Digital Piano vs. Upright Acoustic??

[cvp1796]

Hello everyone! I'm looking to upgrade from my Yamaha DGX-505 (an awful digital keyboard I've had for about eight years now) and I'm not quite sure what to buy. Sorry if I sound like I have no idea what I'm talking about...

I'm not a music student (I'm actually studying business), but I do like to play very often and since I do not live on my college campus, I get the chance to play as much as possible. I'd say I play at least an hour a day, sometimes more than two hours if my schedule permits. I don't really know what "level" I'm at since I don't take piano lessons anymore, and I never was in competitions or prepared for exams. I'd say the most difficult works I've done are Bach's Italian Concerto, Chopin's Prelude No. 22 in G Minor, and Mozart's K333. I mainly play classical, but I also come up with pop/rock arrangements and some original compositions.

I'm looking for something that resembles a piano, in look/sound/touch, more so than the "toy" I currently have...I've only tried out some digital pianos (Yamaha Arius, Casio Privia). I found that the Yamahas feel a bit too heavy, and preferred the Casios...then again, there wasn't much to choose from. I don't need a whole lot of extra functions like voices and learning tools. If anything, all I (think I) need is the ability to record and connect to my laptop.

OR should I just consider buying an upright piano instead? My budget is basically no more than ~4000 USD but I can stretch to 5000 if I absolutely have to - are there any uprights that would be worth it, at that price? Do I even need an upright?

Sorry for being such a burden and sounding so clueless, but this has been on my mind for quite a while.

[chessman]

For 4-5k $ you can get awesome digital piano or pretty nice acoustic piano BUT the latter wont allow you to record to laptop. Not without additional items. Anyway if it's not priority then I recomend acoustic one. About digital, actually Yamaha has pretty good keyboard. Could you please write what model/models have you tried?

[iansinclair]

Keep in mind that you can probably get a really really good upright acoustic, used, for much less than you have quoted as your budget -- depending on where you are (being a global forum, that's not obvious!).

It is quite true, however, that you can't record directly (by which I mean just plug it in) to your laptop from one.  You have to use a microphone.

If you are looking at a digital piano, and you have the budget (which it seems you do), make sure that whatever it is it has an action which reasonably duplicates an acoustic piano.  I know both Yamaha and Kawai make such critters, and I believe Roland does as well.  They tend to be at the more expensive end of the price range.

[night_hawk]

For $4000, you won't get an amazing upright, but you may be able to get a great digital piano. I'm not well versed in the world of digital pianos, because I'm an acoustic player; I do, however, know that $4000 cannot get you a piano that fits your level, especially if you're beginning to dabble in the world of composers like Chopin. While you could get an upright that works and has all of the moving parts and whatnot in your price range, I think, for your purposes, you should go for the digital. Like people have said before, you won't be able to record a piece if you only have an upright, while a digital piano will give you multiple recording options.

[hfmadopter]

If you buy a digital piano buy the heaviest one you can get and when your residence gets broken into they may not steal it. Our house was broken into and robbed today ( they beat the front door down), my MP6 was on it's wooden stand and they did not steal it and they didn't get my grand piano either of course. The one thing stolen that bothers me the most has no particular monetary value, it's the mantel clock I built for my mother years ago before she passed away. It has a small plaque inside stating it was built by me and the year. The clock can not be replaced. You can't buy a similar one and make it due, it was from my heart to hers and back again, made from cherry wood and hand stained etc.... I intended to pass it on to one of my daughters one day. Insurance or myself could buy another laptop another MP6 even but not that clock. It's irreplaceable, it brought my mother comfort in her last year with cancer listening to it tick and chime. Now some grubby slime ball has it and a pawn shop will give him 8 bucks for it or something. Inside the clock is a verse from the funeral home who handled my mothers arrangements.

Anyway, the Arius is not a suitable replacement for a really good upright piano, IMO. And Casio is Casio, also IMO. You need to get into the $3000 range and up of console digitals and they will be close to grand piano action with some setup, so better than average uprights. All my opinion. But if the Arius is heavy to you, then I don't know what to say unless it was that particular model you played. The Arius series I played felt light compared to my grand ( my grand runs right around 53-55 grams of down weight at/around middle C). So I don't really know what you are looking for or felt when you tried the pianos out. I can tell you that the inexpensive consoles don't feel like real piano action. Kawai at about $2500 on up might. Don't try out an MP6 stage piano, I can tell you right now that will be too heavy for you in the action.

[chessman]

Well I bought Roland hp 506 in the end and it's awesome BUT there is small "hiss" sound barely audible when sitting normally but it's there, is it normal in digitals? Some people say it is, some say I shouldn't be able to hear it. I wonder if I should complain about it... Apart from that sound is great and it's as close as "upright" can be to the concert grand piano. OK probably 508 is the closest But still it's really impressive, responsiveness and controll are also as they should be.

[cvp1796]

Thanks for all your responses! I'm still in the process of trying out various models, so I highly doubt I'll be purchasing anything anytime soon.

chessman: I've tried the entire Casio Privia line (750, 780, and 850), the entire Yamaha Arius line (141, 161, 181), and two Yamaha Clavinovas (430 and 440), in terms of digital pianos. As for uprights, I've only tried the Young Chang T-110 and the Yamaha U1. The Yamaha U1 was considerably better, but it's out of my price range, so unless I get a really good deal, I'd probably have to buy a used Yamaha U1, if I don't end up liking any other models.

*Also, that's an interesting point about the Roland - I wasn't looking into Roland models, but I'll keep that in mind.

night_hawk: Thanks for your input! I'm trying to find some higher quality digital pianos, but it looks as though I'll have to travel a considerable amount to see anything other than Casio Privias and Yamaha Ariuses, so we'll have to see. *fingers crossed*

hfmadopter: Thank you for the information. I tried out the Arius again and it doesn't seem so heavy this time, so maybe it was just that particular model. My current keyboard doesn't have weighted keys (!) so that might be a factor, but the digital pianos I've tried aren't *too* heavy for me to play.

[hfmadopter]

hfmadopter:  My current keyboard doesn't have weighted keys (!) so that might be a factor, but the digital pianos I've tried aren't *too* heavy for me to play.

Oh yes it most assuredly is a factor.

[indianajo]

I don't know why people are so obsessed with buying a new piano made out of unproven Siberian woods.  I've never heard a Yamaha I liked smaller than 2.8 m long.
I played a delightful 3.1 m nineteen fifties Baldwin console today, at a fellowship hall where they have a charity dinner for the town.  Loud, bright, the Acrosonic is a jewel not made anymore,  going for about $600 on the resale market here, in flea markets usually.  The piano mover/tuners snap them up the first day they are listed online.     Baldwin Acrosonics are very light, which I think is related to how loud they can be.  The action is very consistant at all volumes.  
Other premium used brands I am familiar with are Sohmer, Wulritzer, chickering, Mason & Hamlin.  Hamilton by Baldwin was one step down but still a great, fast piano.  All these brands names but Sohmer were bought in the late eighties by global corporations to sell their bargain lines of furniture sourced from new factories.  I've played a seventies(?) Kawai from the Carolina factory that was a fine piano.  I auditioned a 1982 Everett 3.2 m that was pretty good, although my Mother's 1949 Everett 3.1 m had a tone match issue between the two and three string notes.  
I auditioned a nineteen twenties Howard upright piano at the charity resale shop two weeks ago that sounded better than the 3.2 m Yamaha console they insist on using at church, because it is "the best".  Out of tune of course, as all most old bargain pianos are.  $75 cash and carry away yourself.  
unless you are in ocean ringed Singapore or fungus prone southeast Asia, India, or Africa,  I say get out to more locations and try some quality pianos from 30 to 50 years ago.  You might save $3000 and end up with a classic.  Of course, check speed of action, cracked soundboards, hammers and damper felts worn scooped by too many hours, missing strings, uneven damper letoff,  sticky keys, bent shafts or wooden parts by excess humidity, glue separating on 3 layer clevises.  In 2010 I bought a used 1941 Steinway 40 that was not used by a school apparently, and consider it a bargain even though it needs a little work (seven tunings to A440 stability, one sticky key only in super dry weather)  Such a beautiful tone from A0 to C8.  I was practicing Malaguena last night that goes from one end to the other, a great pleasure.  

[hfmadopter]

Idianajo and I, as well as a couple of other people around the forums, have agreed on this one before. There are so many older uprights around in great shape it seems silly to buy a new one, unless maybe you have a lot of money and you seek out maybe a Walters or Steinway. Though I personally am not a fan of uprights, two of the brands that Indianajo mentioned I have played and found the experience pleasing, The Baldwin and Wurlitzer and at that the Wurlitzer was a rather short console/ It's tone was very pleasing and the action decent on both pianos. I have no experience with the Chickering brand uprights but the 6ft grand I played in a reception hall for a couple of hundred people was a really nice piano to play. The guy who was tuning my own piano at the time tuned it so it seemed much like my own grand at home to me.

That said most recently I have been working a lot on my own compositions ( All my life I've never been able to write a composition of my own and now suddenly all these new pieces keep pouring onto the key, I'm enjoying that), a couple cover a good range of the keyboard and I have found great joy in my digital for this when played through the live sound system. And I can play that at 3am through headphones and not bother my tenant. I use this piano also for our Bible study group who meets at our house monthly. The pastor has a digital at his house, he keeps after me to play that for the first Bible study of the month which is at his house but it's one of those cut off things with 61 keys or some such thing and no sound system. Not interested in playing that as is, maybe if he invests in a speaker or two. Or if I upgrade my main monitors maybe I would then use my old ones there.

[outin]

[quote author=hfmadopter

That said most recently I have been working a lot on my own compositions ( All my life I've never been able to write a composition of my own and now suddenly all these new pieces keep pouring onto the key, I'm enjoying that), [/quote]

Off topic, but that sounds interesting...What style of music do you compose? When will you post us some?

[hfmadopter]

[quote author=hfmadopter

That said most recently I have been working a lot on my own compositions ( All my life I've never been able to write a composition of my own and now suddenly all these new pieces keep pouring onto the key, I'm enjoying that),

Off topic, but that sounds interesting...What style of music do you compose? When will you post us some?

Outin, I've done about 7 in two weeks but three have stuck. It's just hit me, the first I started on a Sat afternoon and I played it on Tues evening for the Bible study. It just pours out from within, my hands just go to notes. I would put the main genre as New Age in feel, some hints of classical in there. It started after I listened to the All Stars awards at YouTube featuring something like 16 pianists, one of which has been an inspiration to me ( David Nevue). I stopped the youtube video and went to the piano and had the opening phrases in about ten minutes. That first piece spun off of that All Stars presentation. The second was just out of my head when I touched the note E on the piano. The third that I love came to me after I felt the grief of a coworker who's daughter took her own life and also looking up at the empty space where my mothers clock had been that I made for her that the thief got. my wife wants me to name that piece Adria's song after the girls name but I think that's a bit much even if it feels right. I sat passionately at the piano and spun this out after work, actually with my eyes welled up and a chill up my back . Another has a childs playground feel to it, that was the D flat I had been working in on a written piece I was learning. It's a simplistic piece with a lot of pep is best I can say. They are not complicated pieces by any stretch of the imagination anyway. I'm hung up on 6/8 time, A minor, E Minor, D, D flat. F and C major for keys it seems. There are some sixth and seventh runs. I think what is striking is the mood vs required finger articulation in the pieces thus far. I won't be filling in Chopin's shoes anytime soon ! But that's not the point, all my life I've tried this from time to time and got no place, couldn't come up with a simple melody. These whip out in hours and in days are to where I want them. And they are usable, I love playing them people love hearing them . The Pastor in our group actually wants one of them for the church website. We shall see on that, he hasn't heard the others.

Anyway nuff said. I may post a link along the way here. This is a far more critical group of people than my average listening crowd at home but maybe pretty soon you will hear something.

[gyzzzmo]

The sound of a digital piano with a good headphone is often ALOT better than when the sound has to come from the boxes of a digital upright. So if you want to test some piano's and (maybe) are going to practise with headphones often anyway, test them that way.
Digital grand piano's have better boxes and are directed upwards, so they sound much better than digital uprights.

The rest you probably already know enough about accoustic uprights, but the major advantage of a digital piano is that you can practise whenever you want (headphones), and that you dont have to tune them. Just make sure you have a good one, like a yamaha clavinova, and a good brand headphones, like sennheiser.

Gyzzzmo

[ranniks]

- get an upright if you have the room for it and have neighbours that don't mind, if they do mind, arrange for your playing time, e.g. an hour each day

I got an acoustic. I would have been better off with a good digital though. An acoustic piano in the wrong home type/room/location is just not good. Especially if you're a neurotic like me who constantly thinks of whether the neighbours will hate me for repeating a passage for x amount of times.

Yamaha has some great digitals. If you can spend a lot of money, there are some GREAT digitals out there.