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Is it just me or does that silly wireless dongle he demos make anyone else feel irrationally mad at Yamaha? What were they thinking?

The recorded sound does sound muffled to me as well.

I saw Pete call him Mr. Chow and I thought that was his name.

Sorry for the confusion.

God Bless,
David

Cunningham uploaded another interesting video at the same time. They compared Yamaha B1/B2/B3 side by side and also the recording of Yamaha silent system. To me, I feel like even Yamaha B1 sounds better than the N1X either with speaker or recording. I can feel the nuance and phrasing under Hugh Sung’s hands. While those small details don’t exist in the digital recording. In the digital video, the melody in the right hand just sounds like different discrete notes with an over bright timbre.

It definitely sounds muffled.

I thought it was strange for him to place the mic so low and behind the piano and then say it's so that we can hear what he is hearing in an acoustic environment.

If he wanted us to hear what he is hearing, shouldn't he have placed the mic closer to where his head is?

God Bless,
David

Why should a baby action feel much different to a concert grand?

The N1X certainly feels very similar (indistinguishable to me - but I'm no expert) to the 6' Yamaha Grands in the showroom alongside.

My 2005-vintage CLP240 has an action that closely matches that of the finest concert grand piano.
That's what the sales literature said ... so it must be true.

@percy64: You might not be an expert, but your opinion means more than that of the sales literature, or of any salesman.

The most noticeable difference between the N1X’s action and that of a concert grand (besides the fact that the concert one would be regulated carefully by a top gun) would be the pivot length difference. It should be more noticeable towards the ends of the keys but we're already nitpicking here since the pivot length in the N1X is good enough. I even tested the shortest pivot keyboard in the world’s history of keyboard instruments, that of the new Casio pianos and while it’s close to impossible to push the keys towards the end of the keys, I didn’t find that apparent in my regular playing. But my fingers aren’t exactly Rachmaninov-long

I just noticed Hughs Hung at the beginning of the video; as a matter of fact, I watched other videos from him, and his name is always displayed at the beginning.
I apologize for the confusion, but I genuinely thought this was Mr. Chow. He’s a multifaceted man, Mr. Chow, so I just assumed he also sold pianos.

For the record, Mr. Chow is also a doctor.

Apart from the action geometry mentioned by CyberGene, a Yamaha concert grand will be prepped by a very fine technician. That level of attention to detail isn't really feasible given the price of the N1X. Having said all that, a large part of the regulation wouldn't apply to an N1X.

This is odd to me. The Millennium III action in the Kawai NV10 is the same as in in 9' Grands such as the Kawai EX Concert Piano. Yet I am reading in this thread the claim that the action of the N1X is only in Yamaha baby grands and not in Yamaha's concert grands. Does this mean the N1X's action is inferior to the NV10's Millennium III action?

Not all grand actions are the same. Sizes differ. And maybe size matters.

I don't think you can draw a conclusion like that between two makers. Though Kawai users the same base action, they make significant adjustments and use custom/specialised parts in the action on the EX series grands, including specialized hammer felts.

Yamaha otoh doesn't say quite as much about how their actions may differ between models, at least from what I can find online. But almost certainly they use similar specialized materials and treatments in their flagship grands.

Millenium III is a family of actions. The action in a Kawai baby grand isn't the same as in a concert grand. Leaving out the keystick length, the action has to be different to accommodate different numbers of strings in each section. In a concert grand, for example, you will have fewer wound strings, so the placement of brackets will be different. It's quite common for concert grands to make allowances for heavier hammers. This could be a slightly different action ratio, or simply more lead in the keys. Japanese concert grands are also well known for almost fanatical attention to detail, which is expensive.

Grand piano actions are all the same: keysticks, capstans, whippens, jacks, repetition levers... you know all that. One decides to call that Millenium III. Other decides not to call that Billenial 3.14. Whatever. The action in the NV10 is not the same as in SK-EX. There are longer keysticks on the SK-EX. Putting plastic (or whatever plastic compound it is) parts won’t arguably change how it feels, it will only contribute to eventually better durability and more consistent behavior in varying temperature and humidity. Some of the most expensive grands still use all wooden actions and top class pianists haven’t complained. So, when you replace parts with plastic your marketing department need to make it a big deal and come up with some name. Yamaha introduces plastic repetition lever in the first generation of AvantGrand and then also plastic jacks in the second generation. And not call it anything. Whatever

The fact that you have come to believe that shows what excellent marketing Kawai has done on you with the NV10. The NV 10 action is comparable to a grand piano around the 6ft/180cm length. Using the key sticks from a concert grand would make the NV10 prohibitively expensive and also very awkwardly sized.

Does a tractor-trailer drive better than a Corolla?
I mean, it’s much longer, has more wheels, bigger/stronger brakes, and perhaps at times, precious cargo.
Perhaps it doesn’t, but it will certainly be a different experience to driving a Corolla, so we can’t say that ‘the Corolla drives exactly as a huge tractor-trailer’ because it does not.
So is it not a lie to claim that a baby grand action ‘drives’ exactly as a concert grand action?

Replying to Tyrone's question:

When you look at the way how Kawai uses the name "Millennium III action", then you see that this name does not include the key sticks or the hammers (and that usage of the term "action" is common in the acoustic world). While here in the DP world we usually call the whole assembly of moving parts, from keys to moving weights, the "action" (and I think that is where your confusion stems from). The name "Millennium III" refers to the mechanical bits between the key sticks and the hammers (i.e. the wippen, jack, repetition lever and spring, etc.). At least that is what I gather from Kawai's websites. They always talk about the Millennium III action and the keys and the hammers separately.

Of course Kawai's smallest grands have shorter key sticks than their concert grands (and so has the NV10). I don't think Kawai is engaging in any deception there. The smaller/cheaper grands also have different hammers. But the bits in between, those bits that the name Millennium III refers to, seem to be the same throughout their whole line, from NV10 and GL-10 up to the SK-EX. (That is, if we are looking at the mechanism, and the parts involved, for a single key. The whole assembly, for all 88 keys, differs between different pianos - as Johnstaf pointed out - because they have different requirements for the overall layout to fit into the respective piano and to mesh with the other parts of the piano.)

So to attempt an answer for your question:

Kawai has this Millennium III action which, mated to different keysticks and hammers, and in various assembly configurations, they do indeed use in all their current acoustic grand models, from the lowly GL-10 and NV10 up to the SK-EX.
Yamaha does not seem to have such a "named" action that it uses in all of its models. Instead, in addition to the variations in keysticks (and hammers), there also seem to be variations in the core action between Yamaha acoustic grand models. And the AvantGrands may even have their own core action that isn't used in an actual acoustic grand model.

As said above, this claim does not apply to the key sticks (and pivot length), but only to the core action. So from this claim, you should not infer that the pivot length in the NV10 is the same as in an SK-EX concert grand (which it isn't).

But this statement:
was made specifically with the keysticks (and the pivot length that results from the stick length) in mind. And that part is true. The N1X action has keysticks of a length comparable to a Yamaha baby grand, not a Yamaha concert grand. It also seems to have a core action that is not the same as the core action in a Yamaha concert grand

On paper, maybe (and arguably). Because, yes, the NV10's core action is the same as that of Kawai's concert grand, while that is not true for the N1X. And if we again expand the comparison from the core action to the keysticks, the NV10 has a longer pivot point than the N1X.
But in real life, with regards to what you feel when playing it, I don't think so. It isn't "inferior", it is only "different". And it depends on your personal preference which one you like better.
(If one want's to be absolutely nit-picky, one could say that the Millennium III is arguably less susceptible to humidity fluctuations, as it uses less wooden parts - but again, I doubt that this would make a difference to most owners.)

That you JoBert! You've comprehensively answered my question! It now belongs on a FAQ for hybrids!

Thank you Jobert for this detailed explanations, much more clear to me!

Am I sensing some passive-aggression here, Bert?
You’re saying that the core action in the N1X is different to that of their concert grand actions (other than length, etc.). Since the perception is that the concert grand action is the ultimate reference point (whether right or wrong) this implies that not only is the action in the N1X different but also inferior.
Conversely, you state that the core action in the NV10 is identical to the action used in their concert grands (again, other than key lengths, etc..); this implies that it’s better than the ‘unique’ action in the N1X (so good that Yamaha doesn’t use it on any of their grands).
To top it off, the NV10’s action is ‘arguably’ less susceptible to humidity fluctuations, yet we have some reports of hammers flying off their super stable (carbon fibre) cores.