Yamaha QY-10

the manual unfortunately was a must for me. up to now i do not use it to write songs. so far i now understand how to manage to work on my own patterns. i have to look up for the undo function and hopefully there is one. in "step recording mode" i set some basspoints and then keep on recording in "realtime mode". what i play is what it sounds like, and its hard to me to be in time. the other functions i might work out later. good manual.

wish there was a small sampling unit incorporated! i have not figured out the complete thing, so no rating.

i really love some of the sounds! the organ, the piano is not too bad, some electronic drumsounds, breathy can be really cool, again the organ (yes), synth lead sounds,.. depends on what is on my mind. as i said i do not use it for creating songs with the unit by itselves, but connect it to my RC-50 looper. this is more my kind of business, cause its realtime, undo is not a problem, effect devices can be used and there i go!

it still works.

connected to the looper it is an amazing unit. to me its charming as a stylophone (its size), or a casio sk-5. it might look like a toy, but is not: the sounds are too good! creating patterns in the park is also very nice!

I bought this thing when they first came out. I've made a living with it for years when I wasn't playing in a band. Now I use it for some of the songs I programmed years ago, in addition to my laptop. Even though it's limited, the QY-10 saved a couple of gigs for me when a keyboard I was using to trigger sequences (pre laptop) failed.

It sucks that it's not general midi. I'd like to save some of my old songs, which I will do as mp3... and I'll add some real acoustic guitars, etc, to improve. Yeah, the sequencer was pretty amazing for it's time, sounds a bit cheezy now, but still..... there are ways around it. I have some songs that still sound great. As for the keyboard action, ha! Imagine trying to play songs by pressing a those little rubber pads on mini calculators. It's about the same, and it sometimes misses. BUT! I still managed it way back then.
I'm rating this thing in this catagory at 8, considering how old it is.. and I'm still using it. Though I may phase it out in the next couple of weeks.
One thing I didn't like was that it only held 8 songs. I had to buy an Alesis Datadisk unit, which uses floppy discs.... as an aside.... Alesis was great, my Datadisc died for some reason, and I sent it to Alesis, they were real cool, prompt, and fixed it and upgraded it for free. Kind of an obsolete unit now though...

The drums are not bad. Like anything, it gets old if it's all you have. I would say this thing would be great for dance tracks.... some of those sounds are pretty great, though I'm not a fan of "dance" music.

I used this thing with no backup for many years, made a lot of money with it. I'd have to say it's been a lifesaver. And one of the reasons I bought it was that it was portable, plug in headphones anywhere and start sequencing. I remember bringing it to a day job once and amazing my co-workers, one of whom was also a musician.

Never had occasion to.

I've been playing since dinosaurs RULED! Nah, I would't buy another one, but I was talking to a friend who needs something like this, and the QY-100 kept coming up. I've heard them used live and they sound killer, and are tiny.
Yeah, wish it was backlit, general midi, and had FX.

A studio in form of a VHS cassette? Yamaha said: yes!

The QY10 is nifty little 8 track sequencer with integrated sound module.

Definitely easy to use, cause there are plenty of buttons and little two-octave rubber keyboard present, but if intuitive? Matter of standpoint. Definitely I needed to look at the manual several times.

It also has non-backlighted 16 char LCD.

It has a very basic set of 30 programs and single sweet 26-instrument drum set.

The unit uses 6 AA batteries, and has internal back-up battery so you don't need to dump everything or connect it to AC adaptor before changing batteries.

Manual: that's Yamaha, no beating about the bush- stright to the point.

The engine is 28 voice, so it's pretty enough for even more complicated composing.

No effects on board.

No expansion, other than sequencer memory dumps.

OK, the sequencer itself is 8-track, while 4 can be used as song part, the other 4 are arranger parts. you can do 24 user patterns for arrangement, I believe the limit of each is 8 measures. Note memory is about 6000 notes. the chords for arranger are entered by chord type and root note., you can record in real time via midi, the rubber keyboard (it's fun), or you can use very versatile step sequencing.

As previous reviewer stated, it's good to use arrangement patterns to incorporate phrases of songs, because you cannot reassign programs so easily for a track. However copying and pasting is different issue: though "page-switching", qy10 is pretty flexible in doing automated work, and even offers quantisation, transposing, and mixing of tracks.

Also it's true that you can use MIDI channels 1 to 8 only- they're fixed, and cannot be changed.

You cannot edit the sounds, and they won't respond to control changes other than sustain.

Samples are very short (I believe that's less than 256 kbytes sample ROM), but charming in their quality.

It reacts well to velocity, but do not expect anything except... changing volume :)...

Gigged with me across the Europe, and always worked, very reliable.

N/A

In today's world QY10 may be treated rather like a toy, because it's pretty easier to get your laptop and do things that puts it far into the shadow... However, that was the start, a true portable all-in-one studio. Yeah, I'll buy one again, because of the sentimental value it has...

As a nerd, the first thing I did was read the manual cover to cover. Then I found out about and bout a additional manual. Then I even found a couple of books on how to use and sequence it. And (of course) I had the instrument right in front of me trying everything out the whole time. My response after all that: its now intuitive to use and my fingers and eyes fly through the menues and keys effortlessly.

As far as sound quality, I did notice a difference between one QY-10 and another, mine sounds fine. I was doing a solo concert in front of about 600 people with a high powered house PA. Afterwards the sound technicians had a very hard time believing that all my sounds (other than my microphone) were coming from my QY-10. I use the octave keys in the extreme ranges as effects (samples alias and all that...) There is also a feature that allows chords to be sounded over all the octaves.

I'm an eclectic songwriter and my experience says its fine for all types of music. I played in a reggae ban and everyone agreed that the sound signature of the QY-10's piano outperformed my other keyboards and modules....( I use the QY-10 with the Novation mm10 in live settings. Vibe (v19-21) and synth (v22) sounds have stirred crowds and the high organ for reggae skanks as well as the very very low organ for skanks are untouchable....

As a working musician, my QY-10 has seen alot of abuse. But I still use it today (as one of many instruments) although I bought it new in the late 80's when it first appeared. Its badly beaten, has a cracked circuit board (from one foot too many!) and I'll probably have the courage someday to get a new one from somewhere... since I sometimes have to squeeze it to get some of the functions to operate. But still, everything works!

I have a Cs1x, MDF2 and Novation mm10 which I got to complement the QY-10. I bought a QY-22 in 1995 along with an adapter to use in the Novation. But the Qy-10 can do somethings easily that the QY-22 does awkwardly, like triplets and getting/putting backing tracks to sequencer tracks.

It was lost once over spring break at college. Two weeks later someone turned it in to the lost and found. I met the person by coincidence 8 months later. They said they would have kept it, but could not figure out what it was supposed to do! (They were a non-musician!) I would buy another QY-10 because of all the songs I've done everywhere ;-) I've been playing about 30 years and have a Korg Trinity plus w/HD, EMU Orbit,DX-7 with E!, Cs1x, Qy-22 and of course a Qy-10. I sing through a vocalist workstation and have an alesis midiverb, DBX mic processor and Mackie 1202 all powered through a juiceman. I wish: it and the QY-22 were backlit,drums of the qy-10 where on channel 10 and GM drum sounds, and that the ppm where 96!

Once you learn how the menu and display work, it's very easy to use.

There are some sub-menus which pop up in certain modes, and once you know them - that's it.

The manual is dire as a way to learn the thing. It's only useful for understanding some of the clever tricks, like combining tracks.

The keyboard is only useful for entering slow single octave stuff in C. The step-time sequencer is fine, and it's quick to cut and paste bars.

No. It's not expressive. Very Tristano. The patterns are imaginative, given the limitations, and the sounds are OK.

Amazing. No other word.

Free manual on the web.

I bought this from new. Yes, I really paid that much. But I've used it so much, I can't complain.

It really does help make music. It's the MIDI equivalent of a penny whistle.

i didnt have a manual or a clue on how to use it when i got it, and i was sequencing the first song in minutes. that doesnt mean i was doing it correctly... but that came soon after.

30 sounds, 1 drum kit, no editing - period. does it get any simpler? on board sequencer is a piece of cake, as i said, it was pretty much plug and play for me. got midi, which is great as your very limited with memory, you need a data filer, which i got when i bought the thing. keyboard is hilarious - little mini-buttons set up for one octave.

this is really hard for me to give an objective opinion on. it was my first sequencer/keyboard/drummachine/whatever, so at the time it was the shit. looking at it now i guess the sounds arent great - but dont let that stop you and dont let anyone ever tell you that you cant play live with it. i played many shows with this thing as the sole sound source - and even after that i only added an Alesis SR16 for more drum tones.

as i said i played tons of shows with it and i never had a backup. the unit is a workhorse! the power supply crapped out but that was only after months of use - i even did a show with this thing running on batteries without problems! a truly underestimated box!

dunno - never called.

if it was ever lost or stolen i would sob for hours - and then do everything that i could to get another. if you ever see this thing buy it - its worth it. i still use it even now to get ideas down on the run; great fun for road trips and such.

There's a lot of pages to scroll through to get where you want and at first it was very hard to figure out what was what as I did not have a manual. Luckily, I found the manual on a Yamaha site and it really helped once I downloaded it. It's still not as easy as a keyboard or computer, but once you get around the learning curve, I suppose it's not too bad.

There's really not much to it, it is a sequencer/drum machine and that's about it. 30 sounds (no effects or editting) and 20 drum sounds. The little keyboard is not touch sensitve but I wouldn't expect it to be. It does have midi in and out for using with a keyboard, I believe it will recognize expression in playing, but I didn't mess with it enough to say for sure. I was very disappointed that the drums did not match up with my Yamaha PSR-540. I thought I'd be able to use the QY-10 for working out ideas and then tranfer the work to my PSR-540 for better sounds. But the drums are not mapped out in general midi format and that really got annoyed me and pretty much defeated the purpose of me buying the thing. When I did try to play it through my keyboard, all I got was piano sounds too and never did figure out how to get different sounds out of it through my keyboard.

As said before, it is kind of Nintendo sounding, which is good for Nintendo, but not in music. If you're looking for something that sounds good when performing, forget it. For just practicing or something nice and portable for working away from the house on trips or such...than I'd probably give it a 6 or 7 if that's your only use for it. But to rate for actual use for recording or live, than it loses a lot of points there.

Seems pretty sturdy. When I got it, it wouldn't work with batteries (it came with an adaptor though). Someone (either the person who sold it or the pawn shop) left batteries in it that leaked inside. This did upset me, because the main reason I got it was for something to have at work for quick ideas. I cleaned up the contacts where the batteries sat and never had a problem again. I wouldn't gig with it, but that has nothing to do with the reliability of it.

Never dealt with, but the manul was available online, so that's a plus. I'll give them the benifit of the doubt here.

Overall, this product was a disappointment to me. I figured being that it was Yamaha, everything would line up and work fine with my Yamaha keyboard. I was wrong...It was fine for a little unit to fool with when away, but getting it to work with my keyboard and computer was a nightmare. After about 6 monthes I ended up selling it for half of what I paid. Maybe if it sounded much better on its own, or worked better with my keyboard I would have kept it, but it just wasn't worth the effort IMO. I now have a Boss DR-5 I'm using and so far I'm much happier with it...but I haven't had it long enough to give it my official rating yet.

Hard at first. But you get the hang of it. Its like band in a box, only portable. No editing. No effects. The presest sounds are shit except for the strings, synths, bells, and jazz bass. But there are alot of sounds. Like 30 or so. Each one in scale. It was the hot shit in 1990. Now its almost a joke. But you can still compose ideas for later use. Its the size of a VHS tape and you can use it anywhere with batteries. One octav mini keyboard blocks versatality. You have to switch to the higher or lower octaves and that can mess you up if your jammin'=)

No effects, no editting. 30 sounds, 20 or so drum sounds. Has midi in and out so its prtty versatile that way. On board sequencer kicks ass!

Sounds are ok. Robotic like. Like playing a Super Nintendo or Sega Genesis or Turbo Grafx 16. Now, remember there were a few songs you heard on those systems that made you go "woah"? THe qy10 is as good as you make it. You cant edit sounds. But you get the idea. Think of it as you being a visual artist, and the qy10 being your art book to jot ideas on. Works for all kinds of music. All.

Very dependable. Dont need back up....maybe a lap top or a midi data filer cuz there is not much memory on it. Stores only 8 songs.

Awesome. Surpasses all.

If it were lost, I would be sad cuz i know this is a classic. If it were stolen, I would be pissed off. It suits my needs. Between classes, I can make a song and redo it when i get home with better instruments. Or aon a plain to NYC, i can make something. SOme people play with Gameboys and whatever; I play with my QY10. Another thing I love it the fact that its not expensive and I wont get hurt too much if I drop it and break it or whatever. ITs not the best out there, NOR the newest, so it getting a scratch or so doenst concern me. Good safe fun!