Finally decided for a PSR E433 (again)

[vbdx66]

Hello everyone,

As some of you know, I have been hesitating for quite a long time before buying a portable keyboard to complement my DGX 650 digital piano.

After having contemplated the PSR E453, the PSR EW400, the PSR S 670 and the Korg PA300 I finally decided for the PSR E433 (again).

The touch feel of the E453 didn't let my expectations, I decided I didn't need the 76 keys of the EW400 since I already have the 88 keys of the DGX, I missed the opportunity to buy a PSR S670 and a Korg PA300 at a bargain price and decided that it was time to move on.

I chanced to find a second-hand PSR E433 whose previous owner was a little girl who rapidly moved on a Korg digital piano, then lastly a Clavinova, so the PSR E433 has remained fairly unused.

And since I got it for a very fair price, I can still buy a more recent keyboard but know I can take my time to decide which one since I'll have the PSR E433 as a backup portable keyboard in the meantime.

The keyboard will be shipped tomorrow morning (Saturday) and will probably arrive here on Wednesday or Thursday (Monday being a holiday here in France).

I am so happy to be back again on the PSR E board which has been very creative and inventive since it was added to the PSR Tutorial Forum. 

Best Regards to all and thanks the forum members who have given their advice to me for the buy of my new keyboard,

Vinciane.

[SeaGtGruff]

Congratulations on your "new" keyboard, Vinciane! One good thing about going with the PSR-E433 is that you're already familiar with all of its features. I hope the keybed and key action on this used one conforms to your memory of how your old one felt.

[AnupamEnosh]

Congrats for your new purchase

[pquenin]

Congratulations, finally you made it...

[vbdx66]

Hi guys and thanks for your support 

As soon as the keyboard has arrived I'll tell you how I feel about it and if it is up to my expectations and my memories.

@pequenin: how are you feeling about the PSR S670 after having played it for a few weeks?

Regards,

Vinciane.

[pquenin]

@Vinciane : I feel good with the PSR-S670 ! I have a modulation wheel now and great distorded guitar sounds, so I am happy. You can load tons of external styles, songs or sounds directly from the USB stick, without to load them to the internal memory first. Most of the styles available on PSR tutorial are working well with the PSR-S670 and you have access to the 3 intros, 4 variations, break and 3 endings. The 4 pads are great too to add some variations. You can easily edit the styles and sounds. You can display song's lyrics and notation... Well it's great !
The drawback is that the possibilities are endless and I need some king of limitations to be productive.
The PSR-E453 was great too, sometime I play with it again at the local store, it sounds "different" and you end up with others ideas...

[vbdx66]

Hello everybody,

The package with the keyboard haan arrived this morning, apparently in good shape 

I am occupied so I'll unpack it this afternoon or tonight.

@pequenin I am happy for you  that you seem  to enjoy your PSR S670 so much. Maybe some day you'll make a small demo for us  If you decide later to upgrade still higher to the PSR S775/995 or Genos I'll buy you the S670 back 

I'll post my impressions about the E433 as soon as I will have some time to try it out thoroughly. It will be strange to play on this keyboard again. I wonder if after three years without it I will still feel the same about it after having played the DGX 640 and 650.

Best Regards,

Vinciane.

[pjd]

Good luck, Vinciane! I know you've been missing the E433 for quite some time. 

-- pj

[vbdx66]

Hello everybody,

Hereby a photograph of the PSR E433, eventually unpacked and on its stand.

My first impression is that the touch is better than on the E453. I'll have to go back to the Cultura music shop to test this thoroughly after having played the E433 for one week or two.

As far as the sound is concerned, to my ears the sound of this keyboard is as powerful as on the E453. I am wondering if the supposedly increased sound power of the E453 is not purely a marketing thing... if someone can either confirm or infirm this?

And God, I had long forgotten how fun the Live Knobs are. 

Also I am happy to find back some styles which are not on the DGX 650 such as Chillout or which are there on the DGX but are arranged completely differently on the E433 such as Acoustic Jazz. The Arpeggios are a nice feature, too. It could be nice to apply these arpeggios to the left hand voice while using the resonant filter.

On the darker side of things, external styles take aaaaggees to load from an USB stick (and you can only load 5 at a time of course). Interestingly, I have the feeling that external styles sound better than on the DGX... Maybe something to do with voice mapping.

@pjd As soon as I can I will try out some of the styles you tweaked for the PSR E433 like your  Motif performance styles. It'll be great fun I am sure 

Best Regards,

Vinciane.

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[SeaGtGruff]

As far as the sound is concerned, to my ears the sound of this keyboard is as powerful as on the E453. I am wondering if the supposedly increased sound power of the E453 is not purely a marketing thing...

The PSR-E453/PSR-EW400 Owner's Manual isn't clear on this, because in the Specifications it says that the PSR-E453's amplifier is 6W + 6W "(When using PA-150 AC adaptor)," but it doesn't say what the amplification is when not using the AC adaptor.

But presumably the store where you tried the PSR-E453 had an adaptor plugged in, so the amplification on it should have been 6W + 6W, as compared to the 2.5W + 2.5W amplification on the PSR-E433.

The environment can also make a difference-- not just the size and acoustical properties of the room, but also the number and volume of other sounds in the background.

[AnupamEnosh]

Definitely the E453's speakers sound louder than any other similar E series keyboard in the market (I've tested & compared it with I455 and E333, both); not only does it have 6W+6W speakers, but a powerful bass reflex system that sounds harsh and uncomfortable for ears in small rooms. But the same thing produces a majestic sound in halls. Even though the patches are the same, there is a noticeable difference when both are played together.

[SciNote]

On Yamaha's website, the specs for both the PSR-E453 and the PSR-E463 state that the power consumption for the keyboard is 8 watts when using the PA-150 adaptor.  Yet, the specs also rate the amplifiers' output as 6 watts + 6 watts (6 watts for the left channel, and 6 watts for the right), for a total of 12 watts.  So..... Do these keyboards have solar panels to supply the extra 4 watts of power to the amplifiers?  And that's not even counting the power required for the sound generating circuitry, not to mention the fact that if an amplifier is outputting 6 watts, then it is requiring more power than that to run it because the amp won't be 100% efficient.

What is likely going on is that the 6 watts per channel rating is a peak value, not a continuous RMS value.  The true continuous power is probably about half of that, but that is just speculation.   Additionally, when you double the power of an amplifier, all other things being equal, the resultant increase in volume is only about 3 dB, so it won't sound dramatically louder.  But you should get less distortion at higher volumes.

Now, when I look at the specs of my PSR-E433, it states that the power consumption is 16 watts when using the same PA-150 adaptor, with amplifier ratings of 2.5 watts per channel (5 watts total).  So, it's a bit of a mystery.  Is the E433 rating for the amps a true RMS continuous rating?  Why does the E433 require twice as much power to run it?  Less efficient circuitry all around?

Something similar happens with car stereo, when the head unit (radio) is advertised as "50 watts per channel", but then if you want to run a subwoofer and you buy a 50 watt per channel amp for it, the amp is a much larger and heavier piece of equipment than the radio.  It is because the radio is rated in peak power (the actual RMS power usually being 10-15 watts per channel), while the amp is rated in true RMS power.

[vbdx66]

Hi Michael, hi Bob,

Thanks for your point of view on that matter.

This is rather technical stuff and I feel even more confused than before. If you look at the speakers of the PSR E453, they sort of went back to the design of the much older PSR E423, with the PSR E433 and E443 having a different design. I am wondering how the sound of the E453 can be more powerful if the speakers are not bigger.

If we try to do some simple maths: 8x2 makes 16, so what if Yamaha counted 8 watts per speaker for the E453 and 16 watts for both speakers on the E433? Also, if on the E453 the 6 watt output per channel is the peak output, if the RMS output is half of that, it gives us 3 watts, which is not far of the 2,5 watts per channel of the E433.

If I were more proficient with electronics, I would try to test the electrical power with the appropriate testing gear.

This is just my subjective point of view : I went twice to a music shop to try the PSR E453, then a few days after that I received my second-hand PSR E433. Because of the specs (on paper) of the E453 I thought the sound volume of the PSR E433 would be much lower, I was really surprised because I had the feeling the sound volume is as powerful on the PSR E433 than it was on the PSR E453 I tried in the shop. The second time was on a Sunday so the shop was rather quiet at the time.

Bob, Just out of curiousity, the next time you go to your local music dealer, I'd be curious to know what your perception is on that matter, if by any chance you have the opportunity to play the E453 and compare it to your E433.

Best regards to all,

Vinciane.

[SciNote]

The 8 watts for the E453 and E463 is what the specs say is total power consumption for the operation of those keyboards -- just like if you plugged in a lamp with an 8 watt lightbulb, it would be using 8 watts of power to run the bulb.  It's not the power per speaker, so you don't double that number.  The specs say that the power output to each speaker with those keyboards is 6 watts, so that is what you double, to get 12 watts.  That is where the question mark comes in -- How can a keyboard that is using only 8 watts of power send out 12 watts total to its speakers?

That's why I'm speculating that the 6-watt-per-channel rating for the amps and speakers is a peak rating, not RMS.  And it is also why I'm wondering why the E433 requires twice the power -- 16 watts total, versus 8 watts -- to run, and also whether the 2.5 watts per channel rating for the E433 is RMS, not peak.

Even if the E433's amplifiers are also rated in peak power -- as in 2.5 watts per channel peak, instead of RMS, it still wouldn't make the E453 and E463 sound significantly louder, because doubling the power only results in a slight increase in volume.  Granted, 6 is a little more than double 2.5, but it still wouldn't be a dramatic difference.  But there should be less distortion at the higher volumes with the 6 watt per channel keyboards.  If my memory of audio training serves me correctly, with all other things being equal, to double the volume, you have to increase the power of the amplifier by ten times!

[AnupamEnosh]

While we are focusing on this topic, I went to refer the manual of both E433 & E453. Now I got some questions in my mind,
1. if the PA150 adaptor is the same rated adaptor, how can it supply different power to different KBs, and if it does, then the power rating is flexible ? And,
2. There are actually four speakers in E433, while the E453 has only two speakers with Bass reflex feature. If in E433, the 2.5W+2.5W output is for four speakers, that consumes 16W, then in E453, the 6W+6W output is reflected through only two speakers, in other words more or less the same output, as Vinciane said ? So is that the reason, why E433 consumes more power over E453 ?

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[vbdx66]

Hi AnupamEnosh,

Thanks for your input.

I assume there is a typo in your last sentence, which should probably read 'So is that the reason, why E453 consumes more power over E433?'.

Best Regards,

Vinciane.

[mikf]

Adaptors convert the power supply to the correct voltage for the device, not the power used. The device draws the current it needs, when the supply voltage is correct, (power is volts times current). If the appliance draws too much current, the adaptor or wiring may burn out if it is not rated high enough. But when the current is small and similar in both, there is no reason the same adaptor would not work.
Mike

[AnupamEnosh]

@Vinciane
Well there is no typo ma'am.
@Mike
Thanks for the explanation.

[pjd]

Hi --

Unfortunately, I don't have service manuals for the most recent E4xx models. The latest service manual that I have is the E443.

The E423 to E443 use a BA5417 stereo power amplifier. The data sheet is available on-line. Unfortunately, the datasheet does not state "peak" or "RMS". I agree with Bob, however, and it's most likely "peak."

Output from the BA5417 is voltage dependent. Yamaha's design is flexible in this regard. The supply voltage to the BA5417 doesn't come from the voltage regulator which feeds the digital electronics. Instead, the supply voltage is essentially switched between battery or the power adapter.

When running from battery, the BA5417 sees +9V (6 times 1.5V). When running from the power adapter, the BA5417 sees +12V (PA-150). Thus, the audio output is higher when using the PA-150.

This also suggests that a good quality power adapter is important to getting a clean sound.

Hope this helps -- pj

P.S. Wish I had the service manuals for the E453 and later.

[vbdx66]

@Anupam:

Sir, you said 'So is that the reason, why E433 consumes more power over E433?' so for me it is a typo because you put twice the reference number of the same keyboard (PSR E433).

@pjd:

The fact that the output of the amplifier is dependent from the voltage of the battery or of the adapter being used is really interesting. Would there be a maximal voltage suggested to avoid burning something, though?

I'd be very interested to get the Service manual for the E433 if you have it (I already have the E443 Service manual). It is really enlightening to know what these keyboards have into their guts.

Best Regards,

Vinciane.

[pjd]

Hello Vinciane --

Yamaha specs the PA-150 at 12V, 1.5A and the DC IN at 12V. I don't think I would exceed 12V because the higher voltage would begin to stress other components including the voltage regulator(s) for the digital electronics. Higher stress leads to shorter component life even if it doesn't cause an immediate failure.

I'd love to have the service manual for the E433 myself. In my previous message, I assumed that the E433 has substantially the same audio output circuitry since the E423 and E443 are essentially the same. Yamaha doesn't mess with designs that work especially in entry-level products that are price/cost sensitive.

The main change in the "guts" from the E423 to E443 are 1. the addition of the PCM1803A analog-to-digital converter (ADC) for the AUX IN and 2. change from an AKM4385ET DAC to a Wolfson WM8524CGEDT. The CPU/tone generator is the SWL01U in both models and the Prog/Wave ROM is 128Mbits in both. Sure wish I knew when they switched to the Wolfson DAC...

All the best -- pj