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CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

All Casio keyboards and modules.

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purcell Germany
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CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by purcell »

Only one word...!
YEEEEESSSSSSSSS!!!



and



and

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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Fozzer »

From the Demo's, it looks/sounds like an excellent machine for making lots and lots of different noises... 8O ...

...if that's what takes your fancy!... :roll: ...!

It seems to do just what programmable DX7's, D50's, etc, have been doing since the 1980's...nuffin' much new?

Now my cheerful Roland GW-8L v2, will serve as a Synthesizer with first class, programmable multi-effects, a full Workstation, and an Arranger, ready-equipped with hundreds of first class instrumental voices, and lots of different Styles/Rhythms....all rolled into one!...at a bargain price!...£630 or less!... :D ...!

128 Voice Polyphony...256 MB Wave ROM!

Little, or no "programming" involved...just sit down, switch on, and play....proper MUSIC!!

Paul...I love just sitting down...and playing!... :lol: ...!
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by purcell »

Hello Fozzer!
That cheap new Casio seems to be very simple, effective, latency zero :-), fresh, multipurpose,
...and sounds like
a real Minimoog (almost)...!
Instant sit down...and play!
..."with a very special Casio sound" ...somehow futuristic! Somehow "Pacman"!
The XW P1+G1 will sell!

One man! All music! (Not sounding as good...as the upper links! - last posting) ..but for that money...



"Smorenburgs Rihanna" with XW P1+G1!



I think the XW´s will be "must-have" instruments!


Purcell!
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Rara »

Looks like a fun keyboard to have, i'll keep an eye for that :-)
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Saul »

Looked really good but reviews have not been great and sales pretty poor. I think its that "Casio" name that seems to be their Achilles heel time after time. If they want to get into the pro market they really need to ditch the name. It's been too long associated with watches and cheap feel keyboards.
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by tux »

This is an even better demo of the XW-P1 (in German but worth listening to even if you don't understand German for the sounds):


I must admit, given the low price this synth is very tempting.
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Rara »

I like ...
I wonder, ... :- ) already having two CZ's ..... having them slightly
detuned of each other then going through the inputs of this XW then both midi controlled
by the XW. sounds like fun. cant get over how cheap they are. :D
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Jokeyman123 »

As a member here originally for my SY77 and several other keyboards, I noticed this older thread for the XW Casios, just posting a warning to new owners of the XW-P1 which I purchased. Be very careful about updating the firmware on this-Casio I think has taken down the firmware update page because of a problem I posted on the Casio user forum website-while doing the upgrade, my anti-virus program which was set to scan files, scanned the Casio firmware as I was sending over via USB connection, interrupted the process and completely disabled the keyboard. I had done a prior firmware upgrade with no problems. The big problem is that the XW cannot be user restored if this happens, it must be restored at the factory service center. I and several others have posts about this at the Casio user forum. I am following up with Casio to see if this problem can be fixed another way. If under warranty, i think it will be repaired no fee. Mine is not under warranty, not sure what the cost will be yet. Not bashing Casio, just warning anyone who might need to know. The keyboard itself had been alot of fun, sounded pretty good and had no other defects in playability.
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by parametric »

MANY THANKS for that important info jokeyman.

Hopefully, the disappeared page will alert those looking. Perhaps they will put up some sort of statement to reassure users?

Best Regards

parametric
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Curse! This means the end of the horned gramophone and the little doggie that looks in to it.

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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Saul »

I'm just wondering what they do at the factory to restore the XW that could not be done by the user? Surely this is one of the dumbest things Casio have ever done? A user restore function is a must have feature. Who the hell wants to faff around sending their keyboard back to the manufacturer to be restored to factory defaults? Although having said that, I am assuming this is not a "normal" restore?
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by parametric »

Sounds rather like it needs a chip transplant.

The virus-scan would have constituted an "interruption" in the firmware update - rendering the chip "incommunicado" to the outside world.

I have met this scenario before, upgrading Motherboard bioses, firmware upgrades to satellite receivers (especially the older types that require a com port connection).

Repeated warnings are given that the upload and "flashing" MUST NOT be interrupted - if you don't want a paper-weight . . . .

Flashing the wrong firmware can also trash the device.

Whilst we are all familiar with the "No user-serviceable parts inside" routine, that manufacturers cover themselves with, it is true to say that much MAY be done inside - DEPENDING ON INDIVIDUAL EXPERIENCE of such things.

Socketed chips CAN be user replaced, whilst a soldered chip may be too daunting for some - though not impossible.

Many manufacturers will go as far as to deny the supply of parts to users who are NOT service agents - THEY SAY, on safety grounds - though I suspect its to prevent loss of work to their service agents.

I recently suffered this indignity over a pcb-mount headphone socket for a DAT machine.

I'm guessing that Casio need to replace a chip in this case.

parametric
Alesis Fusion 8SSD AND 6SSD - BOTH are 384Mb/120Gb SSD/Akai ADVANCE61/Yamaha MOXF6/1024Mb Flash Ram/Yamaha SY85/8.5mb vol/1024k non-vol/DX21/Roland MT32/Bachmann double overstrung Baby Grand Piano/Win10 Pro/Ubuntu MATE 15.0.4/iBook G4/Mac OS 10.4.6/ProTools 7.4/MBox2/M-Audio MicroTrack 24/96

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Curse! This means the end of the horned gramophone and the little doggie that looks in to it.

Watch out now! take care, BEWARE of the greedy leaders! They'll take you where you should not go - (George Harrison)

IT'S TRUE - "MONEY TALKS" - TO ME, IT MOSTLY SAYS "GOODBYE" ;-)
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Jokeyman123 »

Wow, cool as kids say-another Zombie thread to revive! I love it!

Did not dawn on me years back-when I first re-visited the Casios in 2013-that I would meet such a pedigreed group in the Fusion Alesis music group years later! Saul, Chris-there's no place like home!

Seriously-feeling impelled to revisit this-after i dug it out here in 2021-Saul, unfortunately we still are seeing no replacements or upgrades for the 560/5s which-given this horrible pandemic, hopefully we are trying to put it behind us in the states-my brother has 2 gigs this weekend at the shore (Wonderbar is open now near the Stone Pony) with 2 different bands-small venues with questionable numbers in the audience-many owners still don't know how they are going to recoup the losses of over a year, and still are nervous about re-opening in NJ.

Am also watching for the next model 560 or 5s-and the XW-I kept it, it is definitely a "niche" type of instrument-hard to wrap one's head around-sort of a swiss army knife of keyboards-but it has held up well as has the 560.

I did not care for how the PX-S3000 despte its supposedly better action and tones-removed almost every other feature I play and use with the 560-hex layers, instant splits/layers-a 17-track sequencer which although missing some imprtant functions (I've posted on the Casio music group about this) still works well-a full mixer with effects-and sound editing capabilites. I still consider this the Casio flagship-surpasses the 5s in many respects-although the sound engine is the same I understand, Mike Martin ported many of the 5S sounds over to the 560.

Finally-the XW-P1 firmware update was fixed promptly and professionally by Mike Martin who I met personally in Dover, NJ, a true gentleman and his product demos are superb.

This was an update to the firmware-a .bin file which needed to be flashed correctly-and necessitated a replacement of the mainboard-as this CPU-whatever it is-sealed in epoxy (yes I've disassembled my XW more than once to check this) and apparently therein resides the sound engine, operating system and possibly the user memory-although I'm not positive about that. I think given the nature of its unique OS and functions-Casio saw the need to keep this-as in our Fusions unfortunately-inaccessible to any software/hardware engineers (in a foreign land you know who you are) who might steal the code and create their own cheaper XW clone-hey I just bought a 20.00 Chinese Victorinox "Champ" multi-purpose knife-which is a dead copy of the Victorinox for 1/4 the price of the original-which I have to compare-with a few minor cheapnesses to it-if you blink you would be fooled except they didn't steal the Victorinox logo! So it is happening. and i have found nothing so much better than the 560 that I would feel impelled to spend 2-3 times as much for say a Kurzweil PC-4 (using a cheap Medeli keybed I think-still trying to uncover that one) a Roland DS or FA-which comes in around the same price as the Casio 560-or a Kronos or Montage whcih weighs over twice as much as the PX560 and costs twice as much no sorry 3X, I have the 8HD if I want to build up my back muscles on gigs.
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Saul »

Thanks for reviving this thread :) It enabled me to update the video links (Y)

Also thanks for the info on the XW-P1 and the firmware issue. I can see why it would have needed to be returned to Casio. I hope they have moved on from that type of manufacturing system. I have never looked inside a modern Casio keyboard but I am pretty confident that things have improved :think:

As for the PX-S560 and 5S updates. I really don't know what, if anything is happening there. The last time I spoke to Casio they mentioned something was in the pipeline but there was no indication of when it would appear. I assume the whole Covid thing threw a very large spanner in the works!

Also great to hear that gigging is back on the agenda over there. It's the same here from Monday 19th. It's all a bit of a gamble of course because infection rates are climbing rapidly but also we have around two-thirds of the country vaccinated. At some point, you just have to chance it. Covid is never going away and we all need to get on with "living" not just "surviving".

I will see if I can hook up with the guys at Casio again and find out if there is anything new coming in the synth department (Y)
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Re: CASIO XW-P1 (real!) SYNTHESIZER

Unread post by Jokeyman123 »

Thanks Saul. Just helped someone at the Casio music forum solve a glitch with his XW-G1 which caused dropped beats in his sequencer recordings. He flashed the newer firmware for that one and it fixed the problem-but I think he just flushed the memory and that's what really solved the problem-not the newer firmware. Weren't too many bugs with the XW series-a few minor operations were added with the midi settings.
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