Nord User Forum

Hi everyone,

I am about to buy either a Stage 2 73 or 76. I am not a keyboard player, and it is going in my studio. My question is which would be the better board for the most players? Is it generally easier to go from weighted to non, or the other way around for most players? I do have a 61 key synth they could use the midi out of if it was a problem.

Comments, input?

Thanks

madhermit wrote:which would be the better board for the most players?

There is no answer to that. It's almost like saying that you can have either a Les Paul guitar or a Fender Precision bass, and you want to know which is the better fretted board for most players. Well, it depends on whether they need to play guitar or bass. For piano, you want a weighted action. For organ, you want the unweighted. (For other keyboard sounds, often either is okay, but people can have different preferences.)

madhermit wrote:I do have a 61 key synth they could use the midi out of if it was a problem.

That's the answer, then, Get the weighted board. Then you have a weighted action, and can MIDI in your other board when someone wants an unweighted action.

Thanks! That is pretty much what my thinking was. I plan on learning to play on this thing too! How awesome is that?

Anyone else have anything to add?

Scrounge up some more cash to buy the last 12 keys? Gotta catch 'em all!

Ofcourse, more weight (not really a problem in the studio) and bigger (might be a bit of a problem).

I have the Weighted NS2 88, and i never had a weighted before.

I am/was an Arranger Keyboard player so i always used non weighted.
I understand that it's difficult to choose cuz your probably afraid u'll not be possible
to play everything? Atleast that was my concern.

But i really wanted the weighted especially for piano, and i have no regrets.
Even for organ playing you get used to it, you can use the palm of your hand/fingers
too to go over the keybed really fast, my fingers are used to it now.

It's more strange to go from weighted to non weighted i think

The keybed used for the Nord Stage 76/88 and the Nord Piano (both version 1 and 2, I think have the same type of keys) has a spring so keys come up quicker after releasing them. Older/more traditional weighted keyboards don't have this and it makes it easier to play fast or synth and organ on a weighted keyboard. Nord says the following about the weighted keyboard: "[it] has been improved for response when playing rapid repeated notes."

If you would press a black key all the way down, release it and immediately press it down again when it reaches its highest point you will notice that you can do it much quicker than on some other weighted keyboards. Same with the white ones, of course.

Before I got my Nord Stage 2 SW73, I bought a new Kurzweil PC3K8 (I love their VAST synth architecture) which uses the same keybed as the weighted Nords (but with a heavier weight on the keys). On two of the black keys this spring didn't work as it should've and it was really noticeable they came back up much slower. I send it back to get fixed, it came back unfixed and I sent it back for a refund and got the Nord. All's well that ends well.

Great info! Thanks everyone.

I ended up ordering the HA88. It was less than $100 more than the 76. For some reason I thought it was more. So thanks to mjbrands for making the suggestion.

I am super stoked to get my hands on this puppy! Hopefully I will pick it up in about a week.

madhermit wrote:about a week.

A week can be a long time