My first acoustic piano - Yamaha and Petrof

[danielbo]

Hi everybody,

I'm thinking about buying an acoustic piano with silent function, I've been playing a digital one (Korg SP 170s) for two years and now it's time to change!
I've seen many pianos lately and my budget is around 4000/5000 euros (I live in Italy).
Now the hoice would be among those models:

Original silent (from the factory)
- Yamaha B2 silent SG2(NEW) € 4900-5400
- Yamaha B1 silent SG2 (NEW) € 4000-4200
- Yamaha B1 silent SI (used) € 3100 (no usb)

Genio silent system
- Yamaha u1 (used from the '90) € 4100
- Petrof 118 (NEW) € 5800 (the price includes silent system but it still has to be installed)

Now, I'm very confused.. one of the seller has told me Yamaha B series are not very good because they're made in china. But I was actually positively surprised when I first tried B2 model!
I think U1 for € 4100 is really good, but I don't know if it's a good deal or not.

On the other hand I loved the Petrof sound, even though it's a bit expensive for my budget, but I'm still not convinced because I think I would "ruin" it installing a silent system.
What do you think about installing a silent system on a new piano?
And I've read around that having a silent system preinstalled is better than installing it later.
I've never heard about genio system either.

Thanks in advance for your opinion!

[danielbo]

Oh gosh, I made it that difficult?

Any suggestion?

Thanks guys!

[rachmforever]

Did you thinking about some other pianos? I mean Petrof isn't very well I live in country where they making them and it's not very well with that company yet. Don't know much about Yamaha pianos cuz they making them in China and I'm not sure buying something like this from China by the way they was able to made relatively good grand pianos. I can recommended you something like:
Ritmüller 117 or Feurich 115 maybe Brodmann 118 CE. They are definitely great German pianos with corresponding quality ( I tried some of them ). Anyway you would have to buy silent system separately probably.

[danielbo]

Hi, thanks for your opinion!
Why do you say there's something wrong with Petrof?
As of today I haven't looked other piano brands, but this afternoon I'll visita another couple of shops. I'll check if there's some model of the brands you suggested me!

Thanks!

[rachmforever]

Hi, thanks for your opinion!
Why do you say there's something wrong with Petrof?
As of today I haven't looked other piano brands, but this afternoon I'll visita another couple of shops. I'll check if there's some model of the brands you suggested me!

Thanks!

Because after 2WW in Czech republic left only Petrof company. So they still are only company in CZ.
I mean before it was good but now it's disaster because that quality is really bad for that money they want for it. It's crazy cuz for that money you can buy piano from Germany which sure will be 100% better quality than Petrof is. Anyway people still buying Petrof for absurdly prices.
Let me know how were pianos in other stores you was looking

[bronnestam]

I got a Petrof at the end of the 70's. I quickly got used to it, but most visitors remarked that it was "strange" and difficult to play. (I guess some of them wanted to show off with their piano skills as well, which I found a bit ridiculous. I mean, if I could play it ... Said within parenthesis.)

OK, so it wasn't the best piano in the world BUT one thing was remarkable: we only tuned it once! I played it rather frequently for a couple of years, and of course it was not mint condition then, but you could very well stand the sound of it. I have heard waaay worse examples, even though they were tuned more often. So I suppose that says something about the quality at least. But this was a long time ago, and I have no idea what a new Petrof is like today.

I also love the sound and feeling of the Yamaha pianos. I would not be that afraid of buying a B2 if the price is low. They are definitely not worthless or "crap", but the U1 are a bit better. So I think the U1 choice is a good one PROVIDED that the silent system is worth to have ... don't know anything about it. You have to check that one up.

[hfmadopter]

I think a regular poster in the forum " outin"  has a U1 with silent system. You might try to PM her and see what her opinion is of a Yamaha with silent system on board.

Personally I can't get over the quality of the sound of my Kawai digital, not that Kawai matters so much except for the action, since I run it through Pianoteq software. Pianoteq has some wonderful sounding virtual pianos in it. I own a grand piano but play the digital mostly. I can't make my grand sound like any number of conditioned D4's or C Bechstein's. There is no perfect one solution but this is working well for me, I find it charming to play simulated instruments one could only dream of owning in reality and yet versatile. Just a thought. It's very labor intensive or otherwise expensive to alter my grand piano even a little bit fwiw. I just try to keep it playable.

[bronnestam]

Personally I can't get over the quality of the sound of my Kawai digital, not that Kawai matters so much except for the action, since I run it through Pianoteq software. Pianoteq has some wonderful sounding virtual pianos in it. I own a grand piano but play the digital mostly. I can't make my grand sound like any number of conditioned D4's or C Bechstein's. There is no perfect one solution but this is working well for me, I find it charming to play simulated instruments one could only dream of owning in reality and yet versatile.

I also have Pianoteq together with my digital Yamaha CLP 465GP and I agree completely - Pianoteq is great software. I really appreciate the fact that it records everything automatically. I have found that I learn a lot if I listen to my own playing afterwards; in that way I can hear and analyse my mistakes much better and work out ideas on what to change or improve. (And who has the energy to manually record everything otherwise ...?)  The sound is excellent and I believe it is very hard to hear the difference between a Pianoteq recording and a recording with an acoustic instrument.
I have not worked out any satisfying solution with Pianoteq piped to loudspeakers, though, so it is a hearphone experience to me ... They have a demo on how you do this, but I could not make it work. Anyway, I don't bother much about this detail.

The cheapest version costs 99 euros, and it needs less than 300 Mb on your harddisc, so it is a smaller investment than a real piano, in every aspect ... but not as good-looking, of course.

[hfmadopter]

I also have Pianoteq together with my digital Yamaha CLP 465GP and I agree completely - Pianoteq is great software. I really appreciate the fact that it records everything automatically. I have found that I learn a lot if I listen to my own playing afterwards; in that way I can hear and analyse my mistakes much better and work out ideas on what to change or improve. (And who has the energy to manually record everything otherwise ...?)  The sound is excellent and I believe it is very hard to hear the difference between a Pianoteq recording and a recording with an acoustic instrument.
I have not worked out any satisfying solution with Pianoteq piped to loudspeakers, though, so it is a hearphone experience to me ... They have a demo on how you do this, but I could not make it work. Anyway, I don't bother much about this detail.

The cheapest version costs 99 euros, and it needs less than 300 Mb on your harddisc, so it is a smaller investment than a real piano, in every aspect ... but not as good-looking, of course.

I have to wonder what was missing in your hookup that external speakers did not work. I run mine through Adam Audio Studio monitors via an M-Audio 10" Sub. I ran out of my keyboard via the old midi ports even though I know I could have done it just as well with USB. I did that knowing my laptop would be hooking up to older keyboards I play on that don't have the USB function, only MIDI. I can tell you this much, when using a midi to USB interface the midi out on the keyboard goes to the midi in on the interface.

Somebody scoffed my adapter for my heaphones. My headphone set have a 1/4" jack and the laptop a 3.5 mm. I suspect my Grand daughter is involved in this ! But I will get another so I can hear these instruments with headphones.

I am very very pleased with the seeming lack of latency compared with some other demo software I tried. I bought the optional Klemsegg 2 package just to get the C Bechstein !! I then customized that sound to include a very slight condition degrading, as it was just a bit too pure for my common man ears !! Very nice. I have three different versions of D4 saved and two K2's that I like for general practice very much.

[danielbo]

Hey guys thanks for alla your opinions!

Some day ago I found another Petrof, but it is 50 YO!
I found his sound really good though, and it has a silent system already installed, not sure about its quality..btw the prove is really good, 2300 euros, and it's 135 cm tall!

Since you've already started talking about pianoteq, do you think it's possible to use it connecting the silent system to the pc via midi?

[bronnestam]

Yes, if the silent system has a MIDI OUT connection, then it should work. You connect it to the computer and listen through the computer while you mute the sound from the silent system itself.

[hfmadopter]

Hey guys thanks for alla your opinions!

Some day ago I found another Petrof, but it is 50 YO!
I found his sound really good though, and it has a silent system already installed, not sure about its quality..btw the prove is really good, 2300 euros, and it's 135 cm tall!

Since you've already started talking about pianoteq, do you think it's possible to use it connecting the silent system to the pc via midi?

midi out is midi out, it should work. There can be little complications. If your system is midi out via the older style pin arrangement and the computer has no midi in port on it then you will need an adapter to get from midi to usb. Not a big deal but from what I've been told don't buy the least expensive adapters as they "can" produce latency issues ( the adapters involve a little module on them). Buy at least the next tier up from the cheapest. I think I paid around $60 US for mine and it works flawlessly. I run at times an HDMI attached monitor on my laptop and that messed up where I had to run my headphones from  ( my headphone jack on the laptop is all it has for sound out, so that is chained to a splitter cable and into my Sub which has several different type of connection ports on it, where normally I run from the monitors jack to my sound system when viewing on the monitor for general purpose PC use).

But generally speaking it is all doable stuff, that with some common sense applied you can get good sound. Pianoteq will sound about as good as the sound system you run it to though !! Or just use headphones where again quality counts. Cheap gaming headphones will only do so well.

Good luck with your purchase if you go through with it !

[danielbo]

hey guys, I think I've eventually made my choice!
I thought that the 50 yo Petrof is a too big deal, I mean, it's old, the silent system is not quite new, not sure about his life and I could afford something more...

I've played again the U1 and I'm thinking about buying it. It's never been used, even though it's from the 90's, the silent system is brand new and I think it has also some usb output (need to figure it out though). I think 4k is a very good price for that.
The new Petrof is simply out of my budget, I love the sound but I think I'll be happy with the U1 as well!

[pristinepiano]

Daniel, you will do fine with the U1, it is a very good instrument, clear tones, exceptional action response and dynamics.  They can get a bit shrill and piercing in the treble but nothing a good tech can't voice down for you.  To find one that age in hardly used condition is rare../they typically get the heck pounded out of them, especially if it was in a school or teaching environment.  Make sure the loop threads holding the springs are all intact, these tend to wear or deteriorate with some time.  A U1 with solid tight tuning pins in lightly used condition will fetch 6-7K here in Canada....even the grey market ones that come over in container ships will fetch 4-5K.

[pianolive]

Just to clarify, the Yamaha B series iare made in Indonesia. They don't have a traditional spruce soundboard, instead it is paneled.
All piano manufacturers can deliver pianos with a silent system.