Dubspot-Livid make a beautiful mixer controller

[102455]

If your needs are slightly simpler then a Vestax VCM-600 is a good contender. I've often hankered after one myself.

[leisuremuffin]

i almost went for the vestax before i ended up with the pair of xone k2s. The knob situation is way better on the vestax, but i really need more than 6 channels for what i do live and i didn't like that the knobs were labeled cause i would want to assign them differently. I mean, obv i could just cover up the labels so that's kind of stupid, but there it is.

[102455]

There are actually two banks on the VCM-600, so 6 physical channels but 12 channels of control.

[leisuremuffin]

yeah, but that doesn't really work for me when i play live. I really like to get comfortable with the controls doing the same thing every time i touch them.

[fishmonkey]

there's actually kits out there that make it super easy to build your own usb/midi controller, and i've been tempted for a long time, but ultimately i'm just too fucking lazy.

building a straight MIDI controller is relatively easy, the real problem is how to interface the controller with your software, especially for a mixer-type controller. out of the box MIDI commands don't cut it, which is why we have the Mackie Control protocol, the Eucon protocol, HUI, etc. it's the interfacing that is the big stumbling block.

it will be interesting to see how well Behringer have nailed the Mackie Control compatibility with their new controllers...

[leisuremuffin]

maybe i'm in the minority, but regular ol' midi CCs work fine for me. Live is so flexible with how you can assign stuff i haven't had a problem using straight up 0-127 CCs. But i don't really care about any kind of automap functionality. I just save a bunch of template sets for my different control schemes.