$310

Alright, ladies and gentlemen. Let's take a vote.

Nord? Korg? Roland? or Yamaha?

Which do you prefer and what do you play? What kind of music do you play and what do you like about your particular instrument? If cost were not a problem, would you upgrade to a different brand?

I'm not really a keyboard player, but I have an Alesis Micron. It has 8 voices, each with 3 oscillators, 2 multimode filters, 3 envelope generators, 2 LFOs, sample and hold, a programmable step sequencer and arpeggiator, a programmable rhythm sequencer for drum kits and a 40-band vocoder. It has a 37-key synth-action keyboard with velocity sensitivity, and they're full-sized keys. It's easy to modify presets and save them to a favorites area. All the funtions are done by rotary controls, inclusing the presets, whichsome people don't like. But the sound is amazing and the price is right: $400. A friend has the comparable Korg and the keys are very tiny.

i need a stage piano and am torn between nord 88 and roland rd700. can any1 advise please?

If you just want the piano part of it, go with the Roland. Hands down.

The feel vastly outshines the Nord alone. While the Nord feels a little more like a synthesizer, the Roland has a very nicely weighted touch that actually feels about as close to a real piano as you can get these days. It also has a much better piano sound than the Nord with plenty of more tweaking options.

Here are the kickers that could swing you either way:

Roland:
AMAZING, and I mean, AMAZING piano sound and customizability.
On board EQ.
Natural feel.
Decent effects and decent other sounds, including various organs and electric piano samples.
Over 200 sounds.

Nord:
Much higher quality effects over the Roland
Only about 10 sounds, but very high quality sounds.
The piano isn't as well done as the Roland and the keys aren't well weighted.
The Wurlitzer, Hammond, etc. etc. sounds blow the Roland's organ/E. Piano sounds out of the water. If you plan on using these often, you may want to consider the Nord regardless of feel issues on pure tone alone.

I should also add that the Nord is about $1,000 more expensive at $3,500, and it doesn't come with a stand or full setup like the Roland does for $2,500.

If you have any more questions the get into specifics about the pianos feel free to leave a post here. Hope this helped as a start!