According to one of their promotional advertisements concerning the CTK-4200, Casio boasts of themselves as the creators of the first portable keyboard. While I sincerely doubt the validity of this statement (I did a little bit of research and could find no evidence to substantiate these claims), I must admit it does raise the bar a little bit in terms of what I expect from Casio products. If you claim to be the original creators of this particular type of digital piano, then I fully believe you should be more than a step ahead of the field when it comes to your model. While I’m not so sure if the CTK-4200 is head and shoulders above the rest of the field, I am convinced it is a quality Casio digital keyboard and should be taken seriously by any possibly interested customer.

Piano Buying Guide

Below, please enjoy the interactive guide that was created to make your piano purchase easier. Compare the affordable Casio CTK-4200 to the best pianos and keyboards on the market:

Photo	Model
	Casio PX-S1100
	Casio CDP-S360
	Yamaha P-45
	Yamaha NP12
	Yamaha P-515
	Yamaha NP32
	Korg LP-380 U
	Yamaha DGX 670

Casio CTK4200 Review: One Great Piano Deal

Portable keyboards come a dime a dozen on the digital piano market these days. With so many of them out there sometimes it can be hard to determine which ones really have a lot of quality. There are so many different factors and features that make up a good portable keyboard. There is first of all the size and actual portability, as every product that claims portability is not easily manageable and of a desirable size. Then there is the range of tone selection and special features, along with connectivity capabilities. In short, the portable keyboard needs to be able to perform on a wide range of categories all while being listed at a price that the consumer can deal with.

Many times this can be too much to ask for many digital keyboard companies and developers. You end up having a lot of consumers who aren’t willing to fork out their hard earned money for some of the top of the line products, and instead go searching for a cheap digital piano. Because of a climate like this it is highly refreshing to see products like the Casio CTK-4200. This is a digital keyboard which delivers on just about every level while maintaining a price that can at times seem too good to be true.

Below, please take a look at some of our favorite keyboards currently on the market:

BEST SELLERS
1) Yamaha P-45
4) Casio CDP-S360
5) Casio PX-S1100
2) Yamaha P-515
3) Casio PX-S3100

Beautiful Construction, Design, and Portability

The CTK-4200 has a real beautiful look to it. When I first came in contact with the keyboard I immediately noticed the layout of the control interface and the speakers. The speakers stood out to me as they differ from a lot of the digital pianos and keyboards I’ve seen, in that they look really nice and are covered with a kind of silver or grayish kind of mesh-like material. In my opinion it really enhances the fashion taste of the instrument and makes it a chic option for people who are into décor. The layout of the control interface is also very well put together, and I like the contrast of the black with the light color of the speakers, just as the black and white keys contrast each other.

There are a total of about 40 different knobs and buttons dispersed across the control interface, and the developers of this piano have done a good job of making them all to be useful and not space wasting additions that clutter the piano. A nice and large backlit display rests directly in the center of the interface, and the blue screen is adequately filled with finger notation, musical notation, and actual key notation graphics. This certainly is one of the better keyboard displays I have seen, and it really goes to show how much Casio has put into making many of their products a wonderful and viable learning experience.

This keyboard has 61 keys and is labeled as a piano style keyboard. This range of keys I think is great for the price, and anyone looking for more than that should step up to a more advanced model of portable keyboard.

Great Selection of Tones, Rhythms, and Special Features

The Casio CTK-4200 has an awesome variety of selection boasting 600 different tones and 180 different rhythm accompaniment patterns. Each set of tones and voices bring something new to the table, and it is an assurance than you could never finish playing around with or exhausting all of the tones and rhythms available. Among them are Casio’s world renowned grand piano tones, which have been perfected and brought to the consumer through Casio’s proprietary AHL sound source. The tones are also supported by 48 notes of polyphony which while not the largest, is still more than adequate enough to get the job done.

The CTK-4200 also comes with Casio’s innovative Step Up Lesson system, which allows piano players to choose from the vast amount of pre-loaded demonstration songs and be taught exclusively by the program to learn with both the right and left hand. There is a specific left and right hand diagram notation which will assist you in reading music, as well as the musical notation diagram which will help any person to recognize notes, clefs, and other regular appearances in sheet music.

This digital piano is fully USB MIDI class compliant, meaning it is able to hook up to any MIDI capable or external electronic device such as a computer or tablet. It also comes complete with an eighth inch audio line input and standard quarter inch headphone output, which will support the Nady HP03 closed black studio headphones that come with the Premium Bundle Package on Amazon.com. That package is also equipped with a World Tour ‘X’-Style Keyboard Stand and a Casio specific power supply. This bundle comes at an amazing price of $170 on Amazon, which you shouldn’t be able to find anywhere else on the internet.

For more on reviews of digital pianos, be sure to bookmark the Digital Piano Review Guide website!

And if you enjoyed this review, here are a few other similar keyboards we’ve reviewed as well:

4. Casio SA-76