Casio WK-3000

I found it somewhat easy to use. It has so many features that it going to take a while to learn everything. But out the box, you can start playing the piano and organ with just pushing one button. The manual is OK and you will read it a lot if you want to use all the features.

The keyboards seems light weight compared to my Nord Electro but still it works fine. There are a LOT of features for the price. The effects work very well and everything can be tweaked.

I am an organ player. The organ is very very good. I own a Hammond and a Nord and this "cheapie" compares to the high end stuff. In fact I will probably be selling off my expensive keys because as I play the Caiso more, I realize how good it sounds. I have used it to record and everyone thinks it is a B3 with a good Leslie. If Casio made just a sound module of this machine they would sell the heck out of it. I bet some where some one did just that - take off the cheap keyboard and put in a Nord (Fatar) keyboard.
Also the pianos (rhodes, wirly, acoustic) are fine, the sax, the drums are all use able. I also like the rhythms and use it to write songs.

Never breaks

Never had to use them.

I have been playing for 40 years. I have owned a lot of gear - Hammonds, Nords, Yamahas, etc. I would replace it - if it were stolen.
I am curious to see what Casio will replace this model with. I can not imagine how they can improve the organ. Maybe a Bose or Mackie speaker system would be fun to have have on board. Also a foot switch for the Lesie would be nice.

I just bought the WK 3200. Haven't even looked at the manual yet. It's pretty well laid out and easy to get around the tones/sounds.

Keys are cheapo to the max. Spacing of keys are not uniform, some pretty big gaps, but this is expected on such a cheap board. Haven't used the sequencer yet.

This is were I somewhat differ with most and agree with a few. There are tons of sounds, most I'll rarely if ever use. I'm not in to syth sounds and will likely not be creating my own pathes, but the stock syth sounds sound like most more expensive syths I've played.

Ok, lets get into where I differ ...

Pianos: Range from "fair" to "a little better than fair" to "good considering the price". The Stereo Grand is IMO not that good sounding. Even with the DSP off you get a metalic ringing in the upper range that just sounds unatural. There are other paino patches I think are more realistic such as the Mellow grand, the non-stereo grand and a couple others. None of these patshes blow me away like they do others. To be fair, I've had more expensive boards that didn't impress me either.

Electric Painos: Some pretty decent E-Pianos that rival more expensive boards.

Strings: For the most part a little below average even for this price range. I used to have a very old very cheap Yamaha PSR (like $150 bucks, forget the model) thing and if memory serves me right the strings sounded at least as good if not better and even those didn't sound that good. I'm pretty disappointed in the strings.

Drums: "OK" sounding, but typical. Not much if any better than the old cheapo PSR.

Organs: Good to very Good. Just about all of them are useable and some really do sound quite impressive.

Bass: So-so overall. Again, "typical" comes to mind. Some of the fretless and acoustic patches seem to be the better ones.

Guitars: I hate all guitar keyboard sounds. There is one Electric/waw sound patch that is pretty cool, but I'd never use any guitar patch on a keyboard for anything other then screwing around for two minutes.

Brass& Reed: I find these range from substandard to decent.

Syth: Good for what they are.

Would I buy it again? Well, only had it a few days so I need time to use it more. I will say for $230 shipped you are not going to find anything in that price range that is better. It is probably on par with the Roland EX-3 I owned. That board is only 61 keys and the sounds are overall not really any better and you get a whole lot less of them. The strings and the brass on the EXR were better, the paino and most of the other sounds were no worse but not better, IMO. The EXR cost $500 and you get a lot more for the money with the Casio WK. I also owned a higher end Roland syth for a while. I forget the model but it did not impress me. I was not blown away with the Casio, but for the price you get 76 keys, a zillion sounds (some very useable and even good), a sequencer and programable syth. It's worth the price, make no mistake. I'm a songwriter and mostly write on guitar. I'm looking forward to using the Casio in the mix as I do my own demos at home, I suspect it will do fairly well to round out and fill up my recordings. Once again, for the price you can't lose. I think whenever you put 700 + patches into a board you are bound to have some stinkers, but take your time and weed through the forrest of sounds and you'll find that the good sounds and options on this board probably couldn't be had in this price range anywhere else.

Very easy to use. No need really to look at the manual.

I bought this keyboard for the organs alone and Casio really did a great job with this. The leslie simulator makes it worth so much more than 300 bucks. Add a little distortion to the electric pianos and youve got an excellent rhodes tone. Acoustic pianos are fine, but nothing special in my opinion. Synth tones kinda suck, but I would never use them anyway. I like how they put all those different DSP effects which you can manipulate to create your own effects.

I'm a funk, blues, rock musician and this keyboard fits in well with my taste and style. The only thing I don't like are the keys, because plastic synth keys like these are not ideal for playing organ, but then again, waterfall keys wouldnt work well with every other sound!

I use it on gigs without fear of anything happening to it. It's light weight, but pretty sturdy.

Never needed it

If I lost it I would probably buy another, unless I had the money to buy a Nord Electro. The organs alone make it worth buying; so much better than the yamahas of the same price range. Excellent value.

Bought this board to play hammond organ sounds. In that catagory I give it a 10. Setup and usage is pretty standard for this type of keyboard. I have pretty much ignored the manual except for specific functions that I was personally interested in. Preset organs, and Tenor sax are excellent. Pianos and synth sounds are in my opinion kinda so so ... Actually the piano is GREAT on this board for what I paid for it (200 USD..used). As I said earlier I bought this for the drawbar organ which is VERY VERY GOOD and worth triple the price. I sat thsi on top of my hammond and A-B'd it with my eyes closed until I dialed in an almost EXACT replica of my organ using the drawbar organ feature. Very cool !

Polophony is 32 note. I have see a lot of ^%$#@ing about this but have not noticed any problem for my own use. I'm playing this thing as a substutite for hauling around my hammond and in that role it is working just fine. The DSP effect manipulation could be a little more intutive but once you get used to using it as descripbed in the manual it works pretty good. The board accepts a data card for storing additional patches and sequences. I haven't tried many of the midi functions yet so I can't comment on those yet

Hammond sounds are AWESOME. The rotary simulator works pretty darn good and has a nice ramp up / ramp down effect that very closely mimics a real leslie. For a REAL treat plug it into a REAL leslie (I have a 145) turn off the DSP and hold on to your hat, closest thing to a B3 I ever heard (for less than $400 bucks no less !!)and a lot easier to haul around. on board slow rotary effect sounds a little phase shiftery in mono ... much better in stereo. fast leslie sound is awesome, almost indistunguishable(sp)from the real thing(trust me I have one, I know). The velocity sensing keys to me seem a little stiff (you have to play hard like a real piano player). This may just be a personnal thing for me cause I'm an organ player and not used to velocity sensing keys anyway. I was messing with the velocity and after touch for the sax tones and they were very cool and quite realistic with the right technic.

Seems pretty well made. I built a foam lined road case for it and intend to gig with it. I have drug it from practice and it seems to hold up just fine. I would have no qualms about gigging with it. These guys on here who say they can't gig with a plastic keyboard, I don't know what they are doing with their boards (jumping on them ??? Dropping them down stairs???) I had a old Yamaha PSR-400 that I used to use for LH bass that I dragged allover the country in a cardboard box and it always worked like a charm (still does). I would expect that the casio would hold up just as well (time will tell)

Never used it ...probably never will !

Casio does havea pretty good web site where you can download manuals and software to edit the samples on the wk series keyboards. I do intend to try out there software as they have a very cool drawbar organ edit interface.

Would I buy it again ...In a heartbeat ! I have been playing keys( on and off) for over 20 years and used to own a music store in the 80's so I have played a lot of pro gear. This keyboard is far and away better than the Prophet 8's and Akai samplers that I sold for thousands of dollars each back then. My one complaint is the keyboard itself, I find the black keys to be a little 'skinny' for my fingers, something people with smaller hands might not notice. Makes great Hammond tones which is what I bought it for. Any other sounds and features on it are just gravy IMHO. Well worth the price even at full retail.

I'd better explain. I'm a bluesman. I don't play classical, Latin or easy listening for Karaoke parties. OK, so I play a bit of rock, jazz, soul and reggae too... I wanted a keyboard with good piano, electric piano and organ sounds. So this review is from a basic, no-frills viewpoint. If I had the money I would probably buy a Clavia Nord Electro 73, but this Casio gets pretty close for a fraction of the cost.

Before buying this keyboard I downloaded the PDF version of the manual and familiarised myself with it, as well as trying the instrument out in music shops. The manual is relatively clearly written, but inevitably leaves a few important questions unanswered - I have been able to get answers via the Internet, by joining a WK forum and asking other users!

The main presets rely heavily on reverb - not only do the "advanced" presets all use the onboard Digital Sound Processor - DSP - but the keyboard also has global reverb and chorus which can be turned down. There is also a set of basic presets (which have the DSP switched off by default but can use it at the press of a button), and these make a good starting point for your own "user" sounds.

The "virtual drawbars" are nice to have, but a little difficult to visually associate with their respective footages - the buttons don't line up with the bars on the LCD but are linked by "dog-leg" lines that are a bit confusing. Unlike a real Hammond (and most copies) there are only 3 drawbar levels per footage rather than 8, but that still gives you plenty of different sounds.

The onboard sound editor is basic (attack and release controls but no decay; vibrato of various forms and a simple but effective low-pass filter) but can drastically change your sound and is quite easy to use.

The WK-3000 is 32-note polyphonic, dropping to 16 for some sounds and 10 for certain Drawbar Organ sounds. I'm not too fussy, since I'm not going to be doing much layering, multi-tracking or playing great long hand-over-hand Romantic-style arpeggios.

The keyboard feels just fine - obviously not weighted, but solid enough to really be able to dig into the electric piano sounds while being fast enough for funky organ work. It is velocity-sensitive with 3 global settings, but each sound additionally has its own response (e.g. organs and harpsichords quite correctly do not respond to touch).

There is a pitch-bend wheel with a nice smooth action and assignable range up to +/- 1 octave. Above this is a button and an LED. The button has two modes depending on the sound you are using. It can either be a momentary vibrato switch (fine for string or wind instruments) or it can be a latching switch assigned to any DSP parameter. The latter mode is ESSENTIAL for the Drawbar Organ sounds, as it allows the Rotary effect to speed up or slow down at the tap of a button. It can also be used to turn effects such as tremolo on or off for electric piano sounds. Incidentally, the latching mode is not applied to incoming MIDI commands. You CANNOT use the mod wheel on an external keyboard to change the Rotary speed. Shame...

There is a socket for a footswitch which by default is a sustain pedal but which can be assigned to "soft pedal", sostenuto (the middle pedal that some expensive grand pianos have but that nobody uses because most people don't own those pianos...) or rhythm start/stop. There is also a headphone socket on the front below the bass end of the keyboard which doubles as a stereo line-out. It would have been nice to have a socket for a volume pedal, especially bearing in mind the drawbar organ feature. I just use a guitar volume pedal between the keyboard and my amplifier.

The keyboard can be connected to a PC via a pair of MIDI leads and a MIDI interface (not supplied) and Casio has provided a suite of sound-editing software allowing an owner to produce his or her own sounds from existing .WAV files. I haven't tried this yet, and neither have I tried the Flash Media slot which accepts a standard 3.3v card to allow sounds, rhythms, MIDI files etc to be written to the very small amount of user RAM (about 1.4MB) on board the keyboard.

The DSP has some useful features, particularly the Rotary and Overdrive/Rotary patches, essential for Hammond organ sounds. There are also phasers, flangers, various types of distortion, auto-wah and Lo-Fi, with which you can add tape hiss and colouration for a convincing Mellotron effect...

There are also global settings for Chorus, Reverb and EQ, which are separate from the DSP.

This keyboard has vast tracts of capabilities which I am never likely to use, including rhythms, song styles, auto-accompaniment, auto-harmony, a six-track real-and-step-time sequencer and a transposer. I gather from other sources that these are all top-notch, but if you want more information, better ask someone else!

Well, this is the crunch.

Acoustic pianos - 9/10
As good as, possibly better than my old Alesis NanoPiano module. And you can turn the reverb off!

Electric pianos - 9/10
While the Rhodes sound is pretty impressive, the Wurlitzer sound, "60sEPiano" is in my opinion a good enough reason by itself to buy this. It goes from sweet and tinkly a la Carpenters to funky and swampy just by digging in with your fingers. Add some tremolo from the DSP and you're Ian McLagan! The Electric Grand is a bit twangy in the bass, but it's not my bag anyway.

Drawbar Organs - 10/10
This is awesome! You have control over those sine waves, you can add key-click and (correctly single-triggered) percussion, and then you put the whole thing through one of the best Leslie simulators I've heard, with or without a bit of overdrive. You can also turn off the DSP and, using the Synth facilities, produce some quite convincing Vox and Farfisa combo organ sounds.

Others - 9/10
I particularly like the saxes, brass, strings, pipe organs and some of the vocal sounds. I have even edited the flute sound to make a realistic "Strawberry Fields" Mellotron sound! The guitar sounds are pretty good, but I haven't found a use for them...

It seems quite solidly made, although not heavy for its size. With the kind of jams and gigs I play at the moment, I can't see any potential problems apart from (as always) the external power supply. But you get what you pay for.

If it were lost or stolen I would buy another one immediately. In my opinion it is worth twice what I paid (which incidentally was the manufacturer's list price!).

I have been playing for 27 years, and have used Casio keyboards for 25 years - I bought my first one in 1981. At the moment I have a Studiologic SL-880 MIDI keyboard and a Yamaha EMT-10 module. All my other equipment was recently stolen, hence the need to buy this one!

I love the fact that it has all the sounds that I need, plus a long enough keyboard to make the most of them.

I dislike the fact that it doesn't have a volume pedal facility, and that silly matter with the external mod wheel.

This is more than just another Casio home keyboard - it is a true musical instrument, and it makes me play better than ever.

This keyboard surprised me. Especially the ZPI based organ sounds. I wish the modulation button is bigger and more responsive, since I use it all the time to emulate the leslie effect. Works on most organ presets. I only use the organ sounds. Have tried to edit patches, but found that the factory presets are good enough. Manual is actually helpful.

Best features (not in any particular order):
a. Modulation button for leslie organ effects (fast/ slow)
b. Display angle can be adjusted
c. Unit is relatively light-weight.
d. The organ sounds (with DSP on)

The organ sounds are awesome, in my opinion, especially considering the cost of the unit. Works well for the blues/ jazz band that I play in. Coupled with an Ernie Ball stereo volume pedal, I am able to create convincing "swell" sounds. Jazz organ style is easy to play on the 73 keys. Key action is well suited for organ playing. The "drawbars" don't really work.

Have gigged with it for over two years (averaging 8 gigs per month)without any problems. I use it as a top tier keyboard specifically for the organ sounds ONLY. It's also my band practice keyboard.

I actually called Casio technical service at one time. Response was timely and couteous.

At this point, the alternative is Nord Electro 73. Much better unit but cost a lot more (but still light-weight). Haven't decided yet. For the money, this unit has the best organ sounds.

This keyboard is very Easy to use.. its very intuitive!! but the visor is a small..

The polyphony is the minimum possible.. it shold have 64!
the inbulit efect are very nice.. but this keyboard has no real time slide or something like..
the keys are really bad.. they are too noisy and the plastic is bad..
I have never used the sequencer.. good Flash rom capacibility .. more then the PSR-3000 , but the OS is VERY slow!!! take minuts to load a Wave tone.. forget loading wave tones on a gig..

The sounds are amazings... Very nice Piano.. so god as much $1000 digital pianos.. very good EP, but horrible Strings but chamber tone is pretty good.. the Organs are just incredibles.. very good Sax....

this isnt a gig keyboard.. this was built for home ! its a fragile keyboard..

no problems ...

I dont think i will buy it again.. but is a good keyboard.. it have so many features for this price.. and the sound quality is amazing..

I have not used any but the basic features, i.e. I am using it to play piano and organ, not as an effects machine. It is very straightforward for the basic uses, the more involved effects will take some time to learn. The manual is fairly clear, but this machine does so much that learning all of the features will take awhile.

32 note polyphony is offered with its 76 touch sensitive keyboard. There are over 700 voices, primariliy MIDI, and many DSP effects. The onboard sequencer can hold up to 5 complete songs or six tracks and there is smartmedia expension available.

This machine has an incredible variety of features, some I may never even use, but as far as I can tell anything you want is there. An outstanding variety of features for the money.

I think the piano and organ sounds available on this machine are excellent, especially when you consider the price.

You can do all types of music, many instrument and drum sounds, most are very good, particularly the piano and organ. Saxophone and accordion sounds are very good as well, and it has impressive synth functions and sounds.

I like the key action on this, it does not feel like a real piano, what does, but there is some sensitivity to touch and velocity. I bought a pedal which works much better than I thought it would to add sustain. The feel of the pedal is very good, surprisingly similar to a real piano. For a keyboard of this type, the feel of the keys and expressiveness are very good, the sounds are outstanding.

I have no way to judge this since I just bought it. I do not gig so I can't comment there. The machine seems very solid to me. I looked at some others before I bought this one and this was as well constructed as any in this price range.

Never dealt with the company, so can't comment here either. I sent in the warranty card, but I hope I don't have to use it.

This is the best machine of this type in its class. I looked at machines that were significantly more expensive, and did not see anything that I thought was as good, much less better. This is a winner in every way, just a great machine, outstanding value for the money.

Pretty straight forward. My only nit is the dead slow IDES interface. It takes forever to manage SMF files between your computer and the keyboard.

32 note poly is fine. The thing that blew me away was the depth of user control over a myriad of DSP widgets. Amazing for a $300 machine.

Dynamics are OK ... good response to to key velocity. Awesome DSP.

I wouldn't gig with it unless I had a couple backups - but at $300 ... ;-)

Never had to talk to Casio yet ...

Definately would replace unless Casio comes out with something hotter. Was going to get a Yamaha DGX305 or 505 but after checking out the details the Yamahas can't touch the WK3000-WK3500

I found the manual for this keyboard to be better than most. If you read the thing cover to cover about 4 times, things start to fall into place. The only place where I found myself doing things by trial and error was when using this keyboard with an Alesis MMT8 sequencer. I had just about given up when I had a revelation and now it works great. With the sequencer, I'm not limited to 6 tracks when composing but can record to the full 16 MIDI tracks without linking to a PC. This keyboard is a lot easier to use than my Yamaha S08 which is a real synth, not a unit meant for diddling around at home. But anyone with some exposure to MIDI and portable keyboards should be able to master all the features with maybe the exception of Step Recording. Editing and saving patches is a piece of cake.

32 note polyphony which is half my Yamaha's but enough. Effects out the wazoo, I think over 100 and they're good ones. Very easy to program. The onboard flash memory is good for a couple hundred MIDI files and the flash card slot gives you a couple hundred more. Plus you can download drum kits, rhythms, tones, etc. from the Casio website. Also, you can store more than just the 5 songs you can store in onboard song memory to a flash card. Has a 6-track onboard sequencer but can be used with PC or external sequencer to record all 16 tracks. When using the onboard sequencer, it is WAY too easy to nuke your work by accident. I've done it several times already. They need an "Are You Sure?" step or an undo feature in there or something. Keys are okay, a little rickety if you're used to a semi-weighted or fully weighted board like my S08 and Alesis QS7.1. Pretty expressive tho. Hundreds of tones, most of which you'll never use. Pianos aren't bad but can be tweaked into top drawer patches. Yamaha offers some superior electic piano tones, IMO.

It is possible to create a very good piano patch with a little EQ and effects tweaking. The stock Grand patch is a little over the top with effects and it could use some mids. Organs, as has been well established here, are awesome for the money. A lot of the GM patches are predictably cheesy but many are very good. Strings are pretty weak but brass and reeds are good for the most part, some are extremely good. Drums kits are great and plenty of rhythms...toss out your Alesis SR16. Effects are exceptional. For 300 bucks, this thing really is a hell of a value. Speakers sounds pretty good to my ear.

Seems okay but I probably won't gig it. I bought it mainly for MIDI sequencing since my gigging board's stiff action is not that great for doing drums. I might take it out for the B3 patch if the occasion arises. The organs on the WK3000 blow away the ones on my Yamaha. Nice and light, it would probably work out okay for light gigging. It has never crapped out on me or frozen up.

I would buy this keyboard again. It is a fantastic value and I'm very pleased with it. Wish they'd gone ahead with the 1/4" outs in the back for PA use but no big deal. It's not worth the extra 100 bucks to get the WK3500 in my opinion. I'm amazed at what they've managed to pack into this thing for 300 bucks. You can't go wrong.