Casio CTK-451

Very easy and simple, even this was first time when i tried to play a keyboard, even though i have seen some fancy keyboards, but for start learning i think it a very good

Not alot of features, like recording, save to floppy etc but just for playing this for learning purpose, its cool

some insturments have problem, like violin.
I think its works well for all rock,classical and dance
onboard effects are ok

yes, i can depend on it

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I think i'll buy a better one
i m playing for about 6 months

My brother and I learned to use most of the keyboard's functions within minutes. The control panel is nicely designed, although there is some wasted space. The display is loaded with information, yet it is easy to read. Overall, the simple, yet functional design makes the keyboard very easy to use.

As for features, this keyboard has "a little bit of everything", which makes it good for beginnning or intermediate players. The built in songs are good for learning to play, but due to the fact that you have to look at the rather small display to figure out what keys to play, it can get a bit tricky at times. (If you want to learn to play, I'd reccomend a model with keys that light up.) The 12-note polyphony is definately adqequate for me, but it might not be adequate for a more serious player. The 100 tones are decent, although some sound somewhat artificial. The rhythms are also OK but they are of little use to me. Overall, I would not reccomend this keyboard to a professional player because it lacks features such as touch sensitivity and pitch bend, but it's fine for a beginner or intermediate player.

The sound quality from the built in speakers is not great, but it is acceptable. When I hooked it up to my home stereo system, the sound was much better. As far as the individual instrument sounds, most are good but some are somewhat unrealistic. The fact that it lacks touch sensitivity also compromises the expressiveness and the sound quality. Although the sound is acceptable, it is essentially "flat", so to speak, in that it does not "interact" with its player like a good piano does. Overall, the sound is pretty good, but it could use some improvement.

I've had this keyboard for approximately a year and no problems. It still works as well as it did the day I bought it. However, I would not use it for a gig or any type of "heavy-duty" playing because it is made somewhat cheaply.

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Since I got this keyboard for free, It's well worth the price. I like it very much, but if it got lost or stolen I'd probably invest in a slightly better model.

This keyboard is really easy to use. Just few buttons and numeric pad.

12tone polyhpony which is decreased when you using drums or chords. There is no effects and it has MIDI IN/OUT. I mainly use it as MIDI keyboard with computer and Native Instruments SW (Hammond emulation)

Sounds are not very realistic, but some sound are interesting.

I think that it's great affordable keyboard for beginners and I used it about 2 years and my playing improved lot on this keyboard. I never used it on gigs.

My keyboard falls 3x on floor and It still working but display is crashed.

Great for beginners users.

I bought this as a cheap first keyboard to get accustomed to playing and to maybe add some textures to my recordings. It's completely easy to use, mostly because there's really no features to speak of. It has a couple of easy chord modes for beginners who want to simplify left-hand playing, but I personally never use them.

This keyboard has a basic set of sounds derived from the standard MIDI set. There are no effects; in fact, you can't modify sounds at all. The keys are digital (no touch sensitivity), and there's no pitch bend wheel, so adding organic subtleties are an impossibility. I've never bothered with the MIDI functions. There are some cheesy rhythm backing tracks that are decent to play along with but useless, of course, for any real application. The marketers have put a huge emphasis on the fact that there are 100 built-in songs, but if you're like most people I've known, you really don't want to bother learning the usual crap that beginning music programs teach, so the feature is wasted.

Most of the sounds haven't been noticably improved over the Casio keyboard my dad bought me back in 1991. There's the usual array of fake-sounding acoustic instruments; the pianos are decent and could sound good in a mix. I've gotten some use out of the choir and strings sounds. As stated above, there's no way to play subtly due to the lack of sensitive keys. This would be extremely useless as a live instrument, and I rarely use it for recording. Recommended only for beginners.

It's made of plastic. At the price, however, reliability is really pretty irrelevant. You can pick up another one for less than the price of a decent stomp box.

If you just want something cheap to learn keys on, you won't find anything less expensive, but this is far from useful for any other application. A great instrument actually inspires songwriting; this thing bores me out of my mind. I'll sell it as soon as I can afford a real keyboard (I'm eyeing the Roland XP-30 right now).

Easy as pie. Haven't dug into it too much though.

This is mostly in response to the other post. YES it does send MIDI data. I've got it hooked up to my computer and it is working just fine. It doesn't send patch or sound codes, but the notes go through great. No pressure sensitive keys. What do you expect for $79.99?

Sounds are ok. It's a basic keyboard. A lot better than the 32 sound Yamaha from the 80's that I was using.

You don't use this keyboard at a gig, and I wouldn't take it anywhere out of my house. It's being used as a MIDI controller to my computer.

Overall, it's not great. It's not professional. It is, however, doing what I want it to do as a controller to my computer. I'm using it to recdord tracks into Pro Tools Free v5.01

This thing is silly-simple to use--in fact, they sell it in places like Circuit City, Bestbuy and Toys R Us (uh huh) set up so you can play around with it. Betcha they sell a lot of these this way. It is a VERY CHEAP ENTRY-LEVEL beginner keyboard with speakers. Three buttons--Rhythm, Tone and Tempo--select the presets which include a list of canned backing tracks in various styles "8-beat Rock" etc. You hit "Tone" for example & enter the patch # on a keypad. You can get "rocking" and having fun right away--hence the in-store demo units set up to snare the non-musician. NOT a "serious" keyboard, but got me hooked on them.

I believe it's 12-note polyphonic, which tends to cut-out on low-end when you're using the "casio chord" one touch chord feature. It has built-in canned backing tracks, about 100 of them. Fun feature is a syncro start in chord mode that fills-in tonal part of backing track when you hit a designated "chord" key.

But let's talk about what this board DOES NOT HAVE:
NOT multitimbral (you cannot layer patches except for a couple of cheezy factory "layered" presets e.g. "bass/strings").
NOT fully midi compatible--"recieve" mode only, but midi jacks on back might sucker you into thinking you can midi this up to a computer & use it as a controller. You CAN'T.
NOT "tweakable"--there's no way to alter the factory presets within the kb itself (although I have heard of people running the output thru distortion pedals, etc with interesting results). No LFO, etc you'd find on a serious keyboard.
NO Pitch bend lever. NO arpeggiator. NO velocity/aftertouch.
DOES NOT SEND MIDI DATA !!!!

On the whole, the sounds on this thing STINK. A lot of the patches sound more or less alike--"flute" and "synth lead" both a high-pitched squeal. Three decent patches worth mentioning: #72 "soundtrack" is nice, biggish synth-string pad with LOTS of sustain, unlike the pings and beeps on this thing, #72 will keep up a nice "mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm" sound until you let go of the key. With the 12-note poly you can do nice swirly pads with this. "Vehicle" patch is a split-up collection of cheesy car sounds--fun. "Phone" is same kind of thing. Overall this might work as some sort of lo-fi specialty item for Techno & Dance--a TEN if you want CHEEZY CHEAP SYNTH SOUNDS. If you are resourceful, you might get something good out of this. Otherwise the sounds are crap, and it's "note on/note off" only--no velocity or aftertouch.

Working OK so far, but haven't gigged it & wouldn't--I'm buying a Roland for that ! Overall feel is flimsy cheap PLASTIC as you'd expect, use a butterfly touch playing it, if you bang on it you will break something. Vast empty space atop the board--where the godawful "song bank" list is printed !--is a good place to tape a set list or newbie-musician cheat-sheets, or to velcro a cup-holder on.

I haven't dealt with Casio. 6 months gentle treatment, still working.

If it were lost or stolen I would file an insurance claim and get my hundred bucks back, to put toward a Roland. It's probably worth what I paid because it's minty-mint cond w/box & AC brick. Hope to sell it soon for $75 or so on ebay. Playing this for 6 mos. and have completely maxed-out its capabilities, it's time to move on. An okay machine for what it is--and got me far enough into keys to make me want what it's not. It does make music, I just want to take my thing a whole lot farther than this very limited beginner board will let me go. I could tell you what I wish it had, but I'd just be describing a Roland XP-10 or Juno 106--what I plan to replace this with.

I am posting this review as a public service to others who want to give keyboards/synths a try--save your pennies and for relatively little more, you can buy something MUCH better used, and you won't soon outgrow & have to upgrade, like me.