has a lot of bass in its sound. That's just its nature. It doesn't sound thin at all, just cleaner and clearer. Just my subjective opinion, of course. Some may prefer the XW the way it is. But for me, at least, it has been like getting a new keyboard. I wonder how it would sound if I added a little treble?

I've only had my XW a little while but I can't seem to find any snare drums (or high hats for that matter) in any of the factory drum kits. Am I just missing them? What gives? I'm not averse to creating my own drum kits but I would have thought the factory kits would be more useful.

I thought you did a really good job with it. If the XW was a popular instrument like a Fender strat or a Korg Kronos there might even be a commercial market for your book.

Mixcraft has been on my radar for quite a while now. You certainly get a lot for your money.

I am still trying to wrap my head around all this. I can dig the step sequencer but I initially thought it had about half as many steps as I needed. But then I learned about the chain function, so I think I will probably find it pretty useful after all. But it seems to have a number of quirks. This is the first instrument I have ever owned that had an arpeggiator. I know step sequencers and arpeggiators have been in the electronic music toolbox a long time but this is really my first exposure to these things. Anyway, Allen, I appreciate the work you put in trying to communicate all this stuff. Maybe you will ultimately land a position as a native English speaker writing casio manuals. They could do worse. Still not sure where the phrase sequencer fits into things.

Impressive work! The XW can be hard to figure out; this will be very helpful.

Some thoughts: 1. If you bought your xw used and it didn't come with the manual, you will need to download it (at the very least), and there is also a pcm wave list you can download. I was not able to figure out on my own how to switch between hex layers when programming a sound (turns out it's the part select buttons). 2. Envelope and filter options are quite limited. There are no filter envelopes and as far as I can tell there are no pitch envelopes either. There is a filter "cutoff" value for each element, and that's all you get. There are no amplitude envelopes per se, either; instead, each pcm wave seems to have a rudimentary amp envelope associated with it ("dyno EP" behaves differently than any saw or organ wave, for example, and a lot of the samples have attack transients baked into them), but you do get to enter some offset values in the amplitude envelope editing section, which I acknowledge is better than nothing. 8 3. There is a separate area for user sounds. Kudos to Casio for this excellent choice. You don't have to overwrite anything. 4. A few years back I owned a WK3200 and much of the pcm waveform ROM on the xw is the same. Dated, much? But it's mostly all decent and usable if not spellbindingly great. The exception is the Rhodes EP sound. On the WK, which used the Casio ZPI synth engine, high and low harmonics were looped seperately, I believe. The sound was much more 3 dimensional on the WK than on the xw (or the WK7xxx series for that matter). Just saying. The Rhodes was really good on the older instrument. 5. There are certainly a ton of pcm waves available but a lot of them sound awful similar. Is there really a lot of difference between "choirahhs" and "heavenB"? To name but one of many examples. Much has been made of all the new synth waves but really, isn't one sawtooth pretty much like another? Yeah they have moog saw and jupiter saw but they're all short samples and they don't sound much different from one another. 6. The physical build of the instrument is more than satisfactory. Keyboard feel is light synth action and I like it fine. I bought this to use as a controller but I am quite happy with it's sound producing features. Plastic, yeah, but sturdy plastic. I feel like I got a real good deal.

Some thoughts: 1. If you bought your xw used and it didn't come with the manual, you will need to download it (at the very least), and there is also a pcm wave list you can download. I was not able to figure out on my own how to switch between hex layers when programming a sound (turns out it's the part select buttons). 2. Envelope and filter options are quite limited. There are no filter envelopes and as far as I can tell there are no pitch envelopes either. There is a filter "cutoff" value for each element, and that's all you get. There are no amplitude envelopes per se, either; instead, each pcm wave seems to have a rudimentary amp envelope associated with it ("dyno EP" behaves differently than any saw or organ wave, for example, and a lot of the samples have attack transients baked into them), but you do get to enter some offset values in the amplitude envelope editing section, which I acknowledge is better than nothing. 3. There is a separate area for user sounds. Kudos to Casio for this excellent choice. You don't have to overwrite anything. 4. A few years back I owned a WK3200 and much of the pcm waveform ROM on the xw is the same. Dated, much? But it's mostly all decent and usable if not spellbindingly great. The exception is the Rhodes EP sound. On the WK, which used the Casio ZPI synth engine, high and low harmonics were looped seperately, I believe. The sound was much more 3 dimensional on the WK than on the xw (or the WK7xxx series for that matter). Just saying. The Rhodes was really good on the older instrument. 5. There are certainly a ton of pcm waves available but a lot of them sound awful similar. Is there really a lot of difference between "choirahhs" and "heavenB"? To name but one of many examples. Much has been made of all the new synth waves but really, isn't one sawtooth pretty much like another? Yeah they have moog saw and jupiter saw but they're all short samples and they don't sound much different from one another. 6. The physical build of the instrument is more than satisfactory. Keyboard feel is light synth action and I like it fine. I bought this to use as a controller but I am quite happy with it's sound producing features. Plastic, yeah, but sturdy plastic. I feel like I got a real good deal.

I'm looking at Reason 10 and Komplete 11 and Steinberg Absolute 3. Opinions anyone?