Hi, I'm still fine tuning my choice of a entry level workstation/piano. I have bought a WK220 but am still deciding if it is the best choice for features and value. Based on feedback on that purchase I thought it might be fine (Cost $160 for unit, stand, ac adapter includ tax at Costco). But I still have'nt opened the box as I want to make sure it will last me at least a couple of years before upgrading. So yesterday I went to the local Guitar Center in Phoenix, AZ to compare the sounds of that unit with what they have of a similar type and price. Since much of it's use will be with headphones in my house to play around, I took my Sennheiser set along as as way to get a good test without all the other "noise" in the store which is usually a lot. I focused on what they had which were Casio WK200, 6500, 7500 as well as a Yam GPY235 and some stage pianos as well. All of them sounded quite good through the headphones, but to my surprise I found distortion on the WK200 and 6500 when playing hard cords focusing mostly in the middle C ranges. The other units did not display this, nor did single notes hit or softer keying in chords. Based on the specs for the 200 and 6500 both having similar 48 polyphony, my guess is that they share a lot of compononts, but they do have different wattage to the speakers so the amps must be different (2.5 to the 200 and 6 to the 6500). It did not show up on the 7500. I also tried a set of the stores Shure headphones and the distortion was not as pronounced but still there (maybe less trebbly but still evident). The salesman also observed it with both headphones but thought I was either using the volume too high (it was on max but the same on all the other units not showing distortion) or that there may have been some quality control in the manufacturing process - but it's odd that it was evident in two units side by side which share a lot of components. This makes me leary of these units as a whole. Has anyone experienced a similar issue while using headphones with those or other units. Remember it only showed up with strongly keyed cords, not single notes, and I also did not hear it through the speakers although the surrounding store noise made that hard to make a real test for that. If my theory is correct that it is a design flaw for those unit types I think it would affect the WK200, 210, 220, 225, 6500 as well as the CTK versions of the same. Those units seem to have a lot of great features for the money, but If you use headphones a lot with distortion appearing, that is not a good conclusion. (The tests were all done in Str Grand Piano to compare a similar voice across platforms - others voices were not tried).
Thanks for your help.
Thanks for your help.
