Korg SV-1: Still a viable choice?

[Outkaster]

I always wonder if the SV-1 didn't come out at a good time or did Nord corner the market without leaving room for competition?

[AnotherScott]

I always wonder if the SV-1 didn't come out at a good time or did Nord corner the market without leaving room for competition?

The SV1 came out in 2009, and rather than discontinue it along the way, they came out with updates with alternate colors. You presumably wouldn't do a new run in a new color if the old ones were stacked up in warehouses not selling. So I think it's probably been a pretty successful product for them. Not too many boards have an 8 year sales life. I'm actually curious too see whether we're even now at the end of its life. Depending on how the GrandStage is priced, I could imagine that the SV1 may still stick around in the line for a while yet.

 

Although both largely "vintage board" emulators, I think the SV1 has been pretty well differentiated from Nords. The closest Nord is probably the Nord Piano, which came after the SV1, and I bet the SV1 has out-sold it. The Electro has been huge, of course, but wasn't available with a weighted action until even later, so it would have been for the more organ-centric player vs. the SV1 for the piano-centric. But once they had the HP models, yeah, they would have been more competitive against the SV1. Then there's been the Nord Stage, which I guess you could also put up against the SV1 in a way, though it's always been a higher priced, higher functionality board.

[tucktronix]

I always wonder if the SV-1 didn't come out at a good time or did Nord corner the market without leaving room for competition?

The SV1 came out in 2009, and rather than discontinue it along the way, they came out with updates with alternate colors. You presumably wouldn't do a new run in a new color if the old ones were stacked up in warehouses not selling. So I think it's probably been a pretty successful product for them. Not too many boards have an 8 year sales life. I'm actually curious too see whether we're even now at the end of its life. Depending on how the GrandStage is priced, I could imagine that the SV1 may still stick around in the line for a while yet.

 

Although both largely "vintage board" emulators, I think the SV1 has been pretty well differentiated from Nords. The closest Nord is probably the Nord Piano, which came after the SV1, and I bet the SV1 has out-sold it. The Electro has been huge, of course, but wasn't available with a weighted action until even later, so it would have been for the more organ-centric player vs. the SV1 for the piano-centric. But once they had the HP models, yeah, they would have been more competitive against the SV1. Then there's been the Nord Stage, which I guess you could also put up against the SV1 in a way, though it's always been a higher priced, higher functionality board.

 

The Nords always have a distinct advantage over the SV1 in terms of the expansive sound library.. something that Korg had attempted, but couldn't quite get right.

[AnotherScott]

The Nords always have a distinct advantage over the SV1 in terms of the expansive sound library.. something that Korg had attempted, but couldn't quite get right.

I don't think Korg even attempted it, until the Kronos. They did make SoundPaks for the SV1 which gave it some new sounds, but those did not load any new samples into the instrument, they were re-workings of samples that were already resident, the SV1 was not designed to store new/different samples like the Nord was. So yeah, that was an advantage of the Electro 3 that came out the same year... and for that matter, so too was the advantage that it had a clonewheel engine in it. But again, no weighted action, so not really a piano-player's board, so not really a head-to-head competitor at that point, IMO. Though I suppose some players may not have made that distinction. To this day, though, I still think the SV1 is a better EP!

[analogman1]

I have the best of both worlds; use my SV1 to control my Nord a Electro 5D. While there is some duplication in the types of sounds, the weighted action makes the Electro come alive! And I can still use the Electro for totally different sounds, while using the pianos in the SV1 (still great sounding after all these years).

[AnotherScott]

I have the best of both worlds; use my SV1 to control my Nord a Electro 5D. While there is some duplication in the types of sounds, the weighted action makes the Electro come alive! And I can still use the Electro for totally different sounds, while using the pianos in the SV1 (still great sounding after all these years).

Yup, I can see that as a very satisfying combo! I see in the Electro 5D thread that you've been experimenting with Clav EQ on the Nord. Have you compared the Nord clavs to the ones in the SV1? And for the Nord ones, since you MIDI your boards together for piano, have you tried triggering the Nord clavs from the SV1 action?

[CowboyNQ]

I'm looking to get more info on this.

 

Scott, I have an SV-1 sitting in the rehearsal room. I must confess I was completely oblivious to this issue but I'll pay him a visit tomorrow and see if I can duplicate it based on the instructions in the post above.

 

The only thing is I don't have a Korg pedal so perhaps I will be unable to recreate the issue in any event.

 

Nonetheless I'll give it a crack for you and report back.

Playing with my SV-1 right now. I'm not able to create the note cutoff.

[analogman1]

Scott, they are very complimentary instruments. The Nord pianos and clavs play nicely when triggered from the SV1; yet, there are things I still really love about the SV1. I didnt want to make the mistake of selling it, even though there is an overlap of sounds; I like to think of them as giving me a lot of choices for all of the keyboard "food groups"!

[AnotherScott]

The Nord pianos and clavs play nicely when triggered from the SV1

Uh huh. I was asking about that in particular because of what I'd said earlier, about thinking that clav played particularly well from the SV1 action, very "snappy" sounding with the (relatively) short travel/low release. I mean, it's intuitively obvious that a Nord piano should play better from the SV1 action than the Nord's own SW action, but not so obvious that you might want to do that for clav as well, but I see you've discovered that too!

 

There is still the question of whether the Nord clav sounds themselves are actually even any better than the SV1 clav sounds, something I've never compared, so I was curious about your thoughts there, if you'd done that comparison. It's also not necessarily the easiest comparison to make, as there are a variety of different clav sounds you can load into the SV1 from its soundpacks... and then there's also the variable of the effects of the two boards, since clavs are so often played with fx! Another variable there is that, with only 44 recallable presets in the SV1, you might choose to sometimes stick with Nord clav sounds in part just to free up some of those SV1 preset spots for other sounds.

[analogman1]

Scott, the funny thing about the SV1 is that any of the built in sounds were tweaked extremely well to match up with the RH3 action. I can't really say which clav is more authentic as they all pale in comparison to the real thing (as you well know!) but again, they are all usable and with either board having so much effect processing available "on the fly" it does exactly what you said (that is, give me options to free one board up for another sound etc.).

[AnotherScott]

Here's a video of the note cut-off issue, demonstrated on a Kronos (also an RH3 design). This was a known and widely discussed Kronos issue for a while, and one that Korg addressed. I don't know that any SV1 ever exhibited the problem nearly to the degree that is demonstrated here (there was not the same outcry about this regarding the SV1, and AFAIK no official addressing of the issue by Korg as they did on the Kronos), but I'm posting it so people can see/hear what it's like. As I mentioned, in my own SV1 experience, it happens, but quite rarely, and is not something I can duplicate on demand, i.e. nothing nearly as bad as what's happening in the video, but I figured this could still give people an idea.

 

[video:youtube]

[analogman1]

The problem in that video is that the player is unusually close (in) to the rear of the keys. Obviously He has a lot less leverage to play and that is probably pushing the action to its limits. Let's face it, nothing will play like a Steinway or Bechstein piano. We should all be so lucky!!!!

It's tough to see from the camera angle, but he is almost playing flat-fingered. If you maintain the correct (rounded) finger position, I would bet that the problem with the action would appear a lot less often. I've only experienced the note "cut off" maybe 4 or 5 times and I'm playing challenging material. So I think it's a lot more complicated than it appears.

[Outkaster]

I always wonder if the SV-1 didn't come out at a good time or did Nord corner the market without leaving room for competition?

The SV1 came out in 2009, and rather than discontinue it along the way, they came out with updates with alternate colors. You presumably wouldn't do a new run in a new color if the old ones were stacked up in warehouses not selling. So I think it's probably been a pretty successful product for them. Not too many boards have an 8 year sales life. I'm actually curious too see whether we're even now at the end of its life. Depending on how the GrandStage is priced, I could imagine that the SV1 may still stick around in the line for a while yet.

 

Although both largely "vintage board" emulators, I think the SV1 has been pretty well differentiated from Nords. The closest Nord is probably the Nord Piano, which came after the SV1, and I bet the SV1 has out-sold it. The Electro has been huge, of course, but wasn't available with a weighted action until even later, so it would have been for the more organ-centric player vs. the SV1 for the piano-centric. But once they had the HP models, yeah, they would have been more competitive against the SV1. Then there's been the Nord Stage, which I guess you could also put up against the SV1 in a way, though it's always been a higher priced, higher functionality board.

 

Interesting, I only said that because it seemed to get such a mixed reaction.

[AnotherScott]

Interesting, I only said that because it seemed to get such a mixed reaction.

I think SV1 has consistently gotten a lot of respect as an EP board, at least.

 

But to your point, I think that's something the SV1 and Nord also have in common to some extent. Some people love 'em, others find lots of shortcomings. These boards are primarily designed for immediacy, and--at least in the case of the pre-5 Electros--doing one thing at a time, and some people see that appeal, others find them too limiting. (I'd probably put the Roland VR-09 in the same category.)

 

But one thing Nord always had over the SV1 was light weight.

[bob_sd]

I've had my SV-1 for several years (red w/reverse color keys) and have rarely experienced the keyboard issues so often attributed to the RH3 keys. Like another poster suggested, the only way I can reproduce the issue is if I am playing way too high on the keyed - much higher than needed even when playing in a Stevie Wonder key signature...

 

The Mac/pc editor gets a lot of use. Not only can I mix and match patches found on the three sound sets, I can change several parameters not available directly on the keyboard - like changing the eq mid frequency, effects options, speaker simulators, etc.

 

When shopping for the SV-1 I never once seriously considered any Nord model for one reason only - cost. SV-1 73 new was around $1500, which as I recall was approx. half the price of the electro at the time- and 1/3 that of the Stage And I happen to like the RH3 a lot. It certainly isn't as fast as my Mason & Hamlin, but light years ahead of my old mushy KX-88.

[Chris Link]

Played one a few times accompanying a singer doing standard Sinatra/Bennett type tunes. I thought the sustain pedal was not working as the acoustic piano sounds (can't say as I had much time to delve into anything else) decayed so quickly as to make playing a ballad nearly impossible. I looked into it and there is a software fix that I passed along to the owner.

[bob_sd]

I assume this was due to earlier firmware? A few weeks ago I went to see AJ Croce whom apparently had backlined an SV1. I watched a stagehand try and fail to connect the sustain pedal (using the wrong input on SV-1). After five minutes or so, I offered my services, and within a few seconds fixed the issue. However, even when it was connected correctly, the piano sound decayed way too rapidly. I just attributed this to the loud ambient noise from the guitarist playing at the time. Glad to know my ears haven't failed me. yet.

[Josh Paxton]

The fast decay on the acoustic pianos was a common criticism of the SV1. My guess is that they were made that way to help hide the fact that once the looped portions of the samples kick in, they just sound bloody awful.