New midicontroller

Teclipse · February 18, 2011, 7:59am

Hello guys! I feel it is time for me to upgrade my little home studio with a new midicontroller. What I seek is a controller which will ease my workflow when producing and also a good at live peformance. So, I got two diffrent controllers in mind which are the Akai APC 40 and Novation SL MK2 Zero. Are there any big differences between them? And which would you recomend by your own experience or knowledge of these controllers?

I would not mind if you gave me some other alternatives too.

Cheers!

howiegroove · February 18, 2011, 5:37pm

[quote]Teclipse (18/02/2011)[hr]Hello guys! I feel it is time for me to upgrade my little home studio with a new midicontroller. What I seek is a controller which will ease my workflow when producing and also a good at live peformance. So, I got two diffrent controllers in mind which are the Akai APC 40 and Novation SL MK2 Zero. Are there any big differences between them? And which would you recomend by your own experience or knowledge of these controllers?

I would not mind if you gave me some other alternatives too.

Cheers! :D[/quote]

Well, I just sold my APC40 and my MPD and bought Maschine to conbine them. I found that I didn’t use the APC for all it was for. But I will say that the APC is an amazing machine. I dont know about the Novation piece though. Sorry.

Mussi81 · February 18, 2011, 7:41pm

Novation stuff is cool, its good gear. You would have “automap” to use with it. Some people love it some gate it. It is supposed to make mapping you’re control over midi simple. Tbh I just map direct to ableton and don’t use it.

slender · February 18, 2011, 7:46pm

Yeah I’m no fan off Automap either

Teclipse · February 19, 2011, 9:02am

Thank you guys for your thoughts and tips! Did pick up the Novation SL MK2 and all I can say so far is that I am very pleased with it! It is truly a nice controller and it seems to fit me perfectly!

chekka · February 19, 2011, 1:08pm

i have the 2sl mkii and its pretty cool

would love an apc40 as well tho! (im greedy)

Teclipse · February 20, 2011, 3:13am

Nice mate! Indeed the SL MK2 is very cool, even though I am new to it I really like it controller and it is one of the best purchases I’ve made.

I am not very into the APC 40 only tired it out one or two times, but it is a nice controller for sure!

lattetown · February 20, 2011, 8:22am

It’s funny–everyone has their own preference

Personally, I returned all my Novation gear for Akai controllers. For Ableton Live 8, I love the APC40 much more than the launchpad–configuring 8 parameters in live to the lit knobs is a breeze–and fun to tweak during remixing.

I hated how Novation’s Automap kept popping up every time I opened Live, or Logic, or even garageband–I also really didn’t like the way it defaulted to VST parameters.

Over all I find the Akai stuff feels more solid than the Novation cheap plastic parts–granted I had the Novation Keyboard and Launchpad and not the controller you got, but I have to say I was disappointed with their stuff.