Voices and Styles comparison between PSR-550 and PSR-E373 and Casio CT-X700

[hey_haho]

Hi everyone,

My first post in the forum. Wising everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

I am looking at a used PSR-550, a more-than-20-year-old keyboard, and I wonder how the Voices and Styles in that keyboard compared with some more recent entry level keyboards, like Yamaha PSR-E373 and Casio CT-X700?

A bit of background, when I was a student, PSR-550 was kind of a mid-range keyboard. I now have my PSR-S970 and it is awesome to me, however, I want to buy a cheaper one for my kids to play with, without damaging my more expensive S970 .

In the used market, PSR-550 and PSR-E373 and Casio CT-X700 are pretty much having the same price (of around less than $100).

Please let me know if you happen to have some info.

Thank you very much for reading!

[pjd]

Hi --

Welcome to the Forum!

I did a quick compare PSR-E373 against the PSR-550. About the same, really. Since you're playing an S970, you pretty much know what to expect from an arranger. If it's new E373 vs. used PSR-550, I'd go new E373. You get the warranty and know that the instrument hasn't been abused or sitting in a not-so-good environment for 20 years.

I had a CT-S1000V for a while and used it rather seriously. Casio has come a long way. I prefer Yamaha's auto-accompaniment over Casio "rhythms". Might be worth a stop at a Casio dealer for a try-out.

Kids loved the CT-S1000V voice synthesis, but I realize its price is beyond your budget.

Hope this opinion helps -- pj

[flailman]

In my humble opinion, the PSR-E373 provides a great tool to get started on.  Voices and Styles are somewhat current and the interface is easy to learn.  I got a solid two years of fun and learning from this machine and it translated well when I moved to a higher level instrument.  It had just enough "goodies" like some S.Art lite voices, harmony, Dual Voice, etc. to keep me coming back. 

[Toril S]

I have the PSR-S975, Tyros and Genos. Very satisfied. But they are heavy and bulky. For this reason i bought a Casio CT-S400 because I was going on a trip, and wanted a keyboard with me. I really like the small formfactor, and the sounds are great. Easy to use, 200 styles on it. I also like Yamaha styles better, but the Casio is really fun to play. There is also the CT-S600, it costs some more, but have live control knabs to control effects, and 43 more styles, and some more voices. But you already have a Yamaha, maybe you should go for the e-series. Whatever you choose it will be fine, but I would not go for a keyboard without touch sensitivity, and i advice against buying a keyboard that you can't use a sustain pedal on! Here in Norway the Yamaha F52 is sold a lot for kids, and it would be a good keyboard if it had those features! Good luck

[hey_haho]

Thank you very much for everyone's input. As all of you suggested, I will stick with new entry-level keyboard! It is a good point about the environment that used keyboard has been sitting in, with who-knows dust, smoke, fungus etc.

Have a Happy Holidays!

[Amwilburn]

A bit late, but the PSR550 had amazing speakers. It would be fun to collect just for the sake of it; but it's so old it used floppy disks, so don't expect to do much with it other than play it out of the box.  (I assume you mean the 2001 PSR550, not the 2008 PSRs550; the latter's speakers were underwhelming, but at least it had a USB A port.

Plus the PSR550 used the older (lower rez but punchier) drums, so a lot of the beats actually sounded really good (acoustic strummed guitar, however, was awful compared to the post megavoice era), but the old drums and bass were punchy like a Korg!

And since it was before the Tyros era, guess what? the s550 *should* have seamless sound switching (which was actually on pretty much all keyboards up until the early 2000s). But yeah if it breaks down, good luck finding parts.

Mark