Does anyone know if this ever goes on sale? Would like to purchase it almost as much as I’d like to avoid paying full price 
NI sales - generally summer and winter (Noire was on sale last winter, I think).
yeah, I’ve been following the summer sale, but Noire is not on the list
Noire is my best fav Yamaha Grand. I.M.H.O. Noire worth the full price that N.I. ask.
Grandeur is another good piano (a Steinway-D), but I bought the more expressive Synthogy Ivory II, too.
I do intend to purchase Noire when it’s on sale. I recently purchased Garritan CFX Lite which is very reasonably priced and sounds great. Pianoteq is my go to for daily practice. Ivory is a bit out of my price range
Well, I know that Ivory II is cheap not at all. Anyway, if you really like the Steinway’s sound, there is “American Concert D”, which is only the Steinway, not the full collection (Steinway D, Bosendorfer 280 and Yamaha C7) Ivory II Grand. Still, it’s a bit expensive ($200) and a iLok is required.
Pianoteq is not bad, lots of pianos/keyboards for about $100 the stage version. I prefer the sampled pianos, even I heard a great enhanchement with version 6, hope in version 7, maybe 8, to listen a “perfect” Steinway
At now, lots of work is needed to sample a piano, I guess this is the reason for so high prices. So the modeled pianos will be the future.
I have purchased several of the Pianoteq libraries and have settled on the Steingraeber piano as my favorite. My default is Steingraeber Recording 2, with a little more reverb added.