Update (for those like me that play solo piano): *Important: Don't ruch to conclusions concerning ANY piano model or sample until you have thoroughly investigated the Velocity Sends and Curves setup of your keyboard with each one! Can make a world of difference sometimes. Not good for simulating the instrument that was named the soft-loud (pianoforte). If you find only three levels of output while playing maybe six or seven levels of velocity, you know what you've got there then, a sample that is lacking in velocity layers. Now strike the same key a little harder (faster) and note the VU reading again while listening to the sound. Repeat several times while noting the VU reading.
Strike a key as softly as you can and still be able to hear the sound. Helps to open up a VU meter so one can see the amplitude levels. Know this to be true from doing double blindfold A-B comparison tests with many people who think they are blessed with the Golden All-Seeing Ear, yours truly is included. The damper pedal thang is neat, but is the least of the concerns for getting a great grand piano sound out of the PC. Not all gigasampled piano files are created equal either, further complicating things, some sound like the layers were derived via manipulating maybe only three basic velocity layers, soft, medium, loud. This means large filesize, such as in some of the great Gigapianos (Holy Grail, Bosendorfer, etc.). "Small footprint" (meaning small filesize) and "Grand Piano Sample" are mutually exclusive terms. I tried Pianoteq 2 1/2 years ago, and didn't care for it, but the present version seems a lot better - and I suspect with time it will be the way to go as it can be tailored to produce so many piano sounds.
For HDD mercy, my favourite music software is my wave editor (Goldwave) that uses a whopping 8.81 MB. Installed, Pianoteq takes 149 MB versus 138 MB for Powertracks 11.
I have an EMU 1820M with Emulator X, and it's a disaster as it can't handle all the pedal control steps generated by the Roland.Īnd for the price and size of samples, I'm not ready for that.Ī small footprint on my HDD is important as I have acquired 16,000 digital images in two years.
When I load a KR7 recorded midi into Pianoteq, it gets this part right. Thanks Scott - it's been quite a while (got tangled up in photography - my other creative pursuit).Īllis: I agree with your assessments - it is a bit wimpy, but a fair bit better than my three year old Roland KR7 (which has a really nice keyboard feel, and models the damper pedal from zero to 127 in one step increments - something many digitals do not do).