#399

That’s interesting. The step editing looked pretty easy to me, with the pads being used to toggle steps. Or was it not the ease of use that was the issue for you?

And thanks for the valuable feedback!

#400

Even more if I could lose the computer and plug the Fishman Tripleplay in that would be the most fantastic gig ready guitar synth.

#401

I used Maschine as my primary DAW for a few years so this is really interesting to me! It is surprisingly full-featured for a hardware device: it has the same pattern + arrangement structure that you’ll see in Ableton or Bitwig, and just like in those DAWs you can sketch out patterns (“scenes” in Maschine terminology) and arrange them into songs, or trigger them manually to play them live.

However, my big worry about the standalone Maschine is that it’s probably going to have its own closed ecosystem of instruments & effects that you have to buy into, and whatever you buy won’t be transferrable to anything else. The non-standalone Maschine can host VSTs, and of course when you buy VSTs you can use them elsewhere too. This won’t be true of the standalone. NI probably sees it as a big revenue stream.

(Also, NI has a history of murdering its hardware devices in their infancy [RIP Kore!], so I’m concerned about that too. What if NI decides 3 years from now that Maschine+ isn’t worth it?)

#402

I think I just didn’t gel with it overall, it wasn’t necessarily difficult to work with. I was already pretty used to piano rolls :slight_smile:

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#403

i have no context for this, but i imagine the new maschinex would be something like Push2 without the need for a computer. built in stock plugins and other vsts. that would be awesome. especially if it could sequence hardware with its internal sequencer like a launchpad pro mkiii but with additional cv outs(/ins?). and if that could include max4live, i would probably buy that immediately

#404

With much of the things being thrown around in the “awesome ideas” area, I think where we start to get to is just a dedicated Live box or a dedicated Komplete box or something. Like, just a DAW in a box.

But then I start to verge in to the territory of feeling nervous that these DAW boxes will become like the iPhone of music. A walled garden where nothing is customizable and we’re locked in to the way someone THINKS we should make music. This could potentially be amazing or terrible, I won’t make any judgement. But how far does this go before we start to get diminishing returns on the concept of just having an air-gapped, controller based laptop?

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#405

Pretty excited about this.

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#406

I see many (even in this forum) commenting on the Maschine+ like this, which (and I don’t like NI as a company it needs to be said) seems weird to me. Like, if Maschine as a controller + software thing didn’t exist, and there was just another company releasing a piece of gear that does everything the Maschine+ does in this form factor at this price, I’m pretty sure everybody would just be super excited and impressed by how much feature is crammed into a hardware unit.

I didn’t see anyone worrying that the Toraiz SP-16 or the Octatrack couldn’t load any VST Plugins, and when I see everybody praising the “Elektron Workflow”, aren’t we exactly praising them for proposing a system that “locks us in to the way they THINK we should make music”? DAW in a box is hardly new there are heaps of workstations out there that basically are that even more than the Maschine+ (Korg Kronos workstation comes to mind but there are competing offers from Yamaha and others), and those are used by interesting experimental artists who do things that I don’t think are “locked” to anything. Granted this is not the typical gear this community usually use or lust after but it definitely has a community of its own and it’s put to good use by a lot of people.

So really why suddenly it becomes a problem with Maschine+ is kind of unclear to me. If we’re to compare it to competing products, it competes pretty well !

Also, another concern I’ve seen is this

And again : it’s kind of the opposite here, since for once this is a standalone product, it means that granted the build is good enough, this won’t be completely useless once the big OS have moved to new versions, and it won’t require continued support and new drivers and softwares from NI to at least be functionning and be stable enough. Which is not the case for the current controllers which are very dependent on Native Instrument’s decision to keep them up to date with modern OS to even function. A “Freezed in time” version of Maschine with the hardware of the MK3 is something that can be appealing to a lot of people I think.

Also one last thing

This will soon not be true anymore since they’re working on a (pretty massive for once) update, that’ll make it possible to go off grid in the arrangement/song building section while keeping patterns in place, which means you’ll still have that workflow, with the hability to add small edits and audio bits on top without exactly matching the bars/beats of the pattern sections (Go off grid ! Finally !). It’s a huge update that I’m eagerly awaiting because it will really fix Maschine workflow from a dumbed down clumsy ableton, to a fully fledged song building drum machine that can follow along in ableton without being completely stuck to bars and beats in a weirdly stiff way.

Edit: I tracked down the thread that explains the scope of the update https://www.native-instruments.com/forum/threads/maschine-and-komplete-kontrol-development-updates.420727/

This to me pushes Maschine in fully fledged DAW territory, and it makes sense that it comes just when Maschine+ is around the corner.

3 Likes
#407

I know is not too interesting but seeing my blank panels on Perfect Circuit has me really stoked :partying_face:

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#408

I actually think the Maschine device is really really cool. I guess my comment was a bit out there in terms of seeming potentially upset about the idea. I don’t personally have a lot of hate or dissatisfaction at the device at all. I just get edgy about what I feel might happen over the next few years.

To be honest, I’m also not all the upset about walled gardens much of the time either. The beauty of them is that done right, things just work well all the time. I think I just let my anxiety about the potential future of software being locked behind hardware walls creep through.

What they’ve done with the Maschine + is hella cool and its both a great product but a hint at a potentially different future.

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#409

I’ve decided I need my rack to be more focused and have been selling a few modules. This is the first time I’ve needed blank panels and I’ll do my best to fit your beautiful ones in there!!

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#410

To me it’s the opposite : The current state of the NI SOFTWARE ecosystem is where I feel pretty dismayed and kind of worried about the future releasing habits of the big players of software industry. But their Hardware offering might be the only push I can see in another direction for once, where users have at least a bit more control about the tools they use. So to me, your point is entirely valid except it’s kind of at odds with what Maschine + is which I think is pretty separate from the current issues about NI as a software company.

1 Like
#411

Those are totally lovely! Is there any story behind the organism selections?

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#412

these are lovely! Fantastic work, I may grab one myself :slight_smile:

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#413

Thank you so much! Blanks can be really useful to free up cable real state to access knobs.
We’ll have smaller HP designs really soon so you can fit them for sure :slight_smile:

To give a bit of background, Materia is based on Galicia, Spain. My girlfriend is the illustrator and basically we choose designs based on things that are fond to us: the rosebush is my gf’s grandma’s favorite plant, like, that’s exactly how the rosebush looks in real life; Galicia’s gastronomy is crowned by the octopus (our food is the best, period.); I have a not so little aloe plant growing in my garden, not as beautiful as in the panel though.

Expect to see more of those things, for now heavily focused on nature, may do something different later on :slight_smile:

Ah, also in 1U standard/Intellijel sizes!

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#414

Obviously I can’t fill in what @kasselvania meant but coming from a fully open ecosystem perspective it does sometimes feel like a bit of a waste that there will probably be a new sort of closed plugin standard only for NI devices (even if NI is the only one using it) when there are already (open) standards available.
Apart from that even just being able to run any of the existing binary only Windows plugins doesn’t work either.

1 Like
#415

My description is bad because I’m so overdrawn with work and my brain is unbelievable mush. But I think this device is fucking sweet on the surface but might hint at software going fully hardware gated with more ways to monetize being squeezed out. But that’s just paranoia and something that has already happened with software anyways. So, who knows

#416

Quoting C. Nolan pretty much seals the deal on it being an over-hyped gizmo that we’re all just pretending to like (I’m joking, I hope those aren’t fighting words for anyone :hugs:).

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#417

Yeah, I saw this and it reminded me why I like Make Noise’s teaser marketing over this. :stuck_out_tongue: It’s effectively confirmed to be a bluetooth speaker. I guess they could have a “trick up their sleeve”, and I am curious what that might be, but this is not especially fun hype.

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#418

Teenage Engineering will release a waterproof wizard’s rain-cap with binaural 3D surround sound ear dongles. The hat takes sonic information from the environment (“field recording”) and transmogrifies it into music you can chill / study / sleep to. This novel generative approach to music you can sleep / chill / relax to will help producers make YouTube videos with anime cover screens faster than ever before. With such a hat, one is unstoppable when it comes to relaxing / chilling / studying / sleeping. Plus you can bring it camping and it has Bluetooth built in so you can beam your generative sleeping / studying / relaxing / chilling music to your favorite camping speaker. The hat also has blue LEDs.

14 Likes