Yamaha PSR-E313 Keyboard Review

By: Hiram LeCedre—January 23, 2008 5:08PM
"We highly recommend the Yamaha PSR-E313 as an excellent first keyboard!"
Yamaha PSR-E313

Product Summary

Pros

  • Great bang for the buck
  • Over 400 total voices
  • 32 notes of polyphony
  • Dual and split voice modes
  • 2-track recorder

Cons

  • Small on board speakers
  • AC adapter and USB to MIDI interface are optional features
Yamaha PSR-E313 number pad and panel buttons

Introduction

Making its debut in 2007, the Yamaha PSR-E313 is Yamaha's newest evolution of the now discontinued PSR-E303 keyboard. The PSR-E313 is virtually identical to the PSR-E303 except for a few improvements and features which we will cover here.

Overview

With touch sensitivity, 61-key keyboard, 108 panel voices, 12 drum kits, 359 XGlite voices, 32 voices of polyphony, dual and split voice modes, 106 styles, 39 effects, two-track sequencer, music database, and, chord dictionary (phewww!), this keyboard has quite a list of features for being an entry-level keyboard.

New Features

New to the Yamaha PSR-E313 is the Music Database feature. This feature is great for those who know what kind of music they want to play but aren't sure about which voices and/or style combinations would fit just right. Music Database takes care of this by allowing the user to choose from 100 different music database programs ranging from Pop, Rock, R&B, Jazz, Latin, and more. The Music Database panel button now replaces where the Sound Effect Kit button used to be on the PSR-E303. This is the only change Yamaha made to the panel buttons.

Also new to the PSR-E313 is the option for the user to import new styles using the Musicsoft Downloader from Yamaha and downloading the data to the PSR-E313's flash memory. Although you can only store one new style at a time, nothing limits you from creating a database of styles on your computer and loading the right one when you want right onto the keyboard.

Last but not least for the new features is the new flexible Time Signature function. Before with the PSR-E303, all you could do was adjust the number of beats in a measure from 0 to 15 beats. However, the Yamaha PSR-E313 allows you not only to adjust the number of beats in a measure (from 0 to 60 beats now) but also the beat length from a half note to a sixteenth note. This gives the user total flexibility over the time signature for unique compositions.

Sounds

The Yamaha PSR-E313 has over 100 voices and 12 drum kits. The sounds are very descent and complete. Yamaha claims that the piano sounds are reproduced from stereo samples using the AWM (Advanced Wave Memory) chip used in a lot of Yamaha's high-end synthesizers. The PSR-E313 has everything from pianos, guitars, brass, strings, organs, choirs, etc.

Two-track Recorder

The PSR-E313 features a two-track recorder allowing the user to use both tracks for his/her keyboard performance or to use one of the tracks (track 2) to store style and chord change data. If you don't like one of the tracks you just laid down, simply press the track you want to record and the record button at the same time to record and overwrite the old data.

You can even export your songs as midi files to your computer where you can edit, print, and email your compositions to family, friends, and associates. The PSR-E313 allows the user to store up to five user songs in the flash memory at a time and to export them to a computer using Musicsoft Downloader via a USB-MIDI UX16 optional interface.

Yamaha Education Suite

The Yamaha PSR-E313 has over 100 songs plus you can load your own (up to five) to learn using the interactive lesson program. The lesson program consists of three lessons: Listen and learn, timing, and waiting. These lessons teaches the user to first listen then play along (the correct notes will appear on the LCD for the user) and finally playing the correct notes and timing without the music.

In addition to this, you can concentrate your lessons to the right hand, left hand, and of course both hands. You can even set loop points so you can practice a certain section of the song without having to restart from the beginning every time.

Other Features

Among other features, the Yamaha PSR-E313 has dual and split voice modes allowing the user to experiment with voice layers—sparking unique and ambient sound textures and compositions. And, for those of you who are pianists, the PSR-E313 has a dedicated Portable Grand panel button allowing the user to quickly change voices to piano and an input jack for a sustain pedal. Last but not least, the effects processor is worth mentioning too. A total of 39 effects from which 26 of them are harmony effects, 9 reverbs, and, 4 chorus.

Conclusion

With all the features, functions, and great sounds, we can't believe the Yamaha PSR-E313 has a street value of under $200! We are not saying it's perfect—the on board speakers could have been bigger but then again this keyboard runs on 6 AA batteries so power must be conserved (an optional AC adapter is available) and more user memory would have been nice, but remember this is Yamaha's entry level keyboard.

We highly recommend the PSR-E313 as an excellent first keyboard for the musician, songwriter, pianist or anyone who wants a descent keyboard for under $200.