The Casio PX-S3100 BK Privia is the flagship in the legendary Japanese manufacturer's Privia series of digital pianos. An upgrade of the PX-S3000, it now offers an impressive 700 tones, an arranger with 200 styles, and a polyphony of up to 192 voices. With this comprehensive range of sounds and features, it's suited to a vast variety of musical genres, and musicians can also capture even their most spontaneous melodies and motifs using the built-in audio and MIDI recorder. The LC display gives users a clear and immediate visual heads-up on the current settings while also making the Privia very straightforward to use in general. Sound comes from two 8W speakers, which have again been notably improved compared to the previous model. With its vast collection of sounds and rhythms, the Casio PX-S3100 BK Privia has already proven itself to be a high-quality digital piano, and will be particularly interesting for versatile professional performers.
The Casio PX-S3100 BK Privia features a full 88 keys with graded hammer action, closely resembling the keyboard of a grand piano: The fine-grained surface of the keys helps a pianist keep everything under control, even when their fingers aren't perfectly dry. Sound-wise, the Privia has a truly gigantic range of tones - 700, to be precise - including authentic-sounding grands, organs, harpsichords, and strings, as well as wind and percussion instruments. The 310 presets include settings for colouration, rhythm, and chord progressions, and they can all be loaded at the touch of a button. The memory banks also provide space for 96 custom presets, with split and layer functions available to distribute these sounds across the keyboard for uniquely expressive performances. This wealth of sound can be refined using 14 different reverb and 12 chorus algorithms. Meanwhile, the internal MIDI recorder can be used to capture up to five songs, each composed of up to three tracks.
The Casio PX-S3100 BK Privia is aimed at professional keyboard players looking for an instrument they can both practise with and perform with – a fully equipped stage piano for live music. Beneficial at home and on tour is its clear and well-organised control panel: And for musicians who are frequently on the move, the Privia's space-saving design is a real boon. Its ultra-slim depth of just 232mm has been achieved through high-density mounting technology and miniaturised internal components. The instrument runs on the power adapter that comes included in the package, or a set of AA batteries (not included), allowing pianists to practise virtually anywhere. And so they don't disturb the neighbours, the Casio PX-S3100 BK Privia is equipped with a headphone jack as well as a USB Bluetooth adapter for transferring audio and MIDI data.
The Japanese company Casio was founded in 1946 and initially became famous for its electronic calculators and wristwatches. The company released its first electronic musical instrument back in 1980, since which several decades of experience have poured into the production of keyboards, synthesizers, and digital pianos, including classics such as the CZ synth series and the digital pianos of the Celviano and Privia series. Casio's core corporate philosophy is to contribute to society through its creative products.
Among the Casio PX-S3100 BK Privia's many features is a metronome, on which users can set the tempo to anywhere between 22 and 255 BPM. However, for slightly more varied practice sessions, there are also 152 built-in pieces. What is more, the audio input on the rear panel allows the internal speakers of the Privia to directly output any external source – making it easy to for pianists to practise along with songs. The integrated USB port also transmits MIDI data, and this signal can be sent to a DAW using any suitable USB cable, meaning versatile digital musicians can use the Privia to control their favourite software instruments. This works on any operating system from Mac OS X 10.5 and Windows 7 onwards. The Privia can also be remotely controlled via the free Chordana Play app, which offers settings for tone, touch sensitivity, and the metronome. The Casio Music Space app, on the other hand, lets players perform from a digital score or play along to music.