The CP4 Stage being a piano, is a percussive instrument. While I'm sure you can plug the balanced outputs of an instrument directly into a powered speaker, I always prefer to use a separate mixer for this purpose simply to deal with the transient peaks which can be delivered by any percussive instrument. This is a personal preference, partially because I'm old school, and all this new fangled technology is great but I find myself sticking with certain old school practices.

The DXR's do have a built in mixer. We will assume, since you mention "much tweaking", that you discovered that to use the XLR input you need to set the switch to LINE Level input, as you will immediately overload the input if set to MIC. that out of the way, gain staging a keyboard directly into the DXR is critical. The key is to send a good amount of signal (3/4 or slightly better) from the instrument, and let the DXR setting be used to fill the room.

If too much work is done by the powered speaker (not enough input from the instrument) results will be less than stellar.
If too little work is done by the powered speaker (too much input from the instrument) results will be less than stellar.

I realize that it's a great technological improvement to have flexible inputs on powered speaker systems (makes it possible to work without a separate mixer), but it does come with cravat that you must take care to setup so each component is doing its optimum job. I've worked both ways, plugging my keyboard directly into the powered cabinet, and using a mixer to prep the sound for the powered speaker.

If I have my preference, as I said, I prefer a separate mixer to prep the signal going to my sound reinforcement system. It's why I always carry an MG06 in my keyboard utility bag. This flexible, small format mixer (metal construction) fits in the cable section of my keyboard's case and solves all issues for me on the road. The addition of a Pad, and simple 2-band EQ (10k and 100Hz) on the small mixer makes customizing the output results for the current room a breeze...(without having to adjust my piano sounds for each venue, I can simply tweak the mixer channels to make my sounds work in whatever room acoustics I find myself asked to perform).

While you certainly can plug an instrument directly into today's powered cabinets, as you've observed, it does take some knowledge and tweaking to get it exactly right in different rooms, I don't often need much additional help, the mixers Pad allows me to adjust gain so I'm not hitting my amp with piano transient peaks (which can be brutal) when I'm in a large venue and need the DXRs to crank, (it's not often I get to open those bad boys up to 1100W) but having the mixer between my instrument and the amplified speakers is just my personal preference (old school), plus it gives me more flexibility on-stage having that small format mixer right next to me. Plus the MG won't break the bank...

Hope that helps.

Mark wrote: I've noticed quite a significant difference between the sound quality from the keyboard's XLR and jack outputs. The XLR output is much quieter (which I think is normal), but the sound quality from the jack output is significantly worse (less clean, more distortion), and also weirdly, seems to have a much narrower stereo soundstage than the XLR outputs (the extreme treble/bass notes seem to be much further to the right/left using XLR).

I was surprised at this, as I thought the only problem with using unbalanced jacks was that long cable runs could pick up interference...

Has anyone else noticed this?

Hi Mark, I haven't had any issue like this. I use the CP4 XLR and jack outputs regularly, directly into powered speakers, always running stereo; no problem either way.

Are you 100% sure about your cables/jacks?

Bad Mister, thanks for your detailed and helpful response.

I perform on the road with a singer, and we've been looking at mixers to take the hassle out of setting up. Funnily enough we've been looking at the MG06, but obviously there's no reverb, which is a problem for the mic input.

We thought about the MG06X, but weren't sure whether the reverb could be applied to only the mic channel? Also, what are your thoughts on using the MG06 with a separate inline reverb box for the mic input?

The small size of the MG06 is really appealing, and we don't really want to go to anything bigger if we can help it...

Thanks,

Mark

Thanks m, they're very old jack cables so I think you're right, it's time to invest in some new ones!

We thought about the MG06X, but weren't sure whether the reverb could be applied to only the mic channel? Also, what are your thoughts on using the MG06 with a separate inline reverb box for the mic input?

The Reverb/Delay Effects are only available for the first two channels (XLR/combi) - so plug your microphone in either channels 1 or 2, and the keyboard in 3/4 or 5/6

"Inline reverb box"? Never heard of one... I'd go with the MG06X!

Thanks Bad Mister.

"Inline reverb box"? Never heard of one...

Sorry, I meant a reverb switch/pedal, with jack in/out...