The Yamaha Disklavier has more protection circuits than you could ever
dream of to protect itself.  The computer in the Disklavier constantly
monitors the velocity of the hammers and the keys to make sure they
correspond to the information on the MIDI files.  It can correct
itself.

Very early Disklavier models would cut off but would not burn up if
more notes were called for than it had the ability to play.  There was
one software title that had the problem and was corrected immediately
at Yamaha's expense.  All Disklavier models have heat sensors spread
across the solenoids to correct the response of the solenoids as they
heat up.

The Yamaha people are not stupid by any means.  It is the largest
corporation in the music business, doing 4.5 billion dollars a year;
85 percent of this business is music.  The next largest music
corporation does 700 million per year.  You would have to total the
business of the next 12 largest music corporations to get close to
Yamaha's 4.5 billion dollars annually.

When any company in the music business designs a product they have to
buy a computer chip off the shelf of some manufacturer to make it work.
Yamaha is so large that they can make their own chips.  I doubt there
is a rock show in the country that doesn't have a Yamaha unit of some
type in their audio system.

Recently I think Panasonic decided to quit making a chip that all the
guitar amplifier manufacturers use for their "chorus" effect.  Today,
no one is making a guitar amp with "chorus" until another vendor is
found.  Another example was the little reverb units that many companies
sold starting about ten years ago.  Every one of them used the same
chip.

Yamaha has ten physicists whose only job is to improve the piano.
Under them is a team of engineers who are dedicated only to piano
improvements.  They were the first piano company to have a Disklavier
type piano and it was shown to dealers years before the Pianocorder was
introduced at a dealer meeting.  It was almost 15 years later that they
started to market the piano in the U.S.

The reason they bought Pianocorder is only speculation, because no one
really knows.   They told dealers that they wanted several patents and
the software.  That is a whole story in itself because of a major foul
up.  The first software titles in the U.S. were QRS rolls transcribed
by a company on the East Coast.  It did not take Yamaha long to realize
that was a mistake.  They then set up their own facility in California
with the intent of satisfying the majority of the American public which
is impossible.  You can please all the people some of the time, etc.

I have never agreed with some of the Yamaha titles or playing
arrangements.  Some of the [music] software for a short time was
imported from Japan which was excellent and rivaled any reproducer ever
made.  This importation ceased due to copyright fees, I was told by one
person at Yamaha.  The software for years was the responsibility one
person.

It has only been in the recent models that the Disklavier will accept
MIDI files as Yamaha has always had their own file format.  Reason one
is that it pre-dated MIDI, and reason two was that they wanted their
pianos to play the best which meant they controlled the software.  With
the new models playing MIDI files they made some changes so that the
piano could play more notes than the original models.

A Happy Disklavier Owner
Don Teach

 [ The Disklavier diskette file format, known as DOM or ESEQ, is very
 [ similar to MIDI file format and was developed at the same time as
 [ the MIDI file format, but there was little communication between
 [ Yamaha and the MIDI group in California, and even less communication
 [ between groups within Yamaha, and so several similar but incompatible
 [ disk file formats for controlling Yamaha musical instruments have
 [ existed for almost twenty years in different Yamaha products.
 [
 [ The MIDI file format was adopted world-wide partly because the
 [ MIDI Association published the "Standard MIDI File" format (SMF)
 [ as a non-proprietary format for public use without license.
 [
 [ -- Robbie