NordNerd431 wrote:Thanks for all who provided their opinions and perspective. It’s always helpful to hear from people who uses the gear.
I've had mine for roughly 3 months now; I probably got one of the very first NS3 88HA shipped to normal end-customers, and started using it immediately. I've played live with others/gigging 1-2 times a week on average since then, and I've never had any problems with it playing live. It has always delivered, and the ability to e.g. tweak sounds as you play is so nice compared to my previous stage pianos. I initially had the idea that I would use my Roland RD-700 NX as a controller for more "acoustic driven" piano work, but I adjusted so quickly to the NS3 that I've never gigged with both. In fact, the RD-700 NX is no longer on my keyboard stand here and has been moved to a less prominent position in another room.
So for me, the sounds are really nice across the board (acoustic, epiano, various synth and samples and organs). No one has complained that it sounds bad; people usually say the like "my" (nord-based) sound very much. I may contemplate taking my NE3 (with waterfall keys) for those jobs where I may play pianos and organs simultaneously or if I need to do a lot of organ based stuff -- mainly to have two sets of keyboards. I like the organ in the NS3 better than the older one in the NE3.
So generally I'm very happy with the board. It's so light, and sounds great overall.
As for the other brands: First, you need to compare apples to apples. The Nord is a very complex instrument, and cannot of course be compared to more simple sample-players. Having said that, none of my other (Roland and Yamaha) boards have been without flaws. On one Roland, the buttons on the surface only work for some time and then "dies" and then needs to be replaced
It also has lost a few of the contra-weights glued to the keys, and makes now a very clonky sound. The other Roland had problems cutting out layered voices when playing live, and if you had e.g. a simple click-track running, it could cut out suddenly and would then require a reboot. It was somewhat fixed in an update after some 6 months, but only partially. Another update a year(!) later possibly took care of it... It also had the entire set of keys replaced after 3 months of playing, as the surface was scratched and you ended up with white dust on your hands after playing it for a while. I opted to have a different set of key surfaces installed in mine. My Yamaha also had to have probably half the keys replaced since the springs started to dig into the plastic, so that they would not return to the correct position. And it has a weird problem that sometimes it thinks the sostenuto pedal is pressed -- and the remedy is a reboot.
The only other keyboard that have not given me any problems was my NE3, and yeah -- there are some bugs with the NS3, but none that have prevented me from enjoying playing it for now 3 months. I also think that Nord is going to fix the real bugs; they seem to respond quite quickly to any major things, and generally crank out new features and updates (unlike I guess most others).
YMMV, of course.