Genos Test Number Three

[Pianoman]

Hello Everyone.

I'll be doing my third Genos test in a couple of hours from now, at a friend's house.

My previous 2 tests showed a slight improvement in sound over the Tyros line.
Not by much though, as I considered the improvement to be more incremental,
rather than substantial.

In the meantime, below are 2 links showing what can be done  with a T3.

I will try to reproduce these same 2 songs on the Genos, for the purpose of
voice, style, and drum comparison, and try to post them here later.

It may be interesting too, to hear a Genos owner play something similar,
since He/She would be more familiar with the EQ and compressor settings,
again, just for comparison.

Both songs below are simple "sit and play" performances, played live
straight into the T3's recorder.


https://app.box.com/s/rdgph7010u4djxe6pajpltritj6w0gen


https://app.box.com/s/bp2drgzpfwonz834jif4e6zinpizi5k5


Best Regards.

Abby.

[Gandalf43]

Hi Abby ,

Thank you very much for that interesting demonstration and I would like to hear your opinion
which recording is the better one ....cause I cannot say 

Ideal would be the same song / sound recorded as a midi and the same midi
recorded 1. with the Tyros and 2. with the Genos

Please don't get me wrong I really do not want to tell you what to do !!! Its just an idea Abby

Cheers
Udo

[Pianoman]

Hello Udo.

I like the idea, but to be honest, I wouldn't know how to record a midi.

Having never used Midi, I am not familiar with it's workings.

I will probably just record another WAV version, convert it to Mp3, and
post it.

Still, I'm probably not too old to learn.

Best Regards.
Abby.

[Gandalf43]

Hi Abby,

the songs you have chosen are ideal for comparison.

My music dealer (and friend) tries to convince me for weeks and wants me to
Trade my Tyros 3 or the T5 in for a Genos.

I  really cannot see the sense of it but I will follow your threads 

Cheers
Udo

[soryt]

If u use the Genos only as a Midi player , than it isnt worth to upgrade .
and if you cant hear the difference between a T3 and a Genos general you need to go to a hearing specialist .

Soneg

[Lee Batchelor]

Great playing, Abby!

I think both songs are about the same quality. I would love to hear what you could do with a fully loaded DAW! Now down to business.

There is no comparison in the T3 to a Genos - especially from effects, percussion, and general sound processing points of view. Two things to remember when you audition the Genos:

1- What speakers are you using? A T3 will sound about the same as a Genos when played through cheap dime-store speakers.
2- Even a Genos is delivered with Yamaha's basic EQ and Compression settings, which can make it appear as though it sounds not much better than a T3. Play with those settings and really see what you can do with the sound. It will blow you away.

There you go...and I agree, get those ears checked out (LOL)...like I'm one to talk. I'm about due myself, after 30 years on stage with guitarists who don't have a clue what a volume control is used for.

[EileenL]

Recording Midi is easy. Just press the REC button of the left of the Tyros 3 and play. Press stop when finished and there you are. Press Button A and then name and save song to USB.

[travlin-easy]

Abby, the only true comparison would be for you to record those same, two, outstanding performances on the Genos. Then the side by side comparison would be easy to make.

Keep in your you are an incredibly talented player, and I seriously doubt that unless the difference between the T3 and Genos was not a major difference, no one would notice and you would just be wasting your money. But, if you get a big WOW FACTOR from your audiences and the folks that hire you, then it would be money well spent, especially if it increased your income by a significant degree. The main reason I kept my PSR-3000s for so many years is that when I did A/B comparisons between the 3000 and some of the newer models, no one noticed. My wife was the biggest critic when it came to new keyboards, and when she said Wow about the S-950, that when I upgraded. The audiences responded in kind.

Good luck, my friend,

Gary

[markstyles]

I have found each model T3 - 5, and Genos to be an incremental improvement in a number of areas..  The increases are not huge, but they do add up..
I like the Genos has more Mega-voices, I would love to see a mod, perhaps one of the sliders, that would make it easy to move between the velocity plateaus, so one could hand  play the mega voices. I think it would be an easy piece of code, and lend more usefulness to this great instrument.

I have a huge number of Kontakt libraries, but I find the Tyroses and now the  Genos have so much more 'liveliness' and vitality to them to almost any library. They really can bring a piece to life.

[DonM]

"Abby, the only true comparison would be for you to record those same, two, outstanding performances on the Genos. Then the side by side comparison would be easy to make. "
That is exactly what he said he would do.  Both the posted songs were done on the T3, or at least that's the way I understood it.

[Pianoman]

Hello Everyone.

BOTH of the above songs were recorded on my T3, none on a Genos.
I thought I had explained it well in my first post.

I went to my friend's house of with the intention of playing these same songs,
but this time on a Genos.

The EQ settings on my friend's Genos were crap, and so were the compressor
settings.

I spent a major part of the afternoon grappling with the EQ settings and trying to choose
appropriate voices for my comparison.

I think i managed to obtain decent settings for both EQ and Compression.

My friend has some state of the art sound system, but I took my trusty headphones
with me. Because that's how I recorded on my T3, and I like their sound.

My first recording attempt ended with distortion, as well as the second one.

I reduced the global volume but still got the same result.

I think it was probably from the Bass and Drums being too loud.

I just couldn't get a decent recording.

Between my tapping on the Genos, and my friend trying to impress me
with his Montage through his sound system, it was like a Zoo,
and my friend's wife finally had enough around 8 PM local time here.

Not wanting to push my luck or not be welcome anymore, I bade farewell and left,
without a quality recording.

We did save the work in the Genos registrations, so that I won't have to
start from scratch again next time.

I have four important gigs this coming week, and won't be able to repeat
the testing and recording until next Sunday.

Hopefully everything will come together as desired then.

I'll keep you updated.

Best Regards.
Abby.

[Gloria]

Hi Everyone, I had the privilege of hearing an excellent Genos demo by Manuel Dorantes, Rep for Yamaha.   I'm still "on hold" about getting a Genos because later I tried one at the music store (only with headphones) & it didn't sound good at all!  I went back to the store a few days later & no one even offered to hook up a speaker, so I left very disappointed.  Now I'm reading about EQ settings.  Should I use my PSR S910 settings on the Genos & try it again?  Any advice would be appreciated.

[Gunnar Jonny]

This make me wonder if I'm extremely lucky with the one I did find in the box, or if the ones Abby and Gloria tested has been 'fiddled' around with and way out off the factory settings and also if they are updated to v1.20.

Anyway, our ears don't always hear the same, just as our eyes see things different. I have two sets of headphones that give me slightly differend soundpictures, but not as different that I would call the sound coming from G crap. 

To me, as a well known former anti Yamaha 'cold CD'ish sound', G is the best sounding arranger from Yamaha 'till date, but that's very personal. My G is going to stay until something new knock it down. 
If happy with what allready have and it does what you want it to, just keep it as it is. A kind of 'if it aint broke, don't fix it'

[Gloria]

Quoting Gunnar Johnny - "this make me wonder if I'm extremely lucky with the one I did find in the box, or if the ones Abby and Gloria tested has been 'fiddled' around with and way out off the factory settings and also if they are updated to v1.20."

Gunnar Johnny - I never thought about that & it could really make a difference!  Appreciate you mentioning it!

[EileenL]

Hi Gloria,
  Just listening to Genos with its factory settings should sound good. I have left my compressor on 28,65,70 and my EQ is on Loudness at the moment. I am happy with the sound I get and I only use the Genos speakers. Make sure you use good quality head phones although I always prefer to here a keyboard live when trying it.

[Pianoman]

Hello Everyone.

The crappy settings that I referred to, were the changes and fiddling that my
friend made to his Genos.

There is also a Genos now in our local music store, set up as a demo,
for anyone to have a go and fiddle around with.

It's plugged in to a solitary Peavey speaker, thus only giving a mono sound.

That's why I always take my Sennheiser Headphones with me wherever I go.

Testing at the music store is tolerable for up to an hour at best,
though I did manage around 90 minutes a few days back.
Without a stool or chair in sight, one can only test while standing,

And with people hustling and bustling around and brushing past, it's not really
conducive to peaceful concentration.

That is why I chose to go to my friend's house.
He owns a Genos that he brought from Switzerland.

He has a proper kind of studio setup in a corner of his living room
where one can sit and peacefully explore the Genos.
Till his wife says time's up.

I will only buy a keyboard after being fully satisfied that it meets my
expectations, and that it will deliver what I have in mind.

I plan to borrow the Genos for a full weekend, to test it in my home.

I believe that would be possible, once the store owner returns from his
Easter vacation.

If I feel that it meets my requirements, I'll buy it.

The selling price is now 3400€ (2983£)which I think is fair, and should
have been so right from the beginning.

Updates will follow.

Best Regards.
Abby.

[keynote]

I like the idea, but to be honest, I wouldn't know how to record a midi.

Having never used Midi, I am not familiar with it's workings.



Best Regards.
Abby.

Very impressive songs using your Tyros 3. By the way Midi is basically data instructions that tells the keyboard what note(s) to play. When you play the Genos or in your case the Tyros 3 you are actually triggering midi in conjunction with the wav rom (audio) samples of the keyboard. As Eileen demonstrated it is easy to record midi on the Genos and the Tyros 3. Of course if you'd rather record as audio and save it as a .wav file that is your choice. As a demonstration here is a song using a midi file and an audio vocal track. The song is called Superstition by Stevie Wonder. Stevie Wonder is singing the vocal part but all the musical sounds are from the Genos.

Superstition Remix by Stevie Wonder & Yamaha Genos

PS:Some of the instruments I used are S.Art PopHornsBright for the Brass and the VintageMutedKit Revo Drum kit. This song is simply for demonstration purposes only. In order to demonstrate ways of using midi with the Genos. Since this is a rather large .wav file it might take a while to load on the Box website.

Mike

[Pino]

Gloria
The PSR S910 is still a cracking keyboard, it has a mellow sweet sound.
I have all the PSRs from the 3000 to S970, I'm always back on the 910 for some reason
I gig with it on a regular basis and people are amazed at what they hear,

The styles editing, style voices, balance and midi recording windows is exactly the same on all models right up to the Genos, I was reading the Genos Manual over the weekend, most editing functions are identical to the S910, nothing much has changed,
The sound has got to be better on the Genos, but how much better,?

I wanted to buy a Korg PA4X, I went to the music store on 3 different occasions, the last time I went there I had the money in my pocket, there was something about the styles that did not work with the music I play, so I left it, glad that I did, maybe I'll go for a Genos sometime in the future, but, at the moment I have everything that I need to make nice music 🎶

Good luck,

Pino

[Pino]

Pianoman has been in the business as long as I have.
He knows everything about midi, no problem there.

Did you look at Ketron SD-9.
Big in Spain

[DonM]

Abby, that's about the price of the Genos from the start in the U.S., if you know who to call! 

[guitpic1]

Pianoman Abby,

I hope you get a significant amount of time with Genos. 

The first few days I had Genos I thought I was going to send it back.  I didn't like the keybed or so I thought.  I wasn't sure I liked the OS and other things...etc.  In short, all I could see were the negatives...which actually turned out to be new operator error for the most part.

But after I had Genos for a week, and could really get to appreciate what it could do, that's when I knew it was a keeper.

A keyboard like Genos requires time to appreciate.

[tyrosman]

Hello Everyone.

BOTH of the above songs were recorded on my T3, none on a Genos.
I thought I had explained it well in my first post.

I went to my friend's house of with the intention of playing these same songs,
but this time on a Genos.

The EQ settings on my friend's Genos were crap, and so were the compressor
settings.

I spent a major part of the afternoon grappling with the EQ settings and trying to choose
appropriate voices for my comparison.

I think i managed to obtain decent settings for both EQ and Compression.

My friend has some state of the art sound system, but I took my trusty headphones
with me. Because that's how I recorded on my T3, and I like their sound.

My first recording attempt ended with distortion, as well as the second one.

I reduced the global volume but still got the same result.

I think it was probably from the Bass and Drums being too loud.

I just couldn't get a decent recording.

Between my tapping on the Genos, and my friend trying to impress me
with his Montage through his sound system, it was like a Zoo,
and my friend's wife finally had enough around 8 PM local time here.

Not wanting to push my luck or not be welcome anymore, I bade farewell and left,
without a quality recording.

We did save the work in the Genos registrations, so that I won't have to
start from scratch again next time.

I have four important gigs this coming week, and won't be able to repeat
the testing and recording until next Sunday.

Hopefully everything will come together as desired then.

I'll keep you updated.

Best Regards.
Abby.

hey Abby what was the settings

[Pianoman]

As a demonstration here is a song using a midi file and an audio vocal track. The song is called Superstition by Stevie Wonder. Stevie Wonder is singing the vocal part but all the musical sounds are from the Genos.

Superstition Remix by Stevie Wonder & Yamaha Genos

PS:Some of the instruments I used are S.Art PopHornsBright for the Brass and the VintageMutedKit Revo Drum kit. This song is simply for demonstration purposes only. In order to demonstrate ways of using midi with the Genos. Since this is a rather large .wav file it might take a while to load on the Box website.

Mike

Very impressive.
How did you manage to add the singing of Stevie Wonder to the Genos tracks?

Best Regards.
Abby.

[Stijn]

Hi Abby,

You can find vocal parts on YouTube, like this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7W0oVCyF5c

Here is a link to the mp3 file of this video clip:  https://www.dropbox.com/s/k0btbz8e9zhph83/Stevie%20Wonder%20-%20Superstition%20%28Only%20Vocals%29.mp3?dl=0

Stijn

[Pianoman]

   hey Abby what was the settings

Hello Tyrosman.
I assume that you are referring to the EQ and compressor settings.

I found the Genos EQ settings to be a bit more complicated than on my T3,
because of their wider Bandwidth.

As a starting point, I used these EQ and compressor settings posted by StephenM,
to whom I'm thankful. They are very good actually.

I made a few adjustments to them, not because they're not good, but in order to adjust
them to my headphones.

I started with the master volume at maximum, and slowly lowered it to about a 100 or so.
I always like a powerful Bass and Drums in the individual accompaniment tracks volume.

I think that's what caused the slight recording distortion.

I take into consideration that I've only had a total of about 6 hours with the Genos
up to now, spread over 3 different days.

The Genos owner himself was not much help, nor was the guy at the music store,
who is standing in until the store owner comes back from his Easter vacation.

I have a good relationship with the store owner, and I am convinced that he will
let me have it for a weekend when his store is closed.

Provided that I return it early on Monday morning.

He has lent me equipment to try out in the past, and I hope that he will do the
same this time.

Best Regards.
Abby.




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[Pianoman]

Hi Abby,

You can find vocal parts on YouTube, like this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7W0oVCyF5c

Here is a link to the mp3 file of this video clip:  https://www.dropbox.com/s/k0btbz8e9zhph83/Stevie%20Wonder%20-%20Superstition%20%28Only%20Vocals%29.mp3?dl=0

Stijn

Hello Stijn.

Just amazing what one can do with technology nowadays.

Thank you for the enlightenment.

Best Regards.
Abby.

[Stijn]

My Genos is set up with a couple of Wharfedale Titan 8 active speakers, in a small room.
My dealer adviced me to put the the Master EQ on Flat and the Compressor set to OFF. He said he got the tip from a Yamaha specialist.

I asked a friend, who worked at the Philips factory as an audio specialist, to come listen and give me his opinion.
He also thought it to be the best set-up for the small room that I am using.

Stijn

[stephenm52]

As a starting point, I used these EQ and compressor settings posted by StephenM,
to whom I'm thankful. They are very good actually.
I made a few adjustments to them, not because they're not good, but in order to adjust
them to my headphones.

Provided that I return it early on Monday morning.

He has lent me equipment to try out in the past, and I hope that he will do the
same this time.

Best Regards.
Abby.

Abby, I'm glad to hear those EQ settings were a starting point for you. Good luck with your upcoming test(s). Sounds great if you can get to take the Genos on a gig for testing in a live situation.

[keynote]

My dealer adviced me to put the the Master EQ on Flat and the Compressor set to OFF. He said he got the tip from a Yamaha specialist.

Stijn

On my Genos I also have the Compressor set to Off. I went ahead and screen captured my EQ settings as an illustration of what works for me for my particular setup.

Mike

[attachment deleted by admin]

[stephenm52]

Mike,  Thanks for posting I like experimenting with different eq settings.


Stijn,  I'll try your dealer suggested settings too.