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"Just sounds like a real Casio"


AlenK

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The quote below is from a recent thread in the Keyboard Corner. Some day with any luck, "just sounds like a real Casio" will actually be meant as a compliment.  

 

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Actually the Casio mzx-500 is one of the most innovative arrangers on the market... 
Sadly the sound quallity espescially from the orchestral sounds is very dissapointing..
In yhe end it just sounds like a real casio..

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35 minutes ago, AlenK said:

The quote below is from a recent thread in the Keyboard Corner. Some day with any luck, "just sounds like a real Casio" will actually be meant as a compliment.  

 

 

My reply to that post ...

 

"I'm curious what you base your opinion on. I own the X500 and it holds up well with my Kronos 2 and PA600 in my opinion. When hooked up to a set of decent studio speakers the sound quality is quite good."

 

;)

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Rick's reply is still unanswered in that thread on Keyboard Corner. It's funny but when you ask for specifics of people who are dismissive in a vague way like that, you most often get nothing. That strongly suggests to me that there is no real basis for their criticisms. They're just talking smack. 

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IMHO...There's too many biased opinions with regards to the multitude of manufacturers out there.  It seems that now-a-days you can't get one unbiased review.  Just because the MZ is Casio doesn't mean that it's not up to par with any of the others.  For some reason, Casio isn't regarded as a "PRO" choice.  Um, wrong!  Going all the way back to when the FZ series sampler came out...the was some rocking sampler, but it never got the credit it deserved until later in life!  I wish I still had mine!!

 

I agree with Rick as I've owned mainly Yamaha boards the past 20 years and Casio has really up'd the ante with this series.  The sounds are really good and match up nicely with my S900.  They add a different flavor and augment my other boards well.  In fact, isn't that the purpose of owning different brands, to get some variety and different flavor (as well as features too)?  After all, how many different brands of cooking spices are there and don't they add a different flavor to the mix?

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Casio and the Casio dealerships need to appoint some decent professional players and demonstrators to promote their keyboards with decent online demos.   Players playing real songs that people can identify  -with not too much endless extemporization

 

When Yamaha recently released Genos they did just that, overnight there were demos on line by Yamaha and by the dealerships worldwide.

 

There are many decent Tones on the Casio keyboard that can be further be enhanced by tweaking.  I for one have liked them for many years and I keep coming back to Casio keyboards .  I have also owned Korg and Yamaha keyboards and synths.'

 

People say Korg voices are harsh and certain Yamaha voices 'thin'.  Nevertheless the Casio voices, as I hear them, stand up well, in the hands of a good player who knows what their doing !

.

Owners of Genos are complaining that there's no bar/measure counter,  important if you have to play for dancing.  Also there are complaints that Drum Kits can't be edited !

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Well, maybe Casio does need more demonstrators but they already have a big name who seems, as far as I can tell, underutilized. I'm talking about Rich Formidoni. His credentials as a product demonstrator are without question. He was hired to do marketing, including social media, product demonstrations at trade shows and online videos. While it is quite clear that Rich has done the latter two and we have to assume he is doing the first, he has a surprisingly sparse online presence since joining Casio. 

 

There are plenty of ways Casio could have demonstrated in videos and SoundCloud tracks at introduction of the MZ-X500 that certain of its voices, specifically the Versatile Tones, are actually high quality, with different articulations and extra instrument noises (e.g., string squeaks, fret noise, body slaps). We didn't get those. The drawbar-organ emulation is, I assume, also really good and certainly on paper an improvement over that in the XW-P1 (which isn't shabby itself) but we didn't get any videos that highlighted that either. The videos we did get even months after introduction were not good at highlighting the strengths of the instrument apart from the styles, the synth voices and the pianos, IMO. 

 

Without such online videos and/or online SoundCloud tracks it's no wonder that habitual Casio bashers have had free reign to denigrate. It's only now that we're starting to see videos that show the MZ-X500's true capabilities.

 

 

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Casio has had some big name musicians doing demos but mainly at NAMM. Larry Dunn of Earth Wind & Fire, Stevie Wonder played a Celviano Grand Hybrid at this year's winter NAMM (I think), and the late Joe Sample introduced the PX5S at the 2013 NAMM. Casio really hasn't promoted the MZ-X series or the PX-560 that heavily. The PX5S received a lot more attention when it launched as did the XW P1.

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In agreement re quality of sounds on newer Casios and i have played almost everything being the old troglodyte I am. Granted the GM sounds are not my favorites but then neither are many other GM sets on other keys.

 

One of the reasons I looked carefully at the Casios recently (I own and play an XW-P1, PX350 and PX575 along with a roomful of other keyboards and modules) is based upon a much older Casio arranger, forget which model but was about 10 years ago. I was a school music educator with a classroom full of instruments, had already played many pro Yamahas, Kurzweil piano, Ensoniq and Korgs as well as Steinways in school, a hammond B-3 and the older Fender Rhodes and Wurlitzer pianos (had a practice room fll of them at college) .

 

I picked up a consumer Casio arranger to abuse in the musicroom along with my students :banghead: and what a surprise-the sounds were really good, acoustic piano was as good as the pro boards, given the spring action keyboard and the selection of organ sounds was huge and held up well to anything else I had played, on a keyboard that didn't cost much more than 100 bucks-i was one of the early CTKs I recall. That got my attention and so when I started looking at and listening to the more recent Casios, there was the XW-P1 and PX350. Even the older PX575 is holding up well and although I can hear the subtle differences in stepping up to the PX350, with the piano action keys i am having a blast practicing and composing with these. and although plasticky, every time I start in with the XW, once again I am impressed and would not be ashamed to use this in a live gig as well as the pianos. And i can still afford to eat and pay for my cable Internet, otherwise i would not be here! :2thu:

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Here's an example of what I was saying about putting the MZ-X500's strengths forward:

 

That's a seriously good electric distortion guitar sound. I'm not sure if it's a preset or a custom tone or even a custom sample, but if an example like this had been put out shortly after the product was introduced or at least shortly after it was released, instead of just recently, it may have converted some opinions back when it actually mattered. Really, IMO Casio largely dropped the ball on this. Maybe they only really cared about promoting it heavily in countries other than primarily English speaking ones, where sales of arrangers are reportedly much more brisk.

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  • 4 weeks later...

If it is just one of the presets then there is even less excuse for Casio not to have put out a video highlighting it. The point of my post was NOT about how the sound was accomplished but the fact that Casio didn't really highlight the sounds the MZ-X models do well when or soon after the MZ-X models were introduced. The closest to that were some videos from Ralph Maten. However, when I watched them initially I kept wanting to hear tones he chose not to play. Ralph's primary interest seems to be EDM and of course Casio made sure the MZ-X models do that better than any previous arrangers. But they can't forget all the traditional sounds that people buy arrangers for.

 

Another thing they could have highlighted but didn't is the drawbar organ engine, which is something that on paper at least the MZ-X models should do better than most other keyboards (apart from actual Hammonds). I say "on paper" because there is STILL no video that features the drawbar organ tones. If it isn't clear I don't own an MZ-X model so like all other non-owners I depend on hearing examples. This isn't rocket science, folks.

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As for the quality of sounds- I always spend ridiculous amounts of time finding the patches of any board i have looking for my favorites and then making registrations/ multis that are fully mapped with controllers and whatnot.  As examples of my reaction to various boards i’ve had:

- was pretty meh about the Yamaha XS7, i was apparently in the vast minority of folks on this one, most people give this board very high marks.  Hard to know if i’d have a different assessment these days, being that I’ve had a lot more experience with training my ear since then

- the Korg M3, and most Korg boards, esp. the Triton, have this high mid-range eq emphasis that makes the sound seem very thin and hurts my ears.  But overall i liked it better than the XS7

- grew to hate the sounds on the WK7600, and that was a major hesitation for buying the X500.  Life is too short to waste on sub-par sounds!

- the Nord Stage has been by far my favorite board for bread and butter sounds, i like almost all of them

- had a psr 3000 arranger and a Korg Pa50 years ago, really enjoyed these boards

 

So that’s my point of reference.  I’ve found that it has taken me many years to train my ears.  I didn’t know what a good EP sounded like for example, and what my preferences for a good EP were- I’ve never had a real organ, ep, and various other real instruments to compare the many sounds we get from boards, so its been an education to discern the important differences. Piano of course is the most challenging, there’s so many different piano sounds out there, and like any other sound, it takes not only the good sound, but the good sound system.  Thankfully i’ve got a QSC k10 / k8.2 to monitor/play thru. 

 

Am very pleased to say that for the most part i’m really enjoying the sounds on the X500.  I find the piano to be very decent, the honky tonk piano is pleasantly detuned and very useable.  I’m pretty so so about the EPs, there needs to be more bark in the low end like i get from my Nord Stage, but otherwise OK, i use the Herbierhodes hex tone a lot.  
Am still finding my way around the VTW organs.  I’m mostly OK with the leslie sim, but i’m pretty basic when it comes to organs, but have used many of them with great satisfaction..  I find the strings to be lush, and some of the woodwinds are sweet!  
There’s a surprisingly good amount of good sounding guitars on tap, i have rarely used guitars in the past, but many of these are outstanding and they find their way into more and more patches.  Have been very pleased with the basses, esp with some compressor applied, some of them really pop without being boomy or too heavy.  
The hex tones are curious!  Casio gave us quite a few samples to choose from that are specifically/only for EDM, and most of the hex tones are developed for EDM.  

Have really enjoyed the quality fx, everything sounds really good to me

 

So overall i’d give Casio a solid B for sound quality, have really been enjoying playing this board and find i get very good expression from this board, esp. in noisy jams.  In quieter jams i find it challenging sometimes to be as nuanced as i like, it often seems like when I’m wanting to cut through that it jumps from soft to loud without intermediate levels between these two extremes.  Of course this varies from sound to sound.

 

And the Hex tones seem like a missed opportunity.  Great for EDM, but where are the many Hex Tones developed for all the other sounds?  And, as i’ve said already, there needs to be a hex tone page where you can see how these tones are mapped, otherwise you’re just playing in the dark,  

How exactly do you know, unless you have a fabulous memory or only use a few hex tones, that certain tones only play at a certain velocity level, only play for certain key ranges, what wave sample is used for each of the 6 tones, and for that matter, if there’s even a hex tone assigned to a given slot, etc.  One page could contain all this info, which would make using hex tones much more powerful and useable.

Also, that there was an editing facility so that you could easily swap the position of Hex  Tones, so you could establish your own system for organizing the order of the 6 tones.

 

So in my book, the X500 would get an A+ for sounds if Casio:

- did a software update that allowed you to see all 6 hex tone mapping parameters on 1 screen, and enabled easy re-ordering of the positions of the 6 hex tones

 

- they came out with an ipad editor for hex tones- that could really help develop the user created hex tones

 

- banks of new hex tones that use ALL the samples onboard, not just for EDM

 

- they came up with samples for the 256MbB that would fill out the onboard samples, esp. EPs

 

- made it possible to use the organ sliders for other things!!!!!!!!!!   I’d vote for the first four to go to the volume of the 4 tones, the fifth for Acoompaniment volume and the rest for reverb, delay, chorus and cutoff.  That would be amazing- no need for a new board, just another screen or at least an option that switches up the faders for this.

 

- the knob used for changing values was sped up AT LEAST 3 times.  When it takes me 5, 6 and even 7 turns of that knob to go from 0-127, it’s just too slow.  I’d vote for 2 turns, and of course there’s always the increment/decrement buttons for fine tuning

 

- make the allocation of the two DSPs for the Tones be more user friendly, and easily allow both of them to be assigned to the Tones.  As it is i find the DSP to be really powerful, and would love to have two freely available per registration.  After messing with them a great deal, I’m still really confused how to do a work around to get both of them going reliably on registrations, there seems to be automatic assignments, and there’s 3 places you’ve got to setup them up.  Not user friendly at all, esp. for such a powerful feature.  I mean come on, there could be 5 DSPs, 1 for each of the 4 tones, 1 for rhythms, that’d be on a par with other boards in this price range..  But i have to admit i like their quality, and if it was a question of lesser quality, i’d opt for only having the two we have.  However, if we’ve only got 2 to work with, make them more easily used for the Tones!

 

 

I realize i’ve repeated myself on a number of these points in other posts.  I do so for a couple of reasons.  One, i hope that Casio reads these, and as i explain myself repeatedly i hopefully get better at presenting my case, and that repetition helps for it to sink in.  

I’m also hoping to elicit some kind of response from members of this forum.  I put this stuff out there to y’’all and have heard very few comments on your own ideas, and perhaps i’m just bugging you all until there’s some feedback/ your own ideas for improvements.  

 

While a new generation of this board would be cool, there’s plenty that can be done with software updates that’d improve this existing board.  And we are after all part of the world wide user base that Casio is likely to be getting feedback from for the next OS update and other updates, like sound banks, samples, etc.,   I do realize however that possibly most? of you don’t have the same use for this board that i do, and my suggestions for improvement are my own because of how i use the board, which is not so much as an arranger as a board with good speakers, sounds, pads and rhythms in a very portable package!  And unlike some of you, who use an assortment of other boards on a regular basis, i pretty much use the X500 exclusively, so i need it to cover all my bases.

 

But i have to admit i’m also being a bit of a nag.  Casio hasn’t updated the OS for quite awhile, and i’d love it if they put some more resources into this board- have they abandoned this model?  I hope not.  I suspect that all their attention has been going to a PX-5s replacement with the new screen, and an even more powerful use of the Hex Tones.  

 

In any case, Happy New Year!!!  May your keyboarding bring you ever much more joy!

Randy

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I think Casio is hesitant to go at full steam ahead and release top of the range workstations because they think in my imagination that people would not buy because of name example is FZ 1  and I was proud owner of this much better sampler than any of other manufacturers  at the time but in the name.

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In my oppinion, Casio has a difficult task in trying to balance between lower prices and quality product. 

 

There are things that could be done by one or two very skilled people, like features in the OS, optimization, etc. But other things, like sampling, style creation, musical content in general, will require more people that don't come cheap, I wouln't think so. And then of course is the costs with actual production, distribution, servicing. All in all, I think they could do a blast of a keyboard, but they'd need to be willing to sacrifice the low cost.

 

At least this is in theory.

 

What Casio did with X500 is a good job that I hope was meant to be a start. If Casio is serious about making professional arrangers, they did a very good start with this model, despite various lakcs, but they need to be perseverant and come up with a better product next time. After all they are Japanesse, the ones that invented the "higher standard". 

 

Then, on the other hand, they'd need an aggressive campaign to demonstrate they are a serious alternative to Korg, Yamaha, etc. They might not be ready for that right now, but with a truely competitive product and a strong vision for future, it is possible. And they'd need to pick-up on the big boys, in a clever way, to be noticed.

 

The alternative is not so good I think: producing keyboards that aren't really an alternative to anything, be them good, but rather niche market, hybrid concepts that will attract some people but never mainstream, be a little bit of an exotic breed but not having the nerve to really standout against competition.

 

I really hope for the first course of action.

 

As a side note, I want to say the technology makes it much easier nowadays to produce quality content. There is this ONE guy that produced a Romanian localized content for Korg arrangers, sampled a ton of instruments and created hundreds of styles, from scratch! Yes, it took him a very long time, a lot of effort, great deal of talent and commitment beyond anything else. But is ONE person! Couldn't Casio find someone like that?

 

:) Anyway, take this for what is worth.

 

Many good wishes for the New Year!

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Adimatis,

I wonder about theses things too.    For example the weighted keybeds are something that they obviously invested in, and have available for all their boards.  They’re known/appreciated for being good/decent action keybeds that are the lightest on the market and still respected for their action.  That’s a major accomplishment, one that helps no doubt in keeping costs down while maintaining quality.  They need to develop a semi-weighted action in a similar vein, one thats at least mid-tier, not noisy, plays easily towards the back of the key, etc.,   The one on the X500 is problematic, i’d put it as a wanna be mid tier action, with noisy keys, harder to play towards the back of the key, though i do find its not bad for dynamic expression.

 

They obviously invested in the new screen which makes for a fantastic difference, and being spread amoung so many models its sure to bring the price down for them.  The improvement in user friendliness and accessibility to complex operations is really fantastic.

 

i cant imagine being a manufacturer of these boards- there’s SO MUCH that goes into making an arranger, for example, i would think you could only do it if you were in it for the long haul.  Casio has really outdone themselves with the x500, but their lack of followthru in the last year? makes me wonder if they’re reconsidering their involvement in the mid tier arranger line.  I hope not, I bought the x500 in part because of its price/features, and would love to see this line further developed!

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On 11/23/2017 at 1:55 PM, Rick Sterling said:

 

My reply to that post ...

 

"I'm curious what you base your opinion on. I own the X500 and it holds up well with my Kronos 2 and PA600 in my opinion. When hooked up to a set of decent studio speakers the sound quality is quite good."

 

;)

I feel the same way. I have a Roland Fantom G, Roland Juno Di, Korg Pa50 Arranger, and a Yamaha S03. And I use the X500 as much as the others. It more than holds it's own. And I play professionally. Incidentally the keyboard player for Earth, wind, & Fire has an X500 .

Edited by Ronald Gore
mispell
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