Roland RD-500

Very easy to use, but I play it as a piano and not as midi. Manual is OK, but needs some simple information so you can troubleshoot, but of course, that is not Rolands way...

Built-in voices and effects are very easy to use, and has a wide selection of instruments and colors, so its easy to pick the one that suits the room/group/volume tha you're playing.

Instruments are good, except I could find exactly the Rhodes sound that I wanted. Acoustic piano is very good, which, in addition to the great touch, is why I bought it. Best electric piano feel I've played. I play mostly jazz, and the acoustic sound and feel is very important to me.

At first I could depend on it, but after almost 3 years it is breaking keys. As in other reviews above, the plastic arm holding the weight breaks off. The broken off piece usually manages to block the action of a couple of keys next to it as well. Broke a key each of my last 2 gigs! This is totally unacceptable. Would I use it on a gig without any backup? Not any more! I carry my other (comparitively cheesy sounding) Roland ep-7 in case I lose too many notes, but if this piano had been adequate for performance, I wouldnt have bought the RD-500.

I have tried, and have been told to use the local "factory-authorized" repairman. The key got fixed, but it took weeks(!) and I got the piano back with many of the screws not all the way back in. Repairman said that Roland said (note heresay) that the cracks in the hammers and weight arms were "normal".

Would I buy it again? I'm asking that question right now, since I cant go 3-4 weeks without an instrument.
Other gear: Roland ep-7 (backup/composing), Hammond XB-2
What do I love?: sound and feel!
What do I hate?: keys breaking!
It's impossible to combine these two factors and get a rating. If you can afford to own 2 or three, to have one in the shop and one backup, (if you have the time to work on them a lot yourself, then you could probably get by with 2), maybe the sound and feel are worth it.

nice keyboard, but....
It's like the classic "one hoss chez"
The keys all start to break after 4 years of use.
(if you look inside, you find that those ivories are connected to the counter-weights by flimsy little plastic connections.)
Looks like Roland designed this to keep customers coming back for the laterst new model. If any has one of these, keep your epoxy handy!

I found it to have the best piano feel available at the time. It's
still not a piano, but at least it (barely) fits in my car.

Very good piano sounds. The rest range from okay to good.

I've broken 2 keys on it thus far. The weights are attached to the
keys by tiny, thin pieces of plastic that seem to snap too easily.
Fixing them with crazy glue is simple, but when I was looking at other
keys, I noticed fractures on most of the commonly played keys. The
the thought of breaking middle C at the beginning of a show sends
shivers down my spine.

The presets are amazing! I was sold on this when I sat down to play it, because it sounded just like the 9 foot Steinway grand I had just played. Editing is not all that hard, but I had to figure it out by myself because for some reason there was no manual in the box.

16 note polyphony (I think), but I am more of a piano player than a sequencer. The action is AMAZING!!! Again I am used to a regular piano and not only is this weighted, but it is controled by a hammered mechanism that makes it feel just like a piano. As for expansion, not much needed it has all I'd want, but it does have midi outputs. It has all 88 keys, great chorus, reverb, pitch bender, modulation, tremolo, delay, transposer and 121 fantastic keyboard sounds.

All the instruments are realistic, and then they can be ajusted with attack, decay, brightness, brightness, on board e.q., sensitivity, and key touch. It reacts to my playing fantastically. I read this was the industry standard and I can see why, it sounds amazing. Works great for Dream Theater-esc metal, classical, jazz, and anything else that uses a piano or keyboard sounds.

Its a Roland and like Boss its the most dependable on the market. It may be pretty damn big, but better than carrying a piano, its all I use at gigs.

N/A

It is fantastic! I'd easily buy another if the need arrived. It is just like a piano in many ways, but it the options make it excell beyond. I play it more often than I play my Kawaii Studio acoustic piano because it plays and sounds so good. It has all I want and much more.

The piano presets are stunning. It's also a full- blown synth, easily edited. 88 keys,weighted for a piano feel, has performance setup memory and a controller section for externel keys, effects, etc. Like most Roland manuals, something gets lost in the translation.

Tons of polyphony. Onboard realtime E Q, reverb (NICE)No sequencer or expansion, but great for live.