Casio HT-700

Very cool and increasingly hard-to-find Casio HT-700 from the late 1980s. This is much more than a typical vintage Casio home keyboard—the HT-700 is an actual synthesizer with an actual analog filer. You start with the classic Casio tones, but have control over the digital oscillator, the LFO amount, filter frequency, cutoff, attack , decay and release for bot amp and filter. It is in my opinion the king of the Casio home keyboards.

It also allows you to build your own beats. The drum sounds are from the same lineage as the PCM samples found in the great Casio drum machine of the same era, the RZ-1, and they have a very similar crunchy mid-’80s Casio character.

The HT-700’s Pattern Memory stores 10 user-programmable patterns, each up to 2 measures, plus a corresponding 1-measure fill-in. A pattern can contain rhythm/percussion, bass, and chord accompaniment. The drum part can use up to 15 percussion sounds, entered from the keyboard in real time. You don't need a ram card, but if you can find one you achieve boss level vintage Casio owner status (this one does not come with a ram card).

AND...It has midi. While i love the mini keys because they allow me to play massive extended chords with ease, the midi in and out would allow you to connect this gem to another keyboard and use it like a desktop synth.

Editing the synth parameters is done old school with a single jog wheel, which functions without issue. I don't think this keyboard has spent any time outside of the box, it's essentially brand new and never used. Cosmetically it could go to the vintage Casio museum (if such a thing exists).

It's hard to find videos that showcase the sounds, but it absolutely oozes lo-fi character.

Does not include an original power supply, but it uses a very standard supply that can be bought new for about $12 on Amazon.