What's wrong with my keyboard?

Tomas E

I bought this one in December 2022. I can play sounds but the middle C and the G below doesn't respond normally. Please take a look at this short video.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1WKaKNPDat-5HfR7trrRo4fw8C3IfEe1U/view?usp=sharing

Thanks

JesterMgee

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/84670#Comment_84670

Did you watch the video, explains it pretty clearly.

Issue is a hardware issue that affects a lot of the S88 keyboards at some stage and will usually affect keys that are likely to be played more often.

Issue is the felt damper inside the keyboard either deteriorating or shifting and allowing plastiic on plastic and that makes the awful sound/feeling you get.

There are vids on YT on how to open it up and attempt a repair. If it is still warranty, go that wa, otherwise opening the thing and repairing it is the only option.

Sunborn

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/15189/whats-wrong-with-my-keyboard

There is nothing wrong with your controller.

Surprisingly as may sounds, almost on every controller, old (like my old M-Audio Axiom) and new, middle C sounds louder!

I am trying over 15 years to understand why...

If you Google it you will see dozens of similar posts over the years, with a lot of different answers but never a clear reason why this is happening!

The most "convinced" comment i ever read, said that this is happening because middle C velocity, somehow is always at 127

Tomas E

The velocity isn't my issue. It's something related to the keys themselves, as if something has broke. As you can hear in the video I'm not playing any sound, I'm just hitting the keys. I will make a support ticket to NI about it.

wa7154733

To determine what's wrong with your keyboard, it would be helpful to have more information about the specific issue you're experiencing. Keyboards can have various problems, such as unresponsive keys, sticky keys, connectivity issues, or software-related issues. Please provide more details about the symptoms or behavior you're noticing, and I'll do my best to assist you further.

JesterMgee

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/84670#Comment_84670

Did you watch the video, explains it pretty clearly.

Issue is a hardware issue that affects a lot of the S88 keyboards at some stage and will usually affect keys that are likely to be played more often.

Issue is the felt damper inside the keyboard either deteriorating or shifting and allowing plastiic on plastic and that makes the awful sound/feeling you get.

There are vids on YT on how to open it up and attempt a repair. If it is still warranty, go that wa, otherwise opening the thing and repairing it is the only option.

JesterMgee

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/84610#Comment_84610

If you watched the vid there is clearly something physically wrong. The issue is not velocity related.

And to your mystery of middle C being more "louder" or sensitive, not something I have personally ever experienced on my keyboards but in some cxases it may be some keys are played more sit the middle of the keybed obviously being the most used area and so stands to reason over a long time it would have the most wear out of all keys.

Tomas E

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/84695#Comment_84695

Thanks for explaining, Jester!

I haven't used it very much though. During the last 6 months I've spent about an hour now and then scrolling through the lists of sounds. Not much time with recording and such either.

The warranty still applies. However I'm not looking forward to sending it wherever they want me to send it since I got rid of the original package sometime ago. Didn't expect something like this to happen, but so much for the "famous" Fatar keybed.

Tomas E

Hurray! They are sending me an empty package box so that I can return the S88 to be repaired or replaced. That's great service!

Tomas E

Got it back yesterday. 😁

"Loose keys regreased; Complete test performed"

BIF

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/91491#Comment_91491

So does it behave better?

Also, where are you and where did the shipping box go to for repairs? Just curious.

Tomas E

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/91502#Comment_91502

Yes, the middle C is perfect which is good since that was the worst key before.

The G is...well maybe not completely perfect but almost as new. I really can't complain without sounding fussy.

Guess they have regreased some of the other keys to, I seem to remember that there also were some other ones that didn't behave as expected.

I live in Sweden. The keyboard was sent to the NI Service Team LetMeRepair in Germany.