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This. Of course the sound of electric piano is different, mainly because there is no big box that resonates, but I really enjoy being able to play on my headpho
by Jnr 5y ago
This. Of course the sound of electric piano is different, mainly because there is no big box that resonates, but I really enjoy being able to play on my headphones in the middle of the night.
When I was a kid our family had a very good cast iron frame piano that sounded wonderful, but at some point it cracked and had to be replaced with a not so good sounding piano. That one is still working but the requirement to tune it frequently and inability to play whatever and whenever you want reduced my interest. Some years ago I bought a digital Casio Privia. The keyboard feels very good, but on it's own it doesn't sound too good. However when plugged into computer as a MIDI device and running something like Pianoteq, it becomes one of the best instruments out there (at least in headphones). I especially enjoyed it during the long nights of pandemic lock-downs. :)
- michaelsalim 5y agoCan you share a little bit on your setup for Pianoteq? I tried something similar a while back but didn't find a sound i liked. That plus needing to plug it into a computer had me abandoning the idea. But now that the Steam Deck is releasing, I can use that instead of my PC. Your comment made me want to try it again!
- Jnr 5y agoI have it at my home office, so the PC is always next to it. I am using good open-back headphones (DT 990 PRO) connected to a USB audio interface that supports low latency using ASIO driver on Windows and JACK on Linux (in my case UMC204HD). The rest is handled by Pianoteq. One thing to note - the Casio Privia that I have has nice weighted piano keys and they feel great but the sustain pedal that came out of the box was a binary one. You can purchase better pedals separately. 10 years ago I tried similar approach with Raspberry Pi and some small keyboard that I borrowed. It was a bit tricky to find a good synth that was optimized for such a weak device, but I managed to find one that sounded OK. It had no display and I had to do some tweaks to boot it up in a few seconds time. If I was more serious and not just tinkering for fun I would probably have used a laptop instead. Steam Deck will have plenty of CPU power but it will probably still require a separate audio interface to get that low latency.
- eternityforest 5y agoBoxes that resonate are easy enough. Just put speakers where the strings would be! You could probably convince even the pros if you did it right.