AlenK

Hey, guys and gals. The fact that the MZ-X models haven't been released yet shouldn't stop us from talking about them. I'll get the ball rolling. For me, the most promising features of the MZ-X models are the Versatile Tones and the articulations, the latter in association with the pads. They are promising because they should allow for much better emulations of acoustic and electric (including electromechanical) instruments, not just in the MZ-X models but in future Casio keyboard models as well. This is territory already explored by Yamaha, Korg and Roland with varying degrees of success: Yamaha with their Super Articulation (SA & SA2), Expanded Articulation (XA) and Mega voices; Korg with DNC (Defined Nuance Control) and Roland with APS (Articulative Phrase Synthesis), which was rolled into their current SuperNatural Acoustic voices. Now Casio is joining the party. The MZ-X User Guides say almost nothing about Versatile Tones or articulations but the Appendix documents contain some juicy details. Looking at the MZ-X500 Appendix document page 15 shows how the various samples (I assume) that make up each of the four Versatile Tones, which are all guitars (one is a bass guitar) and the supported strumming patterns are mapped across velocities and the MIDI note range. I suspect these would be fairly challenging to play manually with precise control but are probably well used by the accompaniment patterns. Hopefully in the future we will see more Versatile Tones downloadable to MZ-X and future keyboard models. Page 16 of the MZ-X500 Appendix document contains a list of Sampled Pitch Forms. They have names like HoriVib, VertVib, FretVib, PullingOff, Choking, GlissDown, GlissUp, TremVib, TremChop, Trumpet Fall, etc. These names suggest they are pitch-change-based articulations for a number of different instruments. As the Pad Bank List on page 34 and the "Art" Pad Data List on page 35 show, these and other articulations can be triggered by the pads. It's all very, very promising and I hope Casio releases additional documentation and/or tutorial videos to show how best to use them.

Although my question concerns both the PX-360 and PX-560 models I am choosing to post it in the PX-560 section. One of the features of the new MZ-X arranger keyboards is "Versatile Tones." As revealed in the MZ-X300 and MZ-X500 Appendix documents there are four of them: Versatile Nylon Guitar, Versatile Steel Guitar, Versatile Single Coil E.Guitar and Versatile Electric Bass. In each of these tones various noises, harmonics, etc are mapped to different velocities within the note range C1- B6. Other noises and strums are mapped to notes between C7 and G9 (bass ends at G#7). A note on page A-5 of the PX-360 User's Guide, which I believe likely also applies to the PX-560, suggests that something like Versatile Tones may be implemented in the PX-360/560 models. The note, which is in reference to the preceding Tone List, says "With some guitar tones, playing in the lowest range (far left) or highest range (far right) may result in strum noise, harmonics or other characteristic playing sounds being included with the notes." The Tone List for the PX-560, which appears in a separate Appendix document, does not include this note. However, it is reasonable to assume that the guitar tones in the PX-560 are the same or a super-set of the guitar tones in the PX-360. Hence, the same note likely does apply. Can anyone with a PX-360 or PX-560 confirm what the note says and perhaps see how the mapping of noises etc compares to what is described for Versatile Tones in the MZ-X models? This would be way cool if it turns out to be true.

That's a good question. The industry definition has changed over time. In the beginning anything that had an onboard linear sequencer was considered a workstation. The definition of workstation then evolved into anything that included user sampling as well as a sequencer (a linear one, not a step sequencer, so the XW-G1 for instance doesn't really qualify - it is something unique). It has nothing to do with price or how much "work" you can do on it. But that's beside my original point, which was that the MZ-X models are clearly in the "arranger" category. That category includes a set of features that keyboards identified as "workstations" don't have, such as auto-accompaniment (styles). My point was and is that you have to compare apples to apples. Speaking of apples, here's another: Roland's E-A7 Expandable Arranger, with a street price of $1300US: http://www.rolandus.com/products/e-a7/ http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/EA7

The user manual refers to support information for MIDI. Page EN-87. So there is reason to believe that such a document will be produced in this case.

That chart does not cover nearly as much information as, say, the XW-P1/XW-G1 MIDI Implementation document. Just compare the two. The XW-P1 and XW-G1 manuals also contain such a chart. In fact, I don't know of any keyboard with MIDI that does not include such a chart in its user manual. My question stands.

Can't find one for the PX-560 on Casio's web site (not one for the PX-360 either). ETA?

For your consideration: The author Levi M Santos has uploaded quite a few songs to YouTube. Some have rhythm tracks and sounds I recognize from the XW-P1. This particular one struck me as having particularly good rhythm guitar strumming and pedal steel guitar. It is hard for me to believe those sounds came from either the XW-P1 or the CTK-7200. But as you can see in the comments Santos seems to be saying that they are. What do you think?

I didn't realize Gary Jules recorded a version of Mad World. (I never actually heard of Gary Jules before but now that I read this was used in Donnie Darko I do remember hearing his version in that.) He slowed it down a lot but it's still the Tears for Fears song. Same notes, same lyrics. You did realize it isn't his song, right? Ralph does do major damage to the lyrics, however. http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/tearsforfears/madworld.html I still prefer the original: Re the piano since Casio specifies the "MXi sound source" it might be as good as the CGP-700, which is just a small step down from the AiR piano in the opinion of Pianoman Chuck and a HUGE step up from what is in the WK-7600/CTK-7200.

I didn't realize this was Mad World by Tears for Fears until half-way into it.

High praise from Michael Boddiker and Stephen Fortner for the sound quality they heard from the MZ-X500 in the Casio booth at NAMM (as well as one of the higher-end digital pianos). Go to 12:06 in the video: http://www.keyboardmag.com/video/gear/4723062711001#

Walmart likes to sell the Williams brand. A few years ago they had a Williams model shaped like a baby grand piano (apparently Williams doesn't make it anymore). My wife really liked the look of it, more as a piece of furniture than anything (although to be fair she actually took piano lessons for a short time, which is more than I can claim). I looked up reviews and they were very bad. Here's one: http://azpianonews.blogspot.ca/2010/07/williams-wgb-digital-grand-piano-review.html

Here's some more, guys and gals (assuming there are any of the latter here, which would be wonderful IMO). In section 3.4.6 where I talk about the Virtual Controllers of the solo synth I mention that when you need a constant (non-varying) source you can stop one of the LFOs using a rate of zero. I did not mention in that section (because I said it in the section directly above) that you have to choose a sawtooth, ramp or pulse waveform, including Puls 2:2 which is a square wave. Sine or triangle is not useful because these just give you zero amplitude. Whether the constant is positive or negative depends on the chosen waveform. [Note that a Random waveform will also give a non-zero value when the LFO is stopped (most of the time) but one that is apparently chosen when you select the tone. It unfortunately does not give a new random number for every note, which would be useful. If you discover a way around this let me know!] I also didn't mention, because I overlooked it, that the built-in envelope of each of the solo synth LFOs, which is controlled by the LFO's Delay and Rise parameters, does not re-trigger on legato notes. In other words, the envelope will trigger on the first note but not on subsequent notes so long as you always keep at least one key depressed. This is the "proper" behavior and the one you'll want most of the time, so no worries there. And as it turns out that makes it very useful for creating a modulation source that signals the legato state. The general idea is to use one of the sawtooth or pulse waves with a Rate of zero. Use a short Delay and a short Rise time so that the envelope reaches full amplitude before your second note. When you depress the first key the value from the LFO is zero because the envelope is just starting. By the time the second note comes the value is at a non-zero constant and will stay there so long as you keep at least one key depressed, which prevents the envelope from retriggering. This is a useful modulation source for values that are set at note-on time, such as initial level (Init.Level), attack time (Atk.Time) and attack level (Atk.Level) of an envelope, allowing you to make them different for the first note in a legato series of notes. (I'm not sure yet if the other envelope parameters are only set at note-on time or can be changed up to their time of initiation. Regardless, they can be modified by this source too.) In section 6.4.1.1 I describe a rather convoluted way to control the attack time of the "sustain" or "body" wave of a pair of waves to avoid smearing with the attack wave. It requires the player to carefully control velocity. Using an LFO in the way I describe above eliminates this requirement, albeit at the expense of an LFO. I will be revising that part of the document for Rev 2. PS. Maybe this is a bit too esoteric for most readers but when you get deep into programming little things like this are golden.

MEEDEEEEEE... PS. Just so you know I'm making fun of the video's pronunciation of MIDI, which is quite non-standard (but completely consistent with Spanish, FWIW). Don't worry about the odd turns of phrase in this video ("delicate"). It's from Casio Japan. I'm sure we'll get something considerably better from Casio America in the near future. And, if we ask, something more concrete about how the brand new features work.

I'm going to quote myself here in order to constructively move the conversation forward. (Hey, it's what I do.) Pages 15 and 16 of the Appendix document for the X500 (pages 12 and 13 in the X300 Appendix) reveals some pretty interesting stuff. Such as, there are four Versatile Tones, all of them guitars (one is a bass guitar). They each use a combination of velocity-switched waves up to note B6. From there on up is a selection of what I assume are key switches for events including strums and special instrument-specific noises (fret noise, body slaps, etc). Page 16 contains a list of "Sampled Pitch Forms". Going by the names these appear to be pitch changes for a variety of playing "articulations" that were presumably extracted from samples of real instruments as they were played. I am guessing that the X500 and X300 each use these with the existing instrument samples to re-create the same articulations at arbitrary pitches, which is a much more compact way to do it than storing samples of all articulations at all pitches (as some of the larger sample libraries do it). I'm not sure what options exist for triggering these but in the latest video Rich shows one being triggered by pressing a pad. This is all very promising and should allow some pretty convincing instrument emulations. Yamaha has been doing essentially the same stuff for years, of course, but it's nice to see that Casio is catching up. I have no doubt we'll see more and more of this as Casio brings out new keyboards over time.

Now c'mon guys, you know that no one sells for MSRP (unless they don't want to sell anything). Even Casio is quoting street prices to people at the booth: about $1100 for the X500 and about $900 for the X300. Whether they are "worth it" or not is an open question, of course. And comparing them to Krome and FA-06 (not 08) is not quite fair. The MZ-X models are not workstations. They're quite clearly arrangers, with a far different set of features. As such they should be compared instead to Korg Pa300 (~$850) and Pa600 (~$1150), Roland GW-8 (~$1000) and BK-5 (~$1000), Yamaha PSR-S670 ($800) and PSR-S770 ($1200). I haven't done a feature-by-feature comparison nor am I likely to do so (I'm not in the market for an arranger) but that wouldn't tell the whole story because we don't know how the MZ-X's really sound, do we? Maybe sound-wise they ARE capable of running neck-and-neck with the competition at the same price level. Maybe they are better. Don't count Casio out so early in the game. Have a little faith.

Specs look good for the X500 model. Hex Layer engine X4, a "bass synth" and "Versatile Tones" that include articulations. It will be interesting to learn how the latter work and how they are meant to be played.

It's strange. It keeps telling me "This channel is off-air."

It's pretty flaky. Dropped out again for me after five minutes.

Was working but has died for me. All I get now is the PX-560 Quick Preview.

You are right (not that I doubted it). The text is very blurred but there appears to be just two characters after the MZ-X on the left-hand keyboard and the last one looks like it could be a "0". I should have looked more carefully. Well, that's a relief. It restores my faith in the natural order of the universe.

This is fun stuff, guessing about products only days before they are totally revealed (actually only one day now). Looks like that report from a dealer about there being two models was accurate so we likely also know both of their model numbers: MZ-X500 and MZ-X1000. (The "MZ-X500" label on the right-hand keyboard is certainly quite clear in the original Facebook image.) With its PX-560 blue color and 16 back-lighted pads, the X500 frankly looks like the more advanced model but lower model numbers usually mean lesser features. I wonder what the function is of the area on the X1000 that holds the 16 pads on the X500? I see four non-back-lighted pads and a larger area above divided into three regions with some too-blurry text. Good to see that the nine sliders for drawbar control remain. Hopefully, they have fixed the problem with how the drawbar steps are mapped to the slider range in the XW-P1 (presumably it was the same in the WK7600). And more importantly we can also hope Casio has improved the sonic aspects of the drawbar organ engine. A dual-rotor rotatory speaker effect, true CV and higher-quality distortion would all be nice. I also hope the sliders can be assigned to other functions and/or work as editing controls for other sounds. All will be revealed tomorrow.

There is no mention in the PX-360 manual of it accepting an expression pedal, whereas that is explicitly mentioned in the PX-560 manual (there is even a pinout diagram for the proper wiring of the pedal's TRS plug). Is the PX-360 manual wrong?

Gary, If you remember a conversation here in March 2014 that leveraged off one user's complaint about the manual (and him a self-professed genius) I talked about a hypothetical guide as if it did not exist. I can admit now that I had in fact started writing it almost as soon as I began to figure out the XW-P1 (IIRC I got the thing in late May of 2013). I was only documenting things for myself at first but as a writer I couldn't help organizing it into a real document. And then it just grew. By the time of that conversation I was testing the waters with questions about a "hypothetical" document that in fact already existed (sorry to deceive). But I was not at all sure I could complete it without Casio's explicit involvement. Unfortunately for me (but fortunately for all of OUR benefit) Mike is a VERY busy guy. Furthermore, the engineers that could have given me answers to a boatload of outstanding questions are all in Japan and probably don't speak much if any English. So I just continued to plug away and figured out most of what I needed to know. The document was actually going to be considerably longer. It was going to include a big section on emulating a dozen or so very specific vintage synth sounds (my favorites) and acoustic instruments. I soon realized that it would simply take too long to complete so I re-wrote that section into a discussion of general techniques I had already tried in my programming experiments (with a few specific examples that I thought were particularly fun, like emulating the Solina's triple chorus). I am still working on those specific emulation examples and I intend to publish them in a Volume II along with the sound files. Can't say when THAT might be done but I'm sure Casio will finally release an XW successor before then that will render all of it obsolete! Can't say I'll be too upset. I'm learning a lot in the process.

BrettM, Those are all good observations. I will be sure to get them into Rev 2. Thanks. PS. I had originally included some G1 specific information in the document but soon concluded that it was unrealistic of me to expect to do the instrument any justice without actually owning one. I had no real choice but to make it all about the P1. Still, given the many similar features (they are after all brothers) I recognize that much of what I wrote may be of use to G1 owners as well.

Nothing like that. This is a gift to all. I've been writing this thing on and off for a couple of years but I can't remember when I decided on a title for it. I don't honestly know if I happened to see your post here about two years ago that pleaded for someone to write an XW Companion Guide. If I did and that's what inspired the title (it did not inspire the work - I was always planning to write something if only for myself and I was already well into it by the time of your post) then thank you.