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Well - I unpaked my ES1 this morning, and since then I havn't stopped playing it! Finding a good digital under AU$2k (about $1200 US) has been a challenge. Especially when it needed built in speekers, good sounds and full weighted action. Not to mention a multi-part recorder with multiple songs. And a transpose button. There are 100's of digital pianos with all this... but very few in keyboard style. Note FULL WEIGHTED keys... not EP-88 half assed action. (Rolands offering)
The Kawai sound is really sweet - especially the grand piano sound. Sure - the speakers are pretty puney... but they still kick out enough volume to compete with most vocalists, and the fact the ES1 projects the sound forward AND upwards means it will happily fill a smalish venue with a decent sound. And it doesn't distort at max either! (I think it has a built in limitor)
Combined with a pair of Samson RH600 reference headphones - things really come to life.
The 3 types of on board reverb are fantastic, and it just make you want to play Caberaie (spelling?!) classics all day. The Grand Piano has this awesome bright sound when you hit it hard, and the hammer action sounds fade in and out depending on how you hit the note. And down low... well it's smooth as - and the notes re-resonate on retrigger.
The fact it was Nominated at NAMM last year as one of the best keyboards shows.
I havn't read other reviews yet - this is mine (before I'm biased!).
Bad points? It weighs a bloody ton. But hey - so does all the compertition. Also; as a Midi device it sometimes thows a few surprises... but nothing my friends Korg N1 doesn't. And while we are talking Korg; I've heard from the inside that there new Piano sound is beyond belief ;-) (On the new Triton)
Buy the Kawai. You know you want it!
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