USB Midi Keyboards

[MaestroX]

I'm looking at getting a USB Midi Keyboard to use with my new shuttle pc when I'm at college. I would rather not haul half way down England with a full sized electric piano

Does anyone have any suggestions? I'm also on a bit of a budget as the pc itself set me back a bit

So far I've found this midi keyboard (Evolution eKeys49) has a reasonable price and good features.

And there is also the M-Audio Keystation 49e MIDI Keyboard:


I've never bought one so I'm in need of a few pointers

Thanks

[Gopher]

Hey MaestroX; there are a lot of different midi keyboards out there, the number of keys varies with mileage.

On the tiny side, there is the Edirol PCR-1 which is very very portable, at the expense of number of keys and also key throw (although according to an SOS review a while ago, it wasn't actually that bad). Edirol also do a number of other ones, such as the PCR-30 (which I have) and the PCR-50 which vary mainly in the number of keys, and also number of controls.

There are tonnes of other keyboards though; Novation and M-Audio, Korg and CME do MIDI keyboards, synths, etc. (CME I seem to remember are a chinese make, and thus might be cheaper... might be worth a look).

It all depends, of course, in terms of what you're looking for - number of keys, and also the number of additional controls, such as faders and knobs. If you're like me, all you'll need are Mod and Pitch wheels (some keyboards, such as Roland, have "joysticks").

However, one VERY VERY VERY handy tool is a velocity shape function. Basically, if you don't like the way the key velocity response is transmitted in terms of resulting MIDI data, you can constrain the velocity response to a number of shaped responses, so you can set it to soft, or loud modes so that it's easier to get what you want. This tends to be quite important, as... well, face it, nothing plays like a piano except a piano, and a lot of the finer details are lost in translation, making shape functions VERY important - if not for your first keyboard, then definitely other ones.

Well, I've kind of deviated off the beaten path a bit, but... well, if you live near one, it might be worth getting down to your local music shop and seeing if they have any keyboards on demo. This is a bit of a long shot unless you're near London though.

Good luck!

[reith]

Sympathise with your problem, Maestrox. I have to travel a bit and got a laptop - partly satisfactory but useless on journeys themselves. I don't have a midi keyboard but I'd go for 49...it isn't really enough but a good compromise. 61 is starting to get a bit bulky but 37 really is small, not covering the compass of most instruments. I'd say any reasonable quality one with a few assignable controllers.

[stevel]

Originally Posted by MaestroX

I'm looking at getting a USB Midi Keyboard to use with my new shuttle pc when I'm at college.

I like the M-Audio stuff. We have Oxygen 61 controller keyboards. The 49 key axiom, oxygen and the newer lines are all good choices (I was looking at that same keystation today as a matter of fact for two Music Notation stations I'm putting together).

We also have some Edirol PCR 80 keyboards but I've had nothing but trouble with them - they lose their USB connection, I've had to reinstall the drivers a couple of times, and overall I just don't think they're as good a value (this is on Windows XP - the M-Audios are on iMacs, so that might be a part of it).

If you don't HAVE to have 49 keys, you might look at M-Audio's Midair keyboard - it's USB WIRELESS! One of my students carries his in with his laptop in the same small bag so he can work anywhere.

Happy Hunting,
Steve

[crimson]

I recently bought an M-Audio Axiom 49. It's handy-sized and is rather light (compared to my old 76-key keyboard). It's for control freaks as the marketing slogan goes, and it really does have many buttons/sliders/knobs/thingies. It even has percussion pads at the top right corner that you can drum on. The keyboard might be big enough for some live-playing, although I mainly use it just for inputting notes. I have to mention that octave switching is very easy with it as it has separate buttons for it. Here in Finland it was a little pricier than other keyboards with as many keys, so it might be reasonable to cut some costs and get a keyboard with less controls if you don't plan to use them. Otherwise I think Axiom 49 is a good quality keyboard.

[Gopher]

Does anyone know of any keyboards (any shape or size, really) that have velocity shape functions, or (even better) user-defineable shape functions? Because, frankly as far as I'm concerned, those are the best things since chicken pie.

[stevel]

Originally Posted by Gopher

Does anyone know of any keyboards (any shape or size, really) that have velocity shape functions, or (even better) user-defineable shape functions? Because, frankly as far as I'm concerned, those are the best things since chicken pie.

Most of those M-Audio (Oxygen, Axiom, etc. series) as well as the PCR keyboards have some pre-set velolcity curves. It seems that the Oxygen has 12 if I remember correctly (though I might be mixing that up with another device).

I can't recall any user definable ones (though I haven' really been looking for it) but you can certainly program your synth to respond differently to varying velocities if it's patches allow for velocity switching/sensitivity.

Steve

[chckn8r]

I don't know about the other M-Audio products, but I use an M-Audio Keystation Pro88 - it has configurable velocity curves.

Dave

[MaestroX]

Thanks for all the advice guys, this has helped me out alot! I'm going to spend some more time searching and browsing before I make a firm decision.

I've never heard of a velocity shaping function so it would be cool to have a tinker!

[chckn8r]

Originally Posted by MaestroX

I've never heard of a velocity shaping function so it would be cool to have a tinker!

Yeah, it's quite cool to fiddle with - especially when you have synths / samplers that employ layers or parameters in fine enough detail to take advantage of different velocities.

D