My opinion of the PSR F51

[Toril S]

Hello friends
I took home a PSR F51 keyboard the other day, to look at its features so I could help my friend.
My opinion: Pros: Very lightweight, only 3.6 kilos!Can run on batteries. Even the SC adaptor is light! Easy to use, all right as a first keyboard. Surprisingly good keybed!
30 demo songs, and over a hundred styles and voices. Headphone socket, that can be used to connect to a speaker or a stereo system. The sound improves somewhat with headphones, but it suffers because it doesn't have touch sensitivity.
Cons: Lousy speakers. Sustain and transpose and some other functions are "hidden", you have to press a function button and a
white key simultaniously to use those features. No socket for sustain pedal. No touch sensitivity.
Conclusion: For kids or adults who have never played keyboard this is OK to start with.

It reminds me of my PSR-47, that is 30 years old. The F51 sounds a little better, but not much!

[SciNote]

I remember checking out the PSR-F51 in a music store a while back.  I remember thinking that it seemed like it would be for someone on a very limited budget who wanted to get a keyboard with full-sized keys without going with a keyboard of unknown quality from a "no-name" company, but that for about $20 more, the PSR-E200 series keyboards were probably better.  However, I was not considering the weight and portability of the keyboard, so that maybe the F51 weighs less.

Yamaha's website has the PSR-E273 weighing "8 lb (4.0 kg, 13 oz) (not including batteries)" -- whatever that means (looks like they're mixing English and metric units -- the English-unit weight is likely 8 lbs, 13 oz), and the PSR-F51 at "3.4 kg (7 lbs 8 oz) (not including batteries)", so it appears that the F51 is, indeed, lighter, though not by a great amount.

Then, of course, there is also the little PSS-F30, which is basically a miniature PSR-F51 (right down to the color scheme of the control panel), but of course, that has mini-keys and would not really be suitable to learning how to play keyboard or piano.

[vbdx66]

Hi Toril and SciNote,

I indeed think that the E273 is more interesting than the F51.

That said, for someone who is sure to go on playing for more than a few months, I would straightaway go for the E373 which is not a toy, but a fully-fledged instrument with lots of nice sounds and styles, touch sensitivity, arpeggios, DSPs, an integrated audio interface, the ability to connect a sustain pedal... a very nice beginner keyboard to put under the Christmas tree

Regards,

Vinciane

[mikf]

I know that everyone has their budget limits, but not only is too low a cost  a poor instrument and not very satisfying but also means insufficient commitment. I have never known anyone who bought this kind of 'toy' stick with it even long enough to decide to upgrade  - they give up.   
Mike

[Toril S]

I returned it today, but will be able to help my friend with hers. I also discovered many YouTube videos where people performed on this keyboard. It is very affordable, and it had the Indian kit and Tabla. So I believe the little F51 is providing the opportunity to learn and practice keyboard playing to a lot of people of all ages all over the world. I returned it only because I already have the keyboards I need.