Re: what is best digital piano for touch?

Alan Jones wrote:

Hi Alan,

Just one point of clarification:

Some (?most) digitals have adjustable touch, so mr cin needs to
experiment with that feature if it's present. One thing that I've
noticed with surprise in showrooms is that some people try the
touch when the piano is switched off - that's no good, because the
touch depends on the power and, where fitted, the use of the touch
adjuster. (The adjuster is sometimes left "off" if a previous user
has been using the harpsichord or organ effect.)

A lot of people don't know this but the touch adjustment does not
actually change anything mechanically on the piano. It's all done
with mirrors. ;-)

How it works is there are 2 position sensors (switches) on each key.
The first switch is activated just after the key starts to move and
the second switch activates near the bottom of the key's travel.

The micro controller in the piano measures how long the key takes to
travel between switch 1 and switch 2 and can calculate the speed the
key was pressed. This time value is translated to a velocity value
between zero and 127 and fed to the sound generator section along
with data about which note was pressed.

Touch sensitivity adjustments are applied to this data between the
keyboard microprocessor and the sound generator. To make the touch
lighter the data is scaled so slower key strike speeds create higher
velocities.

For organ or harpsichord sounds the velocity data is usually ignored
completely (set to 127) although a lot of digital pianos still allow
a small amount of velocity sensing on harpsichord sounds.

I can tell by hitting keys on a switched off digital piano if its
worth investigating further. With the right balancing of key weight
the key will offer more initial resistance until inertia on the
hammer causes the key to get lighter.

--
Digital Fake Book
Free chord/lyric display software for Windows
http://www.mike-warren.net/digitalfakebook
.

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