Alesis Control Pad Issue

Tarron_D · Post by **Tarron_D** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 3:30 am

This is killing me. I can't get Live or any other application to recognize my new control pad through USB. It apparently has no drivers and is "supposed to just work"..yeah right...

Windows recognizes it as a "USB Audio Device", but this apparently isn't correct or something because Live doesn't see it. How do I fix this?

blank · Post by **blank** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 3:51 am

please tell us with what version of windows you work ( I assume it's xp pro ) and tell us of what kind of setup you are on. Sometimes these troubles are caused by irq conflicts and its a problem on a lot of laptop computers.

On the other hand I had the same problem with another device on xp pro.

Try uninstalling the device in the windows device manager and reboot with your alesis pads plugged in.

I assume here that the windows plug and play service is up and running without errors.

Sometimes after that windows will see 2 usb audio devices check wich one is receiving midi and disable the other in the live options menu.

If it stills not working at all, go check the windows system log in the administrative tools ( events viewer), maybe you will see what is going wrong when setting the device up.

best

Tarron_D · Post by **Tarron_D** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:00 am

Its windows Xp Home on a Desktop PC. I uninstalled the device and restarted, windows simply installed the same generic driver it has been. "USB Audio Device". Live doesn't see it at all. No MIDI applications do.

Tarron_D · Post by **Tarron_D** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:50 am

I wonder how Alesis thinks not supplying a driver is a good plan?

thelocalhost · Post by **thelocalhost** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:01 am

Tarron_D wrote:I wonder how Alesis thinks not supplying a driver is a good plan?

It's a plug and play device, it doesn't need drivers.

Mine works fine on OSX.4.10 with Live6.

However, there is quark with the device name not showing up correctly when I run the padcontrol with Battery in standalone.

Tarron_D · Post by **Tarron_D** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 9:50 am

thelocalhost wrote:
Tarron_D wrote:I wonder how Alesis thinks not supplying a driver is a good plan?
It's a plug and play device, it doesn't need drivers.

Mine works fine on OSX.4.10 with Live6.

However, there is quark with the device name not showing up correctly when I run the padcontrol with Battery in standalone.

Your not running windows, lol. OSX is at least capable of handling midi devices correctly. But in all seriousness, if anyone has any idea of how to fix this i'd be very happy, cuz it seems to be beyond my knowledge.

blank · Post by **blank** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 10:56 am

Are you plugged in an onboard usb port or you are in a pci card ?

don't you have some mess in the events manager ?

mbenigni · Post by **mbenigni** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:32 pm

I'm using one on XP Home and it works great here. What version of Live are you running?

And am I assuming correctly that when you go to the Preferences/ MIDI tab in Live you see no signs of the driver? (It does need to be armed for Track, like any other MIDI input, before Live will respond to it.)

One thing that's pointed out in the manual, in case you missed it, is that the Control Pad inputs aren't clearly named. They appear in the Live menu as something like:

USB Device Input
USB Device Input [2]

... or something weird like that. According to Alesis these should both be armed (although performance doesn't actually seem any different if I just arm the first one.) Did you already take care of this?

Also, I'm assuming you've got USB 2.0, and not 1.0 ports on your PC? I don't know whether that's a requirement, but it's worth looking into.

Don't give up hope. At $199 this is a pretty great product IMO.

thelocalhost · Post by **thelocalhost** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:52 pm

mbenigni wrote: Don't give up hope. At $199 this is a pretty great product IMO.

I think the pads are way too hard.

mbenigni · Post by **mbenigni** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:37 pm

Fair enough, but $199 for an all-in-one device you can plug directly into a USB port and play drum parts on - no trigger cables, no MIDI converter, heck not even a driver to install? I still say its a hell of a value. Obviously a drummer or someone with specific tastes or requirements might want to look elsewhere and spend more, but this thing certainly fills a niche in the home studio market.

DiGiTaLFX · Post by **DiGiTaLFX** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 10:11 pm

Yeah I think its great little device to start getting some drum loops into live with (sorry osx too and working fine but I agree with "blank" is it plugged directly into a usb onboard?).

Tarron_D · Post by **Tarron_D** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 10:34 pm

I've tried all of my usb ports, they all work the same. Im truly stumped. If its just supposed to show up in live, why hasn't it? I plugged it in, windows installed a driver, and live should have seen it...but it doesn't. Live's midi setup didn't change at all, no new inputs or outputs under any name. My first inclination was that windows must have installed the wrong generic driver, or wasn't properly recognizing that the control pad is a midi device and not an audio device, but I don't really know. I thought maybe some important services were turned off, but Plug and Play is on and running. The event viewer made no sense to me, I've never used it before...

mbenigni · Post by **mbenigni** » Wed Jun 27, 2007 2:30 pm

What version of Live? I'm on 6. If there's a pattern - eg. you're on 5 and all the satisfied users are on 6 - then it might be best to get in touch with Abe support.

Tarron_D · Post by **Tarron_D** » Wed Jun 27, 2007 8:26 pm

no, im on 6 too. The control pad works through a midi interface, just not the usb.

I have noticed something really strange though. I bought a Roland Kick Trigger to go along with the control pad, and if I hit one of the control pad's pads and the kick trigger at the same time, the kick doesn't always trigger. Maybe half the time. I thought maybe if I got it running through usb that it would solve this problem..I've certainly tried all the settings and several programs...any ideas on THAT problem..? O_o

dbolt · Post by **dbolt** » Thu Jun 28, 2007 2:42 am

Contact Alesis here is a link...They will work with you until its fixed or tell you that it needs to be replaced. All the guys ive talked to have been very knowledgeable. Phone #'s USA only

http://www.alesis.com/index.php?id=9,3,0,0,1,0