The best keyboard controllers are made by companies that also make pianos. What I'd recommend is searching for the term "stage piano" -- these are compact instr

The best keyboard controllers are made by companies that also make pianos. What I'd recommend is searching for the term "stage piano" -- these are compact instruments that are designed to be a piano first but can also be used as a MIDI controller. You'll get solid piano sounds and an upper-end keyboard action from these out of the box, but can also hook up MIDI to your laptop if you want to explore software-based synthesizers/VSTs.