Anyone know of a 3 octave small keyboard with din midi out that is battery powered? This looked nice but wish it was battery powered. Need something that can turn my DN into a DN keys but still be relatively portable.
WRT the mini plus, I like that the wheels look more robust and I suppose the small screen is a nice addition.
169 $? Itās 216 ā¬ (199 ā¬ Street price) here in Europe. I wonder where this difference comes from - maybe due to the different routes of the shipping containers.
Well, at least itās immediately available and still not bad for the price. Iād wait for a dark edition, though.
US prices are always shown pre-tax and itās added at checkout.
European prices always include the tax.
Itās a cultural thing. Relatively, these prices are the same.
I have one and for the price its decent. Its basically a travel midi keys for me that fits in a backpack and is powered by usb.
The keys are very āminiā, more like micro. The feel of them is not awesome. There is no aftertouch. The sequencer works, its nothing special. The arp mode/chord mode is useful since its nearly impossible to fit more than two fingers on the keyboard at once. The pads are typically MPC and feel pretty good.
It CAN do quite a bit, but the set up is kind of a pain. To make it easier there is an app, but uggggh another set up appā¦gross.
Ultimately its like ~$200 so its a good value and gets the job done nicely as a backup/travel companion. If I had to use it on a daily basis, I wouldnt.
From what I read and saw (I was looking around at the time) the reviews on this one were quite mixed. A lot of people were really positive about how (for example) the new Arturia Minilab really gave folks a lot of DAW control, where AKAI had done the bare minimum. Others mentioned how itās this wierd size thatās got unsatisfyingly small keys but itās quite big, so itās not that portable. So then your natural competition is more like a 37 key full size.
I actually think the idea is kinda stellar though, itās a nice balance of quick input device for casual desk bashing but also a serious music making tool. You got enough pads, enough keys and plenty of options in terms of plugging it into gear if thatās your thing. I think Arturia could have nailed something like this but they went down the 25 key route again.
They donāt seem to be available new anywhere, in the US at least, which is unusual w/ Akai. That combined with the relatively widespread complaints about the pads double-triggering makes me think they may be doing a hardware revisionā¦
So thereās a 1.13v apparently but I canāt ^$%^#@ look into it on AKAIās website cause the ^#^&# website wonāt allow it.
Edit: I was wrong you can download it but thereās no readme file included. So no clue whatās changed.
Has anyone got a clue whatās changed, added, fixed in the latest firmware?
I thinking about getting one but Iāve read you canāt change the MIDI to different channels, meaning you can only one 1 piece of gear at a time. That would be a dealbreaker for me and Iām hoping they changed that in the latest firmware.
Got it, unpacked it and hereās my first reaction:
The built quality already feels a lot better than I was expecting it to be.
The minikeys (which I hate in general) are quite good. Compared to lets say the Novation mini keys its like night and day and feels way less flimsy. The modwheels are small but useable as well. The buttons all have a nice clickadiclack sound and the encoders arenāt too tiny and feel sturdy. The display looks tiny af so hopefully itās very sharp. The pads are stiff but Iām guessing theyāll be fine as itās an AKAI product after all.
Tonight I will hook it up and see if it everything works like it should. If anyone has questions let me know and Iāll try to answer them.
