Casio CTK 3500 vs Yamaha PSR E263

Looking for the perfect piano for a beginner is not unchallenging because it has to be easy enough to be played for their level of skill and contain useful features to help them getting used to how the instrument played and to improve their playing. Among many beginner suitable electric pianos out there, Casio CTK 3500 vs Yamaha PSR E263 are very popular and equally offer many support to help new learners mastering their basic skills. If you are about to choose between both, go check our article below.

In this article, we are going to give you information about:
– What are Casio CTK 3500 and Yamaha PSR E263
– What Casio CTK 3500 and Yamaha PSR E263 Look Like
– What Casio CTK 3500 and Yamaha PSR E263 can offer to you
– Casio CTK 3500 vs Yamaha PSR E263

About Casio CTK 3500
One of the best and safest way to purchase almost anything is looking who they are coming from or the manufacturer because bigger names tend to produce dependable and quality things compare to some less-known brands. Casio is among the big players in musical instrument manufacturer especially electric piano, so they already have a list for each user level to match their needs and abilities. As for the beginner or young learners market, their popular unit is Casio CTK 3500. Read also: Casio CTK 3500 vs Yamaha PSR E363 here.

Casio CTK 3500 Design
Even though, CTK 3500 is marketed towards beginner, it doesn’t mean that the piano look cheap or flimsy because you will get a robust and tough one build with a quality plastic material. The item is also compact measuring at 946 x 307 x 92 mm and weigh around 3.4 kg when not used with the batteries. As you can see, this piano is sporting 61-keys which is common in entry-level units but it should be enough for new players. There is a small screen in its control panel to view additional information.

Casio CTK 3500 Features
If you are a beginner, the most important feature you will probably like to see in a piano is the learning feature and since CTK 3500 is suitable for the level, it also packed with many useful learning support. One of the best learning capability in this piano is because it is can be connected with your smart device and use together to learn how to play the piano through Chordana Play app that you can download. It even already have 50 built-in songs that you can play as MIDI and save them in keyboard.

Even when you don’t want to connect it with Chordana Play, there are already learning feature built-in into the keyboard such as Step Up Lesson. This function will break your song into short phrases, so you can play them little by little and then combined the whole part when you can already master the playing. The Voice Fingering Guide function will sense if there is any mistake in your playing and call the finger numbers in human voice. It has Lesson part selection covering left, right and both hand as well as metronome.

Just like anything else, you need to practice much if you want to improve your play and to accommodate this, CTK 3500 have 60 songs built in the piano with a whopping 400 tones from various musical instrument to allow you playing different genres. Rhythm amount is counting at 100 including 46 ethnic rhythms and 10 patterns for piano playing. This piano has maximum polyphony of 48 and 2 2W speaker placed at each top side of the unit to give you a decent sound.

About Yamaha PSR E263
It is always good to have another option when purchasing something and just like Casio, Yamaha also produce many dependable, good quality electric pianos for both beginner and those with more experience. One of them is Yamaha PSR E263 which is placed near the brother E363 but with slightly lesser capabilities since it is coming in more affordable price. However, it doesn’t mean that this piano is less capable in helping you starting the piano lesson because the features are still adequate.

Yamaha PSR E263 Design
Just like any piano in this line, Yamaha PSR E263 is having a robust build which made from quality material and not seems flimsy at all. Unlike the big brother, the design is a bit different now because those pointy sides are now changed into rounder and smoother ones. You still can get the many amount of functions in its control panel along with a small screen in the middle while the side is where you can find its speakers. As you can see, this piano is also using 61-keys, so it is definitely suitable for beginner.

Yamaha PSR E263 Features
As it has been mentioned earlier, one of the most important thing you have to consider when looking for a beginner piano is the learning functionality. In this side, Yamaha PSR E263 is already have on-board lessons support to help you get the starting in your learning journey. It is using the 3-step lesson consisting of Listening, Timing, and Waiting modes that are available for each hand and for both hands playing together. After your each play, you can record them to listen later and decide which part need to be improved more.

Just like with many Yamaha’s electric pianos, there is the Duo mode function in this piano which is a good function to have when you want to play with other people because it will split the piano into two parts with 2 middle C notes. Not only with the built-in songs, you may even connect your portable music player such as iPod to the piano for a casual listening session or play along together to enjoy a richer combination.

Yamaha PSR E263 is only supporting maximum polyphony notes up to 32 with 130 preset styles, and 112 preset songs. To emit the sound, this piano use 2 2.5 W speaker on each of its side.

Comparison
Now, let’s compare Casio CTK 3500 with Yamaha PSR E263. The prominent difference between the two piano is because CTK 3500 is having more polyphony notes and can be connected to a learning app, the Chordana Play while the other still don’t offer the feature.

Casio CTK 3500 vs Yamaha PSR E263

- Dance Music Mode w/50 built-in dance music rhythms
- Chordata Play app integration
- 48 note polyphony
- Step-Up Lesson System
- 400 tone, 100 rhythms
- The PSR-E263 Yamaha Portable Keyboard features a wide variety of sounds and functions for beginners
- 61 full-sized keys are great for learning and developing keyboard playing technique
- The Yamaha Education Suite can be used with the more than 100 preset songs, making it the ideal first keyboard for aspiring musicians
- The aux line input allows you to connect any music device with a headphone output, such as an Mp3 player, a computer, a mixer or even another instrument, and hear it through the internal speakers
- Power adapter sold separately

Conclusion
All in all, the decision is all yours to make. In our opinion, both of them are good option if you are looking for a dependable piano for beginner but if we are to choose, after considering the features and price, we are going to recommend you to pick Casio CTK 3500 with its compatibility with Chordana Play and slightly more affordable price