Yamaha P515 vs Kawai ES8 | Digital Piano Review | Buyers Guide

High-end all-in-one portable digital pianos have been increasing in popularity for quite some time now, and it’s pretty easy to see why. Top-of-the-line stage pianos are of course not getting anywhere, but the idea of a professional quality keyboard with built-in speakers, great sound, and weighted keys makes a lot of sense for a lot of people. Today we’re going to compare two of the three most popular professional all-in-one portable digital pianos on the market (with the Roland FP90 being the third) as we look at the P-Series Yamaha P515 vs Kawai ES8 from their ES lineup. These two pianos are priced very close to one another and serve the exact same part of the market. As a result, they are direct competitors so odds are if you’re looking for a nice portable digital piano with onboard speakers, you’re very likely to have both of these pianos on your shortlist. Be sure to check out the companion video to hear these pianos in action for yourself.

Piano Sounds: Yamaha P515 vs Kawai ES8

Let’s start by comparing the sound engines. The piano sound is one of the most critical aspects of any digital piano, and when discussing high-end instruments like these where overall features and functionality are pretty much a wash, the sound comparison becomes that much more important. In the case of pianos, we’re dealing with superb sound engines - it’s certainly not fair to say one easily outguns the other. Instead, it’s really going to come down to which piano sound you happen to connect with more.

Kawai’s Harmonic Imaging XL

The Kawai ES8 is equipped with Kawai’s highly regarded Harmonic Imaging XL (HIXL) engine, the core of which is built around a piano sample of their Shigeru Kawai SKEX, though there are also high-quality samples of their EX concert grand piano and Shigeru Kawai SK-5. These are all 88-note, individually sampled engines brimming without detail and the individual note sampling means there’s no note stretching going on.

Yamaha’s CFX & Bosendorfer Imperial

Over on the Yamaha P515, we’ve got a sample of the legendary Bosendorfer Imperial piano as well as a sample of their CFX Grand, both of which are also 88-note individual samples. These samples incorporate Yamaha’s Virtual Resonance Modeling (VRM) for some extra synthesis, as well as the Stereophonic Optimizer, Binaural Sampling, and Sound Boost for extra power.

Polyphony

Polyphony is even on both pianos at 256 notes which is pretty much as high as it gets from a sample-based engine before jumping to a modeled engine that has the potential to offer limitless polyphony. 256-note polyphony is plenty - you won’t have to worry about notes dropping away on either of these pianos regardless of how busy you get.

Musical Observations

Let's start by comparing the acoustic piano sounds - for most users, the primary focus is going to be an authentic acoustic grand sound that’s able to adequately replicate the acoustic piano playing experience. Flip over to the video if you’d like to hear this comparison for yourself. It’s apparent right after playing both pianos that the sound engines do sound quite different from one another. The Yamaha P515 is definitely producing a brighter sound, while the ES8 certainly has a far darker tone, especially in the mid-range, but the treble still manages to be super clear. The attack, particularly in the treble, tends to be more direct and crisp on the P515 with lots of fundamentals but a lack of complexity at the same time. The sound quality is great with both instruments, but we’re definitely hearing a more detailed, complex tone over on the ES8.

Yamaha’s Piano Room & Kawai’s Virtual Technician

In terms of the ability to modify that sound on both the P515 and ES8, both pianos give the user a lot of options. Over on the P515, Yamaha calls this feature the Piano Room, and this allows you to modify things like the lid position, brightness, touch sensitivity, reverb, master tuning, key-off samples, aliquot resonance, body resonance, and string resonance. On the Kawai ES8, we have essentially the same thing, which Kawai refers to as their Virtual Technician. Some of the editable effects available here include touch curve, voicing, damper resonance, damper noise, string resonance, key-off effect, fallback noise, hammer delay, top board, decay, minimum touch temperament, stretch tuning, user key volumes, half-pedalling adjustments.

Other Sounds

Moving onto the non-acoustic piano sounds and both pianos have a solid stable of additional presets, though there are certainly far more on the P515. For context, the ES8 has 34 total sounds, while the P515 has 40 core sounds, plus 480 XG voices, which are essentially like General MIDI 2. If you need that huge variety of sounds here, the P515 looks pretty compelling here. That said, the quantity of high-quality core sounds is of course much closer with only 6 more on the P515. The first of these core sounds is a selection of electric pianos, and both the P515 and ES8 are very strong in this regard. Both pianos also have some really solid organs to choose from, these tend to sound more realistic on the ES8. Other core sounds include things like strings, choir, vibes, and others. Navigating the various sounds is a little bit easier on the P515 due to a larger LCD display - the ES8 has an LCD display as well, but it’s just smaller.

Speaker Comparison

The P515 and ES8 both have a high-quality set of built-in speakers. The P515 has a 4-speaker system with 40 watts of amplifier power, compared to a dual speaker system and 30 watts of power on the ES8. Despite this rated power output difference, in terms of actual power, they sound pretty much the same when the volume is cranked.

Piano Action: Yamaha P515 vs Kawai ES8

Let's dive into the actions on both pianos. As important as piano sound is, action is pretty close, if not more important for some people depending on their priorities. If you've got an action that feels great, it’s going to make you want to practice. On the other hand, if you've got an action that is simply unsatisfying, it doesn't matter how good the tone is, as the action will mechanically get in the way of enjoying the musical instrument.

Yamaha’s Natural Wood X vs Kawai’s Responsive Hammer III

The P515 is equipped with Yamaha’s Natural Wood X action (NWX) while the ES8 is outfitted with Kawai’s Responsive Hammer III (RHIII) action. Given that these pianos directly compete in the same price range you might assume that their actions are quite similar, however, this is far from the case. In fact, these actions do not feel anything like one another, to the point that it’s actually quite shocking to play them side by side. The NWX features wooden keys while the RHIII is plastic, but interestingly, this isn’t why they feel so different. The first big difference that jumps out is the weighting, as in, the amount of force it takes to get the key in motion. On an upright piano, for example, it should take somewhere between 45 to 55 grams to put the key in motion. On a grand piano, the range is about 50 to 60. We haven't gone so far as to measure this out, but we would guess that the Yamaha P-515’s NWX action is well above 60 grams as it feels substantially heavier than what one would get even on a grand piano. The RHIII on the other hand is right down the middle in terms of its weighting, but when compared to the NWX, it feels considerably lighter.

Escapement

This brings us to the second big point of departure, which is the feature of an escapement. Both piano actions feature escapement, or as it’s also known, let-off, and this essentially simulates the feeling you get when playing a grand piano action. where there’s a lip about 2/3 of the way down where the key resets. On the Kawai ES8, the escapement is very apparent. Over on the P515, it’s really not apparent, to the point that we had to double-check the specs sheet.

Textured Key Tops

The third significant difference is in the tactile touch of the keytops themselves with regard to the texture. Both piano actions feature textured synthetic ivory white keys, but the texture is much more exaggerated on the ES8. Over on the black keys, both sets of keytops are again textured with synthetic ebony but in this case, the P515’s black keys feel more textured. This might seem like a really granular observation, but it is very noticeable and has the potential to impact one’s overall enjoyment of the action depending on their preference.

Triple Sensor Key Detection

Underneath the hood, we've got triple sensor key detection in both actions so the MIDI output is highly accurate in both cases.

Keyboard Action Wrap Up

Action is not something that you want to gloss over when you’re comparing these pianos. Of course, we always recommend carefully considering the action of the piano you plan to purchase, but in the case of this comparison, it’s especially important. These two actions feel so different, especially from a weighting perspective, to the point that you’re very likely going to have a strong, immediate preference for one or the other.

Yamaha P515 vs Kawai ES8 | Features & Connectivity

Accessories

Both pianos are fairly similar in size and come in a basic slab format with a single sustain pedal, however, both are compatible with matching designer keyboard stands and triple pedal units for anyone looking for a more stationary instrument. Out of the box, the included sustain pedal is a high-quality damper pedal in both cases, and this is great as no upgrade is necessary even if you’re looking at either of these as a professional gigging instrument. Both pianos include a music rest in the box at no extra charge.

Connectivity

Both pianos have a solid offering in terms of connectivity ports. Critically, both pianos have 1/4” Aux Out ports so connecting to an amplifier or external speaker for performance purposes is no problem at all. From there, they both also have Aux In, dual headphone jacks, MIDI In and Out, USB to Host, USB to Device, and of course, a jack for your power supply adapter. The Kawai ES8 does not have any Bluetooth connectivity, while the P515 has Bluetooth Audio by virtue of being a newer instrument. In terms of accessing apps on your iPad, other iOS devices, or Android devices such as the Yamaha Smart Pianist App which can actually convert songs from your iOS device’s music library into chord charts for you, you’ll need to use the USB connection.

Auto-Accompaniment

Both pianos have a really solid onboard rhythm and accompaniment function that’s good enough for use in professional playing situations. This feature is also just plain old fun, and you can also control which of the various accompanying instruments get activated, such as bass, guitar, and drums.

On-board Audio Recording & Other Functions

Both pianos also have USB recording functionality. This is great because you have the option of recording WAV audio straight onto a USB key for playback later. Other standard functions such as a metronome, transpose, split, layer, and so on are covered on both as well. The Yamaha P515 has one additional feature, a sequencer, which may be important for so.

Closing Thoughts

Thanks so much for joining us for this article, and hopefully you checked out the companion video as well. As we often say, at the end of the day, when comparing two similar instruments such as these, it’s really ideal to try to play and experience both for yourself. This is extra true for this comparison because these two specs out so close to one another, yet offer totally diverging musical experiences. Like most Yamaha digital pianos, especially their Clavinova series, the P515 has a bright sound engine and also a very heavy action. The Kawai ES8 is comparatively much warmer sounding and features a substantially lighter action. These make for really big differences that will definitely be apparent to anyone with the opportunity to play both of these pianos. Thanks for reading! Shop more digital pianos here.

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Yamaha P515 Digital Piano Review & Demo

 

Introduction

In this article, we're going to be taking a look at Yamaha's P515, the flagship of Yamaha's P series. We'll be looking at the action, the sound engine and obviously talking about the rest of its features and what other instruments you could be looking at in parallel to the Yamaha if you are on a search for a portable instrument in that $1,500 to $2,000 price range.

Yamaha P515 Digital Piano Review Video Transcription

Sound Engine:

We'll start by discussing the sound. The P515 happens to be equipped with a pretty advanced tone engine, with 256 maximum note polyphony. For people out there who aren't too sure what polyphony is or why it's potentially important, a given digital piano's polyphony count represents the maximum number of individual tones that this can sort of simultaneously play at one time. We have detailed video on our YouTube channel explaining polyphony in more depth if you're interested. 256 note polyphony means you could technically hold the damper pedal down, sweep all the way up and down the piano voices three times before the processor starts dropping notes. Under any normal playing circumstance, 256 notes polyphony is plenty and has become the standard for higher quality instruments, starting around the $2,000 price point and going and up from there.

In terms of the sound engine itself, the main acoustic piano samples Yamaha has used here is their Yamaha CFX concert grand piano as well as the Bosendorfer Imperial concert, both 9 ft concert grands. Yamaha refers to their sampling process as Binaural Sampling, which is then enhanced by Stereophonic Optimizer technology for headphone use. These samples sound quite distinct from one another with the CFX sample bring quite colorful, bright and very dynamic, whereas the Bosendorfer Imperial piano sample is a darker natural sound with a more compressed dynamic experience. There's of course some other acoustic piano samples as well making up a pretty good variety of tones to choose from.  Overall, the acoustic piano sample here offers an all around authentic piano playing experience, especially with the CFX and Bosendorfer Imperial piano samples.

There's this function called Piano Room, which operates very similar to what like the Roland's Piano Designer, Kawai's Virtual Technician apps. The piano room app allows for intelligent acoustic control of some of the finer nuances of piano tone. For example, some of the parameters you can edit are lid position height, the brightness of the hammer, touch response curve, reverb depth, metronome, master tuning, damper resonance, string resonance, virtual resonance modeling(VRM), and aliquot resonance. As you can guess, that allows the user a lot of control to customize the piano tone, which is something that's essentially becoming a standard feature on most digial pianos at this price point. It's nice to see that Yamaha is also doing a really nice job with this here. I enjoy the graphic nature of the user interface here, as some instruments leave it up to shortcut command and you can't really visualize what's happening, so having the display makes the whole process more intuitive.

The onboard speakers are rated at 40 watts in total. There's 15 watts per side for the main and then it also lists two 5-watt tweeters. The main speaker is basically a two-way speaker system with a main speaker inside the cone. Embedded on top is an additional tweeter and they rate those separately. 40 watts is enough to fill a small room, and certainly enough that you don't need an amplifier to enjoy private playing. It's probably not enough to gig with, but likely fine for lighter rehearsals.

Other sound categories here include the standard E piano stuff, including a nice Phaser EP. There's also a patch that sounds like a Wurlitzer, as well as a "Disney" patch, labeled DX. Once you get into the clav, the vibes and the strings patches there's a little bit of hit and miss in how well these sound come across, but the acoustic piano and E. piano tones are definitely very well executed. The Yamaha tone is quite specific - a totally different experience than playing, for example, a Kawai which tends to be a little thicker in terms of the tone and maybe a little warmer. Roland's generally have wide selection of sounds and once you get to the FP-90, there's sound modeling which is a totally different experience. Some people really like that, and others don't. For people who are a fan of the Yamaha style of tone, I think they've done a really great job and the piano should work in a variety musical genres.

That's basically a wrap up of the discussion of the tone engine, and a quick review of the types of sounds that are included on-board, and a few other thoughts as well.

Piano Action:

Let's talk about the action on this P515. There are things about the action that I like, and then there are things about the action that I would say is important that you be aware of it. I'm not going to necessarily categorize these aspects as positive or negative, but rather a buyer beware. We'll go through these observations one by one.

The action Yamaha has put into the P515 is what they call the NWX(Natural Wood X) action. This action is a wooden key/plastic key hybrid and both visually as well as in a tactile sense gives you a smooth release and greater feel of an acoustic grand piano. Many digital pianos in this price range offer a featured referred to as escapement or let-off. Escapement is the sensation on a key that is caused by the jack slipping off the knuckle on a grand piano. Basically, you've set the hammer in motion, it swings up, hits the string, without being physically connected to anything so it can bounce back freely, and reset the action. On a real piano this sensation is readily apparent, and within the last 5 to 10 years, digital piano manufacturers have started including that sensation in the portable design of their keyboards to make it feel a little bit more like an acoustic grand piano. I was always puzzled by this because I always thought that this sensation was an unintended sensation on an acoustic piano, to begin with. In any case, it does make you feel more familiar when you're in front of digital technology if you've got some experience playing an acoustic piano.

While Yamaha advertises that the P515 has escapement, I actually double-check that with the specs because after I first played one, I didn't really feel the escapement sensation at all. For people who are looking for a keyboard where that escapement is a little more prominent in terms of the sensation it gives you, this action may fall short of the mark. For people who don't like the feel anyway, just ignore the specs and carry on.

The key surface on the white keys is basically a polished white plastic. This is a very different approach than what most high-end digital pianos have taken within the last few years, which is to go with with a pretty porous white surface to give a greater sense of texture. In the case of Roland or Casio, they've actually gone with a full ivory keytops texture, so Yamaha's choice here is a little bit unusual. The drawback with a polished key surface is that they tend to be quite grippy anytime you're in a more humid environment which can make it a bit more difficult to play intricate music that requires precision of finger position. Otherwise, it's just a personal choice that's neither good nor bad,  just something to be aware of.

The black keys on the other hand have a very grooved, deep texture. The feeling is similar to that of a new Mason & Hamlin acoustic piano from the last 10 years or so, for anyone whose had a chance to play one. It sort of feels like an unfinished ebony wood type of texture. Again, this quite a bit different than what you get on most digital pianos, and it's something that some folks will love, and others will not. The NWX uses a triple sensor which means you're going to have very accurate MIDI output, which is great.

Coming to the last subject and probably the one that needs to be addressed most directly is the weight of the keys. Before I'd played the P515, I'd been on a number of forums to read about other people's impressions, and the weight of the keys is a topic of discussion quite often, as several people had made the comment that the keys were heavy. I come from an acoustic piano world originally, and an acoustic piano should have a key weight (meaning the amount of weight that it takes to put the key in motion) anywhere from about mid-40s at the very lowest up to about 60 grams at the very heaviest. Most concert technicians usually try and weigh the key depending on whether it's at the bottom of the piano or the top of the piano, anywhere from the low to high 50 grams. These keys on the P515 are considerably heavier than that. In that respect, it's consistent with some of the larger Yamaha stage pianos of the past like the CP300. I played one of those for years in a pit band and it had really heavy keys as well. This is something that Yamaha's user community may be used to and appreciate, but for somebody who's not used to it, playing on this instrument for an extended period of time is somewhat fatiguing. I'm someone who's used to playing multiple gigs per week and having those gigs be three to four hours long, so  my playing muscles are well conditioned and I find this action tiring.

I hope this isn't coming across as necessarily a negative, as some may love it and It may be exactly what you're looking for. For people who are looking for a strong sense sense of depth to the key, perhaps this action exactly what you're looking for. But it's something to be aware of that the keys are in the 70-gram range, heavier than a grand piano action.

Features/Accessories/Connectivity:

The Yamaha P515 is comes standard with a few extra accessories, and offers some optional add-on's as well. With wooden accents and polished details, the P-515 looks as good as it sounds. This is consistent with what you generally find in the market from your major manufacturers. Good comparisons to the P515 would be the Roland FP-60 or FP-90, as well the Kawai ES8. The first thing that's included with the P515 is a very solid sustain pedal unit (FC4A). I really like the inclusion of a robust sustain pedal, and it's really frusterating when digital pianos come with those little plastic square pedals that just skid all over the place. This pedal is much more stable and it offers the ability to perform half-pedaling.

The P515 also comes with an integrated music rest, as well as a standard PA-300C power supply. In terms of optional add-on's, you've got available a matching keyboard stand for the keyboard itself, which compliments the furniture and makes the instrument look a little bit more like a stationary piano. There's a triple pedal system that you can be added on as well, and the inclusion of both the stand and triple pedal essentially turns the P515 into a home digital piano.

In terms of connectivity on the back of the instrument, the P515 features an independent 1/4-inch aux outs and aux in, a mini-jack audio input and a Bluetooth radio for quick connection to an iPad or other device. I have to give kudos to Yamaha in terms of how easy it is to turn on and off the Bluetooth audio function. On many digital pianos this feature can be somewhat hidden and require a look at the manual to switch on, so the ease of use of the feature here is most welcome.

Last but not least, there's USB connection that heads out to the computer that also acts as a USB audio connector. This mean the Yamaha P515 is going to work really well if you've got some external software instruments that you're using, such as Ableton, with the P515 functioning as a MIDI controller. There's no need for any of this external mixing as it all goes in and out through the USB connector, so this is super handy. On the front of the P515, we've got a USB device port. This is for things like audio recording, so you can plug that in and you can record WAV straight to here - another super useful feature.

When it comes to features, the P515 has all the standard kinds of digital piano features that you would expect. There's transpose, split, dual mode, sound boost, and EQ. Navigating all of the features is very easy via the user interface. One last function I'm going to highlight here is the rhythm function with onboard accompaniment. There's a lot of control here, and this function would work great for fun at home or light professional applications.

Yamaha has also made available the Smart Pianist app for iOS, which creates a remote control touch screen interface, super cool. The Smart Pianist app also has the ability to access the songs in your iOS device's music library and create chord charts to make for easy play along with your favorite songs.

Conclusions:

This pretty much wraps up our review of the Yamaha 515 - an instrument that is definitely focused on delivering a high quality, authentic piano experience. I'm very impressed with the acoustic piano sounds, the E piano sounds and how easy it is to use the piano editing module. Be aware that this is a heavier action featured here, and somebody who isn't accustomed to that or isn't expecting that this might feel a bit of buyer's remorse if they purchase the instrument before trying it. Otherwise, this is a capable instrument and certainly anyone who is in the market for a high-end all-in-one portable digital piano, should have this instrument on your wish list to check out, along with the Roland FP60, FP90 and Kawai ES8. Thanks for reading!

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