G8 ..i'm sadly disappointed ...

[Keys BeMe]

"DaveC, best piano sounds are software based, there is no way around it, but hook up a board of your choice to a comp with a soft piano, once you try it you will never want to go back to a hardware piano emulators..."

This statement, i couldn't agree with more. Outside of an actual grand piano, if you want the most authentic emulation without having the real thing, you should try Synthogy's Ivory Grand or Native Instruments Akoustik Piano. These are great examples of phenomanal sounding emulations. Also, keep this in mind - Roland is going to make an ARX "Piano Grand" at some point (you know they will) that should give the sound quality and extreme 'tweakibility' currently found in the ARX Drum and EP cards.

Ah yes, the 'G'rowing Pains of the "G".

[kozlikha]

I really don't buy into the whole ARX idea, this board already costs a fair amount for it to have all the usual QUALITY sounds, why pay substantially more to have better pianos/EPs/drums when they should have been there already without having to spend more $ on a better piano, etc. I would rather have liked to see ARX with totally new sounds or collections of old synths. ARX to me is hardly revolutionary, but an extended same old principles of editing waveforms, but re-packaged.

Yamaha have bought out Steinberg, realising the power of software developments aiding the needs of today's musicians, who knows perhaps soon there will be a new DAW including the best of Yamaha paired with Steinberg's tools. Roland has to see where this is all going surely. Let's not see another Fantom Z, but rather something fresh...revolutionary.

I think Fantom G will suit either a onemanband doing a regular spot at the local every Saturday night or an aspiring Youtubeproducer.

[madAhorn]

So far the Stock EP's are Great....The ARX-02 doesn't sound as real.

I have heard good things about the stock drums.

I have cancelled my ARX-01 and 02 orders now to wait for Brass and other ARX to come about.

So, the Fantom G does already have great sounds.
Roland is just fooling with a new technology for now.

[Diametro]

Despite the boards costing $400 a pop (expensive), I can't get away from my feeling that two slots is wholly inadequate when one ARX actually covers LESS ground than an SRX board ... for instance, SRX-07 is vintage keys AND vintage synths ...

[madAhorn]

Hopefully future boards will come out with a lot of options.

But, the current ARX-01 has a 24 track mixer just for drums with independant compressors for each track, etc.
Add to that Cosm style FX and it is a power packed board that gives you great flexibility with recording drums.

ARX-02, as far as I can tell, does not sound that good, so that saves a slot.
But if it did sound good, it had it had lot's of extra FX with Cosm, etc as well.

[Diametro]

It will be interesting to see how Roland incorporates ARX into their other products ...

Will there be a new Juno with an ARX slot?

[Phranchiz]

look guys im sure they will come out with an arx piano.i have the 6 the sound is good to me tweaked or not.id just wait and see what arx has to offer.piano and others

[Astrotaz]

I'm particularly enjoying the Live set Bright Piano.

Also the Super NY Grand is a nice patch in single.


I'm fond of the rich full yet slightly treble sound on that pianos.


Oh and Westminster organ live set patch is amazing

[madAhorn]

The G has the best Piano patches I have ever heard in a synth, period!

Some say they like the X better...The X piano is in there too.
Sounds good, but not as dynamic as the G pianos.

Excellent, Excellent, Excellent!

[special-k]

How a patch sounds to a person is an individual thing. The best piano sounds I've heard have been software based. My favorite has been a 24 bit reason piano refill. When you have several hundred megs of just piano sound, you will get a more realistic piano than a hardware rompler.

The bad thing about my favorite Reason piano is the piano does not work very well in a composition. Its too bright, and does not blend well. If I just want to play solo piano, I'll whip out the computer and call it up.

While the X and G piano's may not be the best for a solo piano instrument, the piano sounds work well within a song. From what I've heard of the G, they fixed some of the things I did not like about the piano waves, including the SRX-11.

As far as keys go. There has never been an electronic keyboard made by yamaha that was better than a Roland of the same era. Yamaha has always been playing catch up. My first Roland weighted keyboard was a HP5500. It beat the pants off the clavinova's in how it felt. To this day, Yamaha's bounce irritates me. I've never seen one real piano that when you released the key, echo-bounced like a car with bad suspension.

The RD and G8 keyboard is hands down the best feeling, responsive and realistic keyboard not attached to strings.

[madAhorn]

By Synth, I meant physical Synth.

[javaj_]

I agree with special-k- it's all individual (although we all know that- we just like to hear ourselves complain about it).
I don't like the sound of natural grand piano's- I find them dull (at least the ones that are true representations). Thankfully- we have a slew of choices from Roland.

[musicMechanic101]

In reply to the basic comments on the new Fantom G's piano sounds, I'm going to have to agree that they really are poor in comparison to the Fantom X's.
Essentially we've been given the same piano's, and I've spent all day trying to figure out why i hate the sound of the G's piano's so much!
After much exploration I think that the Sympathetic Resonance MFX plugin is missing from nearly all of the PRST piano patches, and in comparison to the Fantom X's this plugin featured on all the best sounding pianos.
They just don't sound natural, and playing with a damper pedal I've found that i'm just not getting a natural resonance at all - it just sounds pants in comparison to my X7 piano's!
I'm sure that this can be fixed with some tweaking, but I wouldnt know where to start!
The HM grand patches seem to be the most natural for me, but they're just coaked in verb which doesnt really mask what they're lacking!
They just seem to sound like they have too much top and treble on them, doesnt sound natural - anyone with any bright ideas on how to get the best piano sound out?

[MichaelJHuman]

>>

Not sure what you mean by this. Don't software pianos, and pianos on modern romplers work the same way? With samples? Maybe the software program has better samples, but I don't think they work differently in theory.

Also, modern digital synths run software just like a computer. The difference is that the hardware runs an OS dedicated to the operation of the instrument; it does not have to deal with anything else.

I am not saying you are wrong, just curious as to why you categorically label piano VST's as better than what you can get from hardware.

[The Audacity Works]

Best piano? For my most recent track, I went through a bunch of of 'em—Motifs, XV-5080 with an SRX-11, Ivory, NI's Akoustik Piano, Gigapiano...

Ended up going with GarageBand's Steinway sample that ships with Logic Studio. Go figure—it fit the track perfectly.