Casio 61-Key Portable Keyboard w/ Stand - Black - CTK-720/STADV

by Casio

Product Features

• Instrument Size: 3/4
• Keyboard and Piano Features: Portable, MIDI Interface, Volume Control Slider
• Tones: 242, Keys: 61
• Accompaniments: 100
• Demo Songs: 100
• Maximum Polyphony: 12-Note Maximum Polyphony
• Speaker Size: 2.0 "
• Input Type: Audio Jack
• Output Type: Headphone Jack
• Instrument Body Material: Plastic
• Includes: Microphone, Instruction Manual
• Warranty Description: 1 Year Limited Manufacturer Warranty on Parts and Labor

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 30.9 pounds
• ASIN: B0013TO90O
• Item model number: CTK720STADV
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #38,192 in Musical Instruments (See Top 100 in Musical Instruments)

Product Description

Portable, MIDI Interface, Volume Control Slider. It has 61 keys and has 242 tones with a 100 demo songs

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Barely Adequate Keyboard for Beginners or Children, December 29, 2008

By 

Robert Paterson (New York, NY, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Casio 61-Key Portable Keyboard w/ Stand - Black - CTK-720/STADV

If you are a beginner and want a few songs to play along with or rhythms to improvise to, this keyboard will do the trick. It's OK for young kids, but could use some improvement.

The positives:
* Lots of songs, tones and rhythms (rhythmic patterns), and a piano bank, essentially a group of pre-recorded pieces using the piano sound
* Fairly long battery life (takes 6 AA batteries or a 9V Adapter, included here)
* Shuts off automatically after a few minutes
* Lightweight
* Somewhat sturdy
* Includes USB General MIDI function in order to use it as a MIDI controller with a computer (with music notation software such as Finale or Sibelius, for example)
* Metronome function

The negatives:
* Songs not alphabetized on list printed on keyboard, so finding songs takes longer than it should.
* Somewhat worthless, overly complex "Music Information System" information on the front screen (including a keyboard diagram showing which keys you struck - is that really necessary?)
* Keys not weighted, so if does not really feel like a piano, but you get what you pay for
* No velocity sensitivity (loud and soft)
* No native Apple Macintosh OSX support for USB General MIDI (see below)
* No way to prevent the volume slider from being pushed all the way up all the time, so if a children are playing this and they figure out how to adjust the volume, there's nothing you can do other than to keep reminding them to keep the volume at a low level

Unlike a previous reviewer, I didn't encounter any keys out of tune, but the piano sounds (let alone the most of the others) hark back to the 1980s in sound quality.

Regarding the lack of support for Apple Macintosh OSX, you can find an Apple Macintosh OSX MIDI driver for ALL Casio keyboards here:
http://code.google.com/p/casiousbmididriver/

Why am I giving this keyboard two stars? I think that with the popularity of the Macintosh platform for music applications, it's not much to ask to have native support for Macs. Also, a lot of effort went into including lots of bells and whistles, but not much went into making this more user-friendly for children (I know, it's not marketed as a kids keyboard, but still...). Also, the sounds are basically abysmal. It's a new century, and the sounds are way too old-school.

All in all, this is an OK keyboard for beginners or supervised children, but you can probably find something better for just a bit more money.

17 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars You get what you pay for..., June 27, 2008

By 

Ryan L. Lopees "Read more at www.GameTechWorl... (Las Vegas, Nevada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Casio 61-Key Portable Keyboard w/ Stand - Black - CTK-720/STADV

Now, it's been ages since I have had a keybaord or piano around the house. I wanted to get myself back into the swing of things again so I thought I would low-ball it on the price and just get something to get the creative juices flowing again. Well, you get what you paid for.

The CTK-720 arrived today perfectly fine (sans a few nasty dings in the box, the unit was unscathed). I set it up, hooked it up to my own speaker system to make sure it would have the chance to produce a nice clean sound. Boy, not even my speakers could help it.

Beyond the fact that this is definitely a "Beginners" keyboard in the way that just about any instrument other than "piano" sounds like a midi file circa 1980s there is an odd issue. As a 5-octave keyboard you would want to be able to move around, but there's something odd in the mid octaves on the CTK-720.

Bear in mind, before this I had owned Korgs and Rolands, 88 weighted piano key styles. So I may be a bit spoiled. But for the first time in my life I have heard an electronic keyboard that actually needs to be tuned. The mid-range octaves on the CTK-270 produce a warble when the key is first pressed. Much like a piano that has the cord ever so slightly out of tune.

Unfortunately, my tuning key does little to help me with am electronic keyboard. It's a shame, if it weren't for the dodgy "tones" and the mysterious out-of-tune mid-range keys it would have been a nice keyboard to start out on all over again.

I will give it two stars just because it's still functional. I may just be a bit too discerning at this point.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars GOOD, January 25, 2009

By 

Wright - See all my reviews

This review is from: Casio 61-Key Portable Keyboard w/ Stand - Black - CTK-720/STADV

I got this at a Target during a christmas sale for [...] bucks! Even at 99 I'd have to say for the price it is a a good buy. I like all the different tones you can choose from. I use this as a tool to make my indie music. And I like the sound quality just fine. I might upgrade to a Roland later down the road. But this will do till then.