Casio Adds to Digital Piano Line with PX-400R

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Casio expands its flagship PRIVIA line of digital pianos with the introduction of the new PX-400R, designed for home or professional applications.

The PX-400R's 256 digital tones range from pianos and strings to wind instrument and synth sounds. Casio's new HL (Highly-compressed Large-waveform) Sound Source audio processing chip employs a proprietary dual-element sound source that reproduces the sound response of acoustic instruments. The development process started by taking stereo samples of a world-class concert grand piano and storing the resulting sample waveforms in PRIVIA's memory. Separate waveforms are used for strong keyboard pressure and light keyboard pressure, providing a full range of dynamic expression, from lilting pianissimos to thundering fortissimos, providing the player with incredible realism in tone. Sound is further enhanced by a pair of semi-custom speakers to ensure optimum sound quality throughout the full 88 key range.

For a grand piano playing experience, the PX-400 features an 88-key hammer action keyboard. This new keyboard does not use springs, so that keys react naturally to even slight changes in key pressure. The hammer action of the keyboard has been "scaled," which means that lower range keys feel heavier, while keys in the higher range feel lighter, just like the keys of an acoustic grand piano.

The PX-400R includes a built-in library of 80 favorite tunes from piano classics to jazz to better help you learn to play, as well as 120 rhythms. The auto accompaniment feature allows players to select from three different accompaniment modes: CASIO CHORD, which enables play of fully formed chords with one finger, FINGERED CHORD, which enables full chord play in the accompaniment range of the keyboard, and FULL-RANGE CHORD, enables chord play anywhere on the keyboard.

The PX-400R also features a large backlit LCD, a Song Recording mode with a 5,200 note capacity, a USB port for saving and downloading songs, a Smart Media card slot for easy song storage, eight digital effects and a MIDI in/out port.

The PX-400R has an MSRP of $1,099.95 and will be available in September 2004.