Yamaha PSR 550 - is it good enough?

[Vidilian]

I'm very much a newb to making music (other than playin the piano), so I was just wondering if the psr- 550 is a keyboard capable of making remixes that are of this sites standards? If not, are there any sample based keyboards like this within the same price range that are good enough. Its the quality of the samples I'm most worried about. The features on the psr 550 are good enough for me.

[Compyfox]

A thing to ask yourself before everybody else is writing in here:

Was there a thread like this necessary if you browsed about through page 1 and 2 of this section first? Or looked through the stickies?

Please think about that before answering first.

[Vidilian]

I apologize if it wasn't right for me make a thread on this. But could someone direct me to somewhere where my question could be answered. I'd appreciate it.

[Compyfox]

http://www.ocremix.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=83930&highlight=keyboard+remixing

http://www.ocremix.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=83101&highlight=keyboard+remixing

http://www.ocremix.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=77854&highlight=keyboard+remixing

Or the short answer:

You can make music with everything nowadays. Read the stickies, use the search function. Then ask more questions.

[JamesXIIC]

Don't mind him, he's being a bit harsh I'd say.

Anyway, I own a PSR-540 which is near identical to the 550 'cept a bit older. I think the DSP chips and wavetable ROM are exactly the same though, and if not then the 550 is bound to sound even better.

The good news is that the PSR-540 (and 550) and absolutely outstanding sounding keyboards in that price range. In fact, factory sound wise I say they are much better bang for your buck than all this Motif and Fantom stuff if you just want stock sounds.

The bad news is that, unlike those more expensive workstations I mentioned, you can't program the PSR's sounds. Or expand on them. So you are pretty much limited to the sounds you get.

It really does spank the ass off of most GM modules and has more sounds to boot, 707 for mine, maybe more for yours?

I'd say it's perfectly capable of professional music when it comes to a lot of instruments like organs, electric pianoes and synths. The piano, brass and woodwind sounds may not fool most people into being realistic but they sound very nice and expressive indeed.

That's just my opinion though. I think you'll find while the samples may be a bit outdated they are perfectly acceptable.

If you want ULTRA realism however, I would stray from the realm of keyboards and workstations and invest in a good set of samples and sampler or ROMpler.

Something like Sampletank, Sonik Synth, Kontakt, HALion are good starts. Garritan Personal Orchestra if you want expressive orchestral samples at affordable prices.

Hope this helps.

[Yoozer]

I'm very much a newb to making music (other than playin the piano), so I was just wondering if the psr- 550 is a keyboard capable of making remixes that are of this sites standards?

A remix that makes the standard doesn't need incredibly realistic sounds; most of the tools used by the remixers do not necessarily achieve this goal, either. You have a good set of capable bread & butter (realistic instruments, strings, piano, brass, etc) that can compete with various virtual instruments out there. Not with the huge gigabyte orchestral libraries, but good enough to pass.

The other advantage is that the PSR has MIDI. This means that you do not have to use the soundset in the device itself; you can hook up software synthesizers to it. These can take the tasks upon them that your PSR can't do - purely synthetic sounds or sampling. You can also use effects plugins to add effects your PSR lacks (distortion, probably? I don't know- last PSR I had was a 500 and it only had 3 types of reverb.)

The features on the psr 550 are good enough for me.

Then all you need is a MIDI interface and a proper audio interface to record your PSR with, and maybe a controller with rotary knobs and sliders to control the software synthesizers with.

[FM]

I've got a PSR, and I'm in the market for selling one - for a reason. It's served me okay, I guess, but I've never been satisfied with it. I can think of a bazillion things that I'd rather have spent the $500 on. If you want a controller, you can pick up a great Studiologic weighted 88 key for less than $300 on ebay. A million times better than the 61 plastic action keys on the PSR (unless those ultra-light touch keys are your thing). If you want a great sequencer, Cubase SL is amazing, and goes for $240 at Academic Superstore (you have to be a student, but the savings are worth borrowing a friend's student ID if you aren't). If you want much better sounds than the PSR ones, get Kontakt II, something like 8GB of great sounds, and as a bonus feature (not really), you get the best software sampler out there around this pricerange ($175 at Academic Superstore).

[SnappleMan]

Creativity is the best soundfont.

-The more you know-

[Argle]

i have a 550, and while I don't use it for the sounds anymore, they are surprisingly decent for a newbie board like that. That said tho, the effects section is super limited, as is the general sequencing/mixing capabilities of it, so you'll find that extremely extremely limiting.

Unless you absolutely must have a hardware board for your sounds for some reason, you'll probably find a software sample setup to be 13209870x more powerful and flexible, unless you spend thousands for a workstation keyboard like teh Motif.

[-RK-]

I also have a 550. I bought it a few years ago to learn to play piano and kinda break into music production/keyboards. If you already know how to play piano well, the synth action keys will probably dissapoint you. I really dont like to play serious peices on it. However, as a midi controller, it works just as I'd want one too, and occasionally I'll sample some of it's pads or instruments, because some are quite good.

So, basically, as a newbie board it's pretty good, but stepping up to something more... proficient is more reccomended.

[Vidilian]

Thanks for the help everyone. Wish I'd looked back here before I went for the PSR 1500 instead of 550. I wasn't expecting any answers. Oh well...