Akai Advance 49, ends up being a headache?

[Sebastian]

Anyone?

Regarding the VST loading and browsing, Im reading around mixed reviews....


thoughts?

[miyaru]

It seems to be a difficult device to master in the first place. Second you have to like the workflow it leads you to.

On the other side, if you wade yourself through the learning curve, you have an impressive controller.

Personally, I own a Push 2, and that seems to make more sense if you use Live. It is not as versataile as the Akai, but I like the workflow.....

[Sebastian]

thank you!

[arretx]

Once you figure it out, it's pretty incredible what you can do with it.

VIP is pretty dang awesome. It's almost like it takes a single Ableton track and splits it into 8. You can use VIP to browse ALL of the plug-ins and sounds and effects, etc., that you have on your system, and then load them up into a single instance of VIP. You can control Set Lists by using the PGM control inside of a clip. You can route 8 independent Ableton tracks on a one-to-one basis to VIP and then control the keyboard using automation by mapping to VIP's configurable controls.

It's taken me a while to figure out my Advance 61, but I love it now. Has a few little quirks, like no sliders, rather knobs, but I automate that stuff anyway...

Stuck on anything in particular?

[forgingry]

Is Akai Advance able to browse and use Ableton Factory Packs?

[jestermgee]

Is Akai Advance able to browse and use Ableton Factory Packs?

Nope. Push can tho.

[jlgrimes]

Anyone?

Regarding the VST loading and browsing, Im reading around mixed reviews....


thoughts?

I have mixed feelings about it. I own an Akai Advance 61 which I use for live gigs.


The good

1. Controller quality is good to great. Keys feel pretty good (not great) knobs feel great but might be too big for some.

2. Vip program is pretty deep. You definitely can do alot with the program. Be prepared though as the learning curve is pretty high.

3. Included plugins are of high quality. Most controllers include very basic plugins. Not Akai. They include the AIR vst bundle, and the VSTis actually stand their own against alot of my commercial plugins.


The bad

1. Vip program is very deep. If you dont know what you are doing you can mess up in a live performance. I was just at a gig playing a piano sound in my left hand and a electric guitar sound with my right hand. I was wanting to turn up the volume using a knob on the multi, somehow I affected the transpose or pitch of sound causing me to mess up on stage. Not sure of what I did wrong but I guess I have the wrong pad bank selected. It is one of those programs that is pretty deep though and everyone probably use it a little different. I'm sure if I put the time in it the program would be very rewarding.


2. Controller integrates best with VIP software. DAW support so so. Ableton native support is undocumented and still on v9. Reason is not natively supported unless you have 3rd party codec. Kind of a shame such a great controller doesn't have better native DAW support. But for creating manual mappings it works fine.

3. Could be easier to create splits. It would be nice to type in values but you are stuck with clicking and dragging.

4. Tagging process takes some getting used to.

The ugly

3. Limited plug-in support. They do have a huge selection of plugins but as newer plugins get released they are having a hard time supporting plugins. It seems like they are two years behind. It is not too hard to manually add presets but it is a little frustrating when very popular plugins dont have maps.

[jlgrimes]

Once you figure it out, it's pretty incredible what you can do with it.

VIP is pretty dang awesome. It's almost like it takes a single Ableton track and splits it into 8. You can use VIP to browse ALL of the plug-ins and sounds and effects, etc., that you have on your system, and then load them up into a single instance of VIP. You can control Set Lists by using the PGM control inside of a clip. You can route 8 independent Ableton tracks on a one-to-one basis to VIP and then control the keyboard using automation by mapping to VIP's configurable controls.

It's taken me a while to figure out my Advance 61, but I love it now. Has a few little quirks, like no sliders, rather knobs, but I automate that stuff anyway...

Stuck on anything in particular?

I probably need help from you. I use it for gigging. I am just pretty slow with it. It is hard to wrap my head around at times.

[Sebastian]

thank you all for your input on this

[jlgrimes]

Anyone?

Regarding the VST loading and browsing, Im reading around mixed reviews....


thoughts?

For live playing, it is okay.

Biggest gripe is Akai isn't updating the VIP software for newer plugs. You will need to do it manually.

Also without the VIP software, the controller support could be better.

[Sebastian]

went with the NI Mk2 Komplete. Works perfect

[jestermgee]

went with the NI Mk2 Komplete. Works perfect

If you have any VSTs that are not officially NKS you may find them here:

https://freelancesoundlabs.com/nks