At a music store (with bad listening conditions), I recently played a Kawai MP9000 for the first time, and was surprised by it. The octave two octaves above middle C was not wonderful--almost sine waves. On the other hand, the octave below middle C and above it were very good, particularly on the Studio Grand patch.

Is anyone here familiar with both this instrument and The Grand? Presumably, The Grand would be much better, since it has longer samples and more samples\less interpolation. But my main concern is if it sounds as good, has the same presence and clarity, as the midrange of the MP9000. (I'm seriously considering buying a MP9000 just because of its ability to sustain chords in this area so well. Or were my ears deceiving me? I've played enough store keyboards to know how hard it is to judge a sound while other in a noisy store, so it wouldn't surprise me if the MP9000 samples sound less pristine in a quiet setting.)

A second question (or is this the third?): Is The Grand sampled from a hall perspective, so it's more suited for classical, or is it sampled from a players perspective\close mic'ed, more like the Studio Grand patch on the MP9000?

Hey, I own a Kawai MP9000, The only stuff I've noticed is that the C above middle C sometimes has an unnatural ringing to it after prolonged playing (to my ears anyway). Aside from that it sounds pretty good. Does it sound amazing? no, but it sounds damn good for what it is . I have my mp9000 as my main controller and it works just as well triggering piano samples thru kontakt or giga160, so I'd say go for it

My gf who's been playing piano for 18+ years now doesn't mind the Kawai sound, and she's DAMN picky so I can't complain.

The thing about the Kawai is the FEEL, nothing else I've played (sub 5k) comes close. hehe

HTH

note: never tried the grand

The piano sample set in the MP9000 is tiny compared to the large (1 gig + ) piano sample sets currently available so I would not expect it to be the definitive sampled piano.

As a controller it is excellent - wooden keys, great feel. Just don't plan on moving it around a lot on your own it weighs 40+ kg without a case.

The Eg

You might make sure that your computer will play The Grand to acceptable performance levels before buying. I have friends who bought it and cannot use it, even though their systems do not have trouble with GigaStudio or Kontakt grand pianos.

Robert

I have "The Grand" and I hate it. It's not even installed on my computer. I use the 76 meg "Splendid Grand" sampled piano taken of the Akia website. I have it converted to both Soundfont and Kontakt formats and it sounds WAY BETTER than Steinberg piano either way.

Another thing with "The Grand": only my external USB Sony cdr recorder will read the disk through whatever kind of copy protection Steinberg uses. I got errors trying to install it with anything else. "The Grand" is a great idea, but it wasn't that well done.

Laurence Kingston

I love The Grand.

I love its warmth, and for the way i play piano it´s superb to use it -
I was never a fan of these modern used bright piano-sounds ... i prefer these 60´s-pianos sounds from the likes of morricone, mancini, michel legrand etc ... and therefor The Grand does a super job here.

cheers
putte

yeah putte is right

B.

bluey, long time no see ....