Really nice groove, Michael. Glad you went with the 4 on the floor! Sharing the thought process is great too. Next question from me then is, do I get a Digitone?
Thanks! And also: Ooof! Honestly unless you can get a mega bargain for a Digitone (I definitely wouldn't recommend the keyboard version regardless btw), I'd be suspicious of considering a purchase now because in my view the Digitone would be the obvious choice for a refresh in Elektron's line-up... just like what happened with the Digitakt 2. I absolutely adore my DN as it is but I'd be VERY salty if I just bought one and a major updated version came out 3 months later 😄
I think I’m less bothered about Elektron coming up with a DN2 than the complexity and user friendliness of it (been looking at a few more TH-cam vids of it!). The reason I bought the DT was because they came out with the version 2 and the prices dropped on the OG versions so I managed to get one for just over £400. I’ve been looking at the Syntakt though! In the mean time, I’ve been looking at a new mixer. I played a gig for the first time in a while and managed to combine a couple of tunes on the DT, a small controller to play some newer tunes that I streamed through DJay Pro on the iPad and some old fashioned techno records on my Technics 1210s. The mixer is an old Pioneer DJM600 which I’ve had for 20 years and is a work horse but I never looked around for an alternative and now through the wonders of TH-cam I’ve seen the Allen and Heath mixers and think they would bring a sound quality improvement plus a way of sound blending that would suit what I come up with on the DT and iPad and the newer ones, the PX5 and the XONE 96 have sound cards that could resolve some of the tricky mixing and recording issues I have trying to use an interface! I think I probably do need to get some videos uploaded to explain my set up and how I got to this point, there’s not enough room in the comments section of your TH-cam channel, lol! That’s why your videos have been an inspiration. Anyway, don’t know what you think of all that. I’ve got a bit of money to add a mixer and maybe a Syntakt over the next few months. We’ll see. For now, I’ve been practising getting the DT midi channels to play Ruismaker apps on my iPad!
@@teknodriver Bringing a physical mixer in the mix is a subject I'm mostly ignorant about. However, with what I do know I can tell you that on paper IF the right applications could be put to work, the iPad itself can serve as your mixing surface and this implies it would free up a massive amount of space on your desk surface. The question is whether or not the compromises that come with a touch screen based approach are compatible with your goal/use case. I strongly suspect that if you're leaning towards "live performance", a touch screen based interface would be a major leap of faith, and it could never be expected to have the same level of reliability that a physical surface with buttons and faders inherently gives, so the touch screen component would have to be used as a complement to a physical control surface. I'm a complete believer in relying on an audio interface such as the RME Fireface UCX II to handle the mixing/monitoring of things with effectively zero latency and pristine audio quality. I do have the original RME Fireface UCX as my PC's audio interface, and it is also compatible with the iPad as a professional grade class compliant audio interface if I need more connectivity/flexibility. Whether you're on PC/MAC/iOS, RME's TotalMix FX application offers the core elements of the infrastructure you might need for mixing things, without occupying physical space. This gives you the flexibility to potentially bring in a much smaller physical controller to address reliability concerns inherent to a touch-screen control surface, while still leveraging the iPad to display information and to control things that are under less "pressure". It would be conceivable to make use of more than just a single iPad/iPhone in your setup too because remember the software can pretty much be duplicated across all your Apple mobile devices... In my opinion, combining AUM + a carefully selected physical control surface to take care of your mixing needs is inherently going to be much more powerful, efficient and flexibile than a bulky full on physical mixer. What I'm advocating for is definitely the "hard way" but on the other end of this gamble your reward is a setup that's immensely more powerful and efficient than investing your money on a dedicated mixer, and it's not like what I'm suggesting is cheap by any means either. Between a Faderfox control surface and an RME UCX II that's a very significant investment, but still in my experience it's almost never the cheaper solution that represents the best value. One thing is for sure: if based on my needs I somehow came to the conclusion that buying a dedicated mixer was the way to go, I would never buy a mixer unless it also doubled as a highly performant class compliant audio interface, with effectively zero latency monitoring. I can totally see how the price of such a device could easily become astronomical lol... If you look at something like an SSL BiG SiX for example, it's 2700$ USD + you're stuck with an unnecessarily bulky machine on your desk and it doesn't give you DJ mixer style functionality either so that's another challenging element of the equation to address. In my opinion decoupling the functionality from the control surface is key to unlock major ergonomics/convenience improvements. Regarding the Syntakt, in my opinion it's just not an efficient purchase in the context of having access to a Digitakt and an iPad. I've always loved the Syntakt though, even though I've never had one. In my opinion, considering the existence of the Digitakt II, DrumComputer, Ruismaker apps and many other apps available on iPad, it's extremely difficult to see the value in paying a massive premium for a Syntakt, plus it also runs hot and there's no easy way to know if in the long run that might become a problem. Yet, it inherently presents a level of polish that can only be somewhat approached by the iPad and purely out of preference I can totally see why someone might feel compelled to still make the investment. In other words, considering its price the Syntakt represents a significantly questionable value, but it's still a great product.
@@Silent_Stillness thanks so much for taking the time to reply Michael, I’m really enjoying our conversation and value your input. On the back of what I’ve seen you doing, I’ve bought Ruismaker, the drums one and the FM one and they are both sounding great. I think the Syntakt can wait, lol! I do believe in the power of the iPad for music making so I’m going to spend a bit more time integrating it with the DT. As for the mixer, I’ve been all over the place with my thinking on this. Once I saw AUM a few years ago I could immediately see the power of it. I got hold of a Beatstep to control it but haven’t given that enough of a go really. I was thinking of getting the Launch Control because it has faders which fits with how I use a DJ mixer but haven’t got that yet. I’ve got money in the bank to fund a few gear purchases but I’m trying to be thoughtful about what I get next. The DJ mixer with audio interface is a real pull at the moment as it integrates a number of different things plus sharing music is a big thing for me so playing records or streaming through the DJ app means the mixer would be used by my friends and family too, my wife occasionally DJs and I like to take the kit out for parties every so often. When I got back into electronic music making, I set this restriction of having it all on the top of the piano in order to keep it from taking over the house for starters but also restrictions can fuel creativity and it can be fun. So getting a mixer would mean having to put it on the shelf NEXT to the piano but hey, rules are there to be broken right?!
@@teknodriver My pleasure :) ! It looks like you've already solved a good portion of the equation by identifying your use case. It's pretty clear that going with a DJ style mixer is the way to go as it's obvious it would be significantly easier to operate for a larger group of people. The difficulty of where to go from there seems to be about identifying the smartest way to go about meeting these functionality requirements in the context of the iPad. When I try to think of how to solve this considering your use case I see 2 main approaches: 1. Actually decoupling your potential dedicated audio interface from your potential DJ style mixer, which would then imply that you'd have to buy both a mixer and a dedicated audio interface for your iPad. In my somewhat uneducated opinion, the purpose of such an approach is to acknowledge that it's relatively unlikely that a DJ mixer device exists out there that would be optimal as an audio interface to pair with your iPad. It's not impossible but it's just less probable because generally speaking these have been 2 different kinds of worlds historically. 2. To somehow find a DJ style mixer that doubles as a Class Compliant audio interface and that has the right footprint, the right performance friendly features, and the right specs to accommodate let's say 2 elektron machines and 2 turntables. Intuitively if I was in your position, because a proper hardware DJ mixer can really have its own appeal as a music instrument, I'd be more inclined to choose approach #1 because I'm thinking there's probably many more devices out there that are likely to excel at just being a DJ mixer and which can potentially retain value in a music production/home jam context (I'm thinking of stuff like mixers with analog filters and large rotary style faders, that kind of thing...) By decoupling functionality in this particular case, it gives you much more potential hardware options, and it can potentially reduce the cost of the DJ mixer too while giving you access to appealing unique features. The part where I'm sort of blind due to lack of experience is more about BPM syncing considerations for FX and things like that. You also can't forget that only 1 device at a time can be seen as the iPad's audio interface so this situation is definitely not obvious to deal with. Good luck with your research 😁
What do you like about bringing the Elektron boxes into this setup for sequencing in sounds compared to just using the iPad with midi controllers for example?
The iPad iOS platform's biggest weakness is precisely that on this platform sequencing hasn't been refined and isn't sufficiently polished due to the fact that developers on iOS tend to do their own thing in isolation whereas developing a state of the art sequencer (whether it's a step based or piano roll style based sequencer) is by far the most difficult task a developer could tackle. As a result, the independent developers efforts generally speaking tend to produce an outcome that never goes far enough to actually solve the sequencer problem once and for all. Elektron boxes provide the missing link to the iPad both in terms of functionality, polish but also in terms of reliability, not only with physical components as a complement to the touch screen surface, but also as a rock solid reliable instrument that integrates so powerfully with the resources that the iPad Pro provides. This gets amplified massively with the Digitakt 2 and the Digitone 2 (which I now have - the DN2 that is) as they each offer the flexibility of controlling up to 16 external MIDI tracks each. Your question is actually quite a complex one to answer so even if my answer is incomplete it's all I can manage with the time that I have, cheers!😄
@@Silent_Stillness Great reply, I really appreciate it! Yeah I do think bringing a hardware sequencer to the iPad is pretty interesting, such as a Digitakt, OXI One, or a Hapax. From the iPad side of things, what about tools like Drambo (Elektron like step sequencer), or Koala (sampler); do you think either of those apps rival the usage of a Digitakt?
@@DJ_Personal Digitakt/Digitone do transmit and receive audio over USB on top of MIDI and they effectively allow users to dodge having to invest in a dedicated audio interface (for my setup at least). The OXI is not on the same level in terms of value because of this difference even though the sequencer implementation itself appears to be compelling from what I understood (even though I have not tested it). I'm instinctively doubtful that the Hapax has the same level of flexibility and robustness of implementation as modern Elektron boxes for the routing of the audio aspect either (I hope I'm wrong on this of course). Drambo is the perfect (and best possible) example I could think of to illustrate what I hinted at in my first response to your original message. The dev behind it is a 1 man operation and represents a textbook example of someone with good intentions running out of breath and ultimately falling short of actually delivering a product with the level of polish and attention to detail it takes for it to become undeniable, specifically as it relates to the core elements of the app (the sequencer implementation in particular, both in terms of robustness and UI implementation). I know this first hand because I was close to the project for a period of time and I invested a LOT of energy in testing and reporting very significant issues to the dev. Time has proven that these serious (and at times critical) problems haven't received the attention they needed, in my discerning opinion. I have had no choice but to completely eject Drambo from my workflow within the first few months of my iPad music making journey, which deeply saddened me at the time. Ultimately letting go of Drambo was the right decision, as the most important problems I've identified with it still have not been addressed to this day and it has now been 1 year since I went for my "all out pro bono push" for the dev back in December 2023 and early 2024. I couldn't think of a worse decision than to invest time and energy on a music production platform that is profoundly flawed (in ways that aren't apparent to new users) hoping for critical core issues to get addressed only to look back a year later and to realize I've been crippling myself investing time learning to use a tool that would forever be bound to cause unnecessary friction and frustration over technicalities. I don't really want to go into details regarding Drambo's issues at this time, but at least I'll share that Drambo is effectively incompatible with key Fabfilter plugins such as Pro-C 2. In Drambo, Pro-C 2's ratio knob behaves as if it was at maximum value regardless of the ratio knob's position, which effectively makes the plugin unusable in Drambo. One year after being reported this is still going on (which is in my opinion 100% unacceptable) and represents one many reasons as to why I abandoned the tool completely. In my opinion Drambo to this day remains the self contained app that has the most potential on iOS on paper, because of how much it intersects with Elektron machines functionality and in some aspects surpasses it (I'm thinking of the Bezier curves parameter modulation implementation in particular). Based on the tangent Drambo took over the last year though, the changes it would need to go through to become the powerhouse I thought it could be from the beginning seem HIGHLY unlikely to happen, to the point where the thought of going back to Drambo doesn't even cross my mind today, even though I would happily go back to it if the critical issues related to its core elements were addressed adequately. Now more than ever, I'm completely independent from needing to involve Drambo in any way because I've committed to acquiring the Digitone 2, and I'm a firm believer in AUM as a new "music production tech paradigm defining" host, as it allows me to do things with my iPhone remote control (such as quickly navigating the UI) that neither Drambo or any other iOS host ever would. To this day I've steered clear from Koala because I do not like how it implements things like amplitude envelopes among other things. Basically it's too simplistic even though the interface definitely has some compelling attributes. I do not own Koala and contrary to popular perception it is NOT exactly a cheap product (relatively to other apps on iOS), as in order for it to become viable, multiple in-app purchases have to be made. I view it as a tool that ends up occupying a key role but doesn't offer the level of depth and control that I would expect out of a "professional" instrument as an electronic music artist looking for compelling tools. In the early days of my iPad journey, I ended up taking a chance with Sitala, which I ended up regretting unfortunately, as it didn't behave in a way that I found satisfactory in the context of my needs, and if I had the chance to switch my purchase decision in favour of Koala, I would 100% have done that. With Sitala, the main issues came down to 2 things basically: it was impossible to set the decay/hold time of a sample below a certain threshold which was still way too long and effectively made the tool unnecessary restrictive in the context of electronic music in particular, and it was impossible to put focus on a sound corresponding to a pad without actually triggering the sound in the process, which is very disruptive in the context of building a live groove from scratch using step sequencers (it constantly breaks the immersion - similar problems with Drambo btw). I gave feedback to the developer who acknowledged my message, but 1 year later nothing was done and I added Sitala to my "wasted money" purchase list (which only exists in my mind LOL!) . To my knowledge none of the sampler (or sample player) style apps on iOS offer functionality that even remotely approaches what the Digitakt does even though the lines are getting blurred as the platform evolves. Drumcomputer sort of blurs the lines for example. Even the recent mega release of OneShot by Klevgrand on iOS has some deal breaking flaws that I was fortunately able to pinpoint with the PC version before making the mistake of committing to a purchase, the main flaw being that the decay parameter of a sound is not exposed by the plugin to the host due to the fundamental structure of how objects are arranged in Oneshot, which means that OneShot is incompatible to be used within the context of a parameter locking capable sequencer such as the Digitakt/Digitone sequencer. It's fundamentally not meant to deal with electronic music sounds as modulating decay of percussion sounds is THE most important bread & butter move I rely on to inject depth in my music. At some point an app named Async Sampler emerged which on paper had some potential but the devs behind it were committed to keeping that instrument limited to some sort of experimental music tool concept, which ended up heavily restricting its versatility (especially again with managing amplitude envelope and LFO behaviour) and therefore pretty much lost most of its appeal for my use case as it was lacking key features (I was offered the app for free after discussing with the dev as I was asking very specific info that was not obvious to deduce - which ultimately confirmed that the app was not for me). Lastly on the sequencer front, the Prism sequencer is emerging (I do not own it but I'm following its evolution) but again the "theme" of a "one man operation"' app being almost invariably guaranteed to be underdeveloped instantly jumps to mind. I 100% admire the dev's efforts though that's for sure. At the end of the day I want to use my tools to make music as opposed to becoming a full time unpaid tester, so every single time I would recommend the Elektron Digitakt 2 or Digitone 2 to resolve the sequencer problem at the source. Hopefully by now it should be much more obvious why modern Elektron boxes are THE single most important item to pair with an iPad. Cheers!😅
@@Silent_Stillness Incredible response, and very very helpful by the way, so I appreciate it greatly. What I hear is that while iPad has some absolutely incredible sound sources (synths), as well as effects available, competing with the sequencing and sampling capabilities of a company like Elektron with the years of expertise and testing is just no realistic for iOS developers. One more slightly related question if you don't mind: What's the primary benefit of bringing the Digitone 2 to the setup when there are so many great synths on the iPad? Is it primarily to have the extra tracks of Elektron MIDI sequencing power with the bonus of internal sound design?
@@DJ_Personal In my mind when it comes to involving the Digitone 2 it's not a matter of just 1 single primary benefit, it's a combination of many key factors: 1. It acts as a class compliant audio interface (although a very minimal one) 2. It opens up the possibility of sequencing 16 tracks within just one machine, up to 16 of which can be dedicated to act as purely MIDI tracks to control external instruments (AUv3 plugins on iPad). 3. For the first time in Elektron machines history, up to 16 CC parameters can be mapped PER MIDI track (destined to control external instruments) which are accessible over 2 distinct pages at the tap of 1 button (no key combination or multi button press cycling needed) 4. All of these parameters can now actually be NAMED (as opposed to what can currently be achieved on the original Digitakt/Digitone) 5. All of these 16 mappable external CC parameter control slots enable external instruments to effectively be massively augmented by the KEY Elektron sequencer parameter locking functionality (a "signature" parameter value modulation system/methodology), and this effectively allows the user to break free from the need to rely on Elektron Machines as sound generators while maintaining access to p-locking, which opens up a world of possibilities (with the limitation that each of these mapped CC parameters can only be controlled with a resolution of 128 - it's low outdated MIDI resolution and without the option of involving NRPN stuff basically). The AUv3s controlled DO need to be responsive enough to be compatible with p-locking though and there's no control on Elektron boxes to apply a negative timing offset specifically for p-locking data. Still, there's a lot to work with, especially with the LFOs that can also control external MIDI. 6. All the intricate configurations that a user would want to make over a MIDI track on the Digitone 2 can now be saved as a MIDI machine preset (and therefore recalled), which represents an unfathomably important step towards seamlessly being able to adapt the Digitone 2 (and the Digitakt 2) MIDI tracks to whatever AUv3 plugin the user wants to control for a particular project. By comparison, with the first iteration of the DT/DN this was much more difficult to manage but between the 2 machines there was just a maximum of 12 total MIDI tracks available to control external stuff, and each track could only have 8 CC parameters mapped. With the DT2/DN2 combo there would be a theoretical (although unlikely to be used) limit of 32 MIDI tracks available to control external instruments, which would be unmanageable without the addition of the MIDI machine concept. 7. The Digitone 2 drum engine effectively surpasses anything that exists on iOS on top of not being bound by the resolution of 128 for all of its parameters (in modern Elektron boxes, many key controls - but not all - have a resolution with 2 added decimals of precision which dramatically augments the potential (and therefore appeal) of the instruments as this detail effectively pushes these machines in "premium quality sound generators" territory. The internal engine itself operates at a CRITICALLY important 48kHz/24bit resolution. 8. On iOS, once you start doing some heavy processing to significantly elevate the perceived audio quality of all the elements in your production, if you involve "advanced" synthesizers in your project it's not difficult to build an AUM project to a complexity level where it hits the limits of what can be sustained with perfect stability for very long periods of time on the iPad (I'm talking 3h+, basically 100% flawless). What the iPad Pro can sustain for long periods of time is MUCH less than what it can sustain without any error for short periods of time, due to thermal considerations. In that context, having access to up to 16 simultaneously accessible high quality additional timbres (distinct synth sounds) that don't tax the iPad CPU in any way becomes critically important. 9. The immediacy (and ultra low latency) of having access to synth sounds while interacting with physical buttons (which represents an user input error tolerant interface by contrast with the iPad's touch screen surface) is priceless, as it effectively allows the user to access an ultra low latency physical MIDI controller device WITHOUT invariably needing to involve an additional external MIDI controller like a keyboard or pads which would disrupt the ergonomics of my highly immersive setup. With TWO Elektron boxes all of a sudden it becomes possible to physically/manually control multiple instruments in parallel (while potentially playing different notes on different instruments) which is incredibly beneficial/flexible during the creative process. That about sums it up (even though I'm probably still missing some important stuff). By your questions I can tell you're probably the type of person that would see the value in the dedicated content I already released revolving around this kind of topic, even though these comments I'm writing to you represent the first time on my channel that I release information articulated like this specifically as it relates to the inclusion of the Digitakt 2/Digitone 2 in an iPad based setup. You might want to have a look at these in particular: *Real Talk & Chill #1: The future of music production on iOS and the platform's issues* th-cam.com/video/uUUm0HhOIx4/w-d-xo.html *Real Talk & Chill #2: The iPad Pro's touch screen potential to revolutionize electronic music* th-cam.com/video/I-dw478XVKs/w-d-xo.html
*INTERESTED IN A PRIVATE COACHING SESSION?*
Have a look at the video description for details!😎
Really nice groove, Michael. Glad you went with the 4 on the floor! Sharing the thought process is great too. Next question from me then is, do I get a Digitone?
Thanks! And also: Ooof! Honestly unless you can get a mega bargain for a Digitone (I definitely wouldn't recommend the keyboard version regardless btw), I'd be suspicious of considering a purchase now because in my view the Digitone would be the obvious choice for a refresh in Elektron's line-up... just like what happened with the Digitakt 2. I absolutely adore my DN as it is but I'd be VERY salty if I just bought one and a major updated version came out 3 months later 😄
I think I’m less bothered about Elektron coming up with a DN2 than the complexity and user friendliness of it (been looking at a few more TH-cam vids of it!). The reason I bought the DT was because they came out with the version 2 and the prices dropped on the OG versions so I managed to get one for just over £400. I’ve been looking at the Syntakt though!
In the mean time, I’ve been looking at a new mixer. I played a gig for the first time in a while and managed to combine a couple of tunes on the DT, a small controller to play some newer tunes that I streamed through DJay Pro on the iPad and some old fashioned techno records on my Technics 1210s. The mixer is an old Pioneer DJM600 which I’ve had for 20 years and is a work horse but I never looked around for an alternative and now through the wonders of TH-cam I’ve seen the Allen and Heath mixers and think they would bring a sound quality improvement plus a way of sound blending that would suit what I come up with on the DT and iPad and the newer ones, the PX5 and the XONE 96 have sound cards that could resolve some of the tricky mixing and recording issues I have trying to use an interface!
I think I probably do need to get some videos uploaded to explain my set up and how I got to this point, there’s not enough room in the comments section of your TH-cam channel, lol! That’s why your videos have been an inspiration.
Anyway, don’t know what you think of all that. I’ve got a bit of money to add a mixer and maybe a Syntakt over the next few months. We’ll see. For now, I’ve been practising getting the DT midi channels to play Ruismaker apps on my iPad!
@@teknodriver Bringing a physical mixer in the mix is a subject I'm mostly ignorant about. However, with what I do know I can tell you that on paper IF the right applications could be put to work, the iPad itself can serve as your mixing surface and this implies it would free up a massive amount of space on your desk surface. The question is whether or not the compromises that come with a touch screen based approach are compatible with your goal/use case. I strongly suspect that if you're leaning towards "live performance", a touch screen based interface would be a major leap of faith, and it could never be expected to have the same level of reliability that a physical surface with buttons and faders inherently gives, so the touch screen component would have to be used as a complement to a physical control surface.
I'm a complete believer in relying on an audio interface such as the RME Fireface UCX II to handle the mixing/monitoring of things with effectively zero latency and pristine audio quality. I do have the original RME Fireface UCX as my PC's audio interface, and it is also compatible with the iPad as a professional grade class compliant audio interface if I need more connectivity/flexibility. Whether you're on PC/MAC/iOS, RME's TotalMix FX application offers the core elements of the infrastructure you might need for mixing things, without occupying physical space. This gives you the flexibility to potentially bring in a much smaller physical controller to address reliability concerns inherent to a touch-screen control surface, while still leveraging the iPad to display information and to control things that are under less "pressure". It would be conceivable to make use of more than just a single iPad/iPhone in your setup too because remember the software can pretty much be duplicated across all your Apple mobile devices...
In my opinion, combining AUM + a carefully selected physical control surface to take care of your mixing needs is inherently going to be much more powerful, efficient and flexibile than a bulky full on physical mixer. What I'm advocating for is definitely the "hard way" but on the other end of this gamble your reward is a setup that's immensely more powerful and efficient than investing your money on a dedicated mixer, and it's not like what I'm suggesting is cheap by any means either. Between a Faderfox control surface and an RME UCX II that's a very significant investment, but still in my experience it's almost never the cheaper solution that represents the best value. One thing is for sure: if based on my needs I somehow came to the conclusion that buying a dedicated mixer was the way to go, I would never buy a mixer unless it also doubled as a highly performant class compliant audio interface, with effectively zero latency monitoring. I can totally see how the price of such a device could easily become astronomical lol... If you look at something like an SSL BiG SiX for example, it's 2700$ USD + you're stuck with an unnecessarily bulky machine on your desk and it doesn't give you DJ mixer style functionality either so that's another challenging element of the equation to address. In my opinion decoupling the functionality from the control surface is key to unlock major ergonomics/convenience improvements.
Regarding the Syntakt, in my opinion it's just not an efficient purchase in the context of having access to a Digitakt and an iPad. I've always loved the Syntakt though, even though I've never had one. In my opinion, considering the existence of the Digitakt II, DrumComputer, Ruismaker apps and many other apps available on iPad, it's extremely difficult to see the value in paying a massive premium for a Syntakt, plus it also runs hot and there's no easy way to know if in the long run that might become a problem. Yet, it inherently presents a level of polish that can only be somewhat approached by the iPad and purely out of preference I can totally see why someone might feel compelled to still make the investment. In other words, considering its price the Syntakt represents a significantly questionable value, but it's still a great product.
@@Silent_Stillness thanks so much for taking the time to reply Michael, I’m really enjoying our conversation and value your input. On the back of what I’ve seen you doing, I’ve bought Ruismaker, the drums one and the FM one and they are both sounding great. I think the Syntakt can wait, lol! I do believe in the power of the iPad for music making so I’m going to spend a bit more time integrating it with the DT.
As for the mixer, I’ve been all over the place with my thinking on this. Once I saw AUM a few years ago I could immediately see the power of it. I got hold of a Beatstep to control it but haven’t given that enough of a go really. I was thinking of getting the Launch Control because it has faders which fits with how I use a DJ mixer but haven’t got that yet. I’ve got money in the bank to fund a few gear purchases but I’m trying to be thoughtful about what I get next.
The DJ mixer with audio interface is a real pull at the moment as it integrates a number of different things plus sharing music is a big thing for me so playing records or streaming through the DJ app means the mixer would be used by my friends and family too, my wife occasionally DJs and I like to take the kit out for parties every so often.
When I got back into electronic music making, I set this restriction of having it all on the top of the piano in order to keep it from taking over the house for starters but also restrictions can fuel creativity and it can be fun. So getting a mixer would mean having to put it on the shelf NEXT to the piano but hey, rules are there to be broken right?!
@@teknodriver My pleasure :) ! It looks like you've already solved a good portion of the equation by identifying your use case. It's pretty clear that going with a DJ style mixer is the way to go as it's obvious it would be significantly easier to operate for a larger group of people. The difficulty of where to go from there seems to be about identifying the smartest way to go about meeting these functionality requirements in the context of the iPad.
When I try to think of how to solve this considering your use case I see 2 main approaches:
1. Actually decoupling your potential dedicated audio interface from your potential DJ style mixer, which would then imply that you'd have to buy both a mixer and a dedicated audio interface for your iPad. In my somewhat uneducated opinion, the purpose of such an approach is to acknowledge that it's relatively unlikely that a DJ mixer device exists out there that would be optimal as an audio interface to pair with your iPad. It's not impossible but it's just less probable because generally speaking these have been 2 different kinds of worlds historically.
2. To somehow find a DJ style mixer that doubles as a Class Compliant audio interface and that has the right footprint, the right performance friendly features, and the right specs to accommodate let's say 2 elektron machines and 2 turntables.
Intuitively if I was in your position, because a proper hardware DJ mixer can really have its own appeal as a music instrument, I'd be more inclined to choose approach #1 because I'm thinking there's probably many more devices out there that are likely to excel at just being a DJ mixer and which can potentially retain value in a music production/home jam context (I'm thinking of stuff like mixers with analog filters and large rotary style faders, that kind of thing...)
By decoupling functionality in this particular case, it gives you much more potential hardware options, and it can potentially reduce the cost of the DJ mixer too while giving you access to appealing unique features. The part where I'm sort of blind due to lack of experience is more about BPM syncing considerations for FX and things like that. You also can't forget that only 1 device at a time can be seen as the iPad's audio interface so this situation is definitely not obvious to deal with. Good luck with your research 😁
What do you like about bringing the Elektron boxes into this setup for sequencing in sounds compared to just using the iPad with midi controllers for example?
The iPad iOS platform's biggest weakness is precisely that on this platform sequencing hasn't been refined and isn't sufficiently polished due to the fact that developers on iOS tend to do their own thing in isolation whereas developing a state of the art sequencer (whether it's a step based or piano roll style based sequencer) is by far the most difficult task a developer could tackle. As a result, the independent developers efforts generally speaking tend to produce an outcome that never goes far enough to actually solve the sequencer problem once and for all. Elektron boxes provide the missing link to the iPad both in terms of functionality, polish but also in terms of reliability, not only with physical components as a complement to the touch screen surface, but also as a rock solid reliable instrument that integrates so powerfully with the resources that the iPad Pro provides. This gets amplified massively with the Digitakt 2 and the Digitone 2 (which I now have - the DN2 that is) as they each offer the flexibility of controlling up to 16 external MIDI tracks each. Your question is actually quite a complex one to answer so even if my answer is incomplete it's all I can manage with the time that I have, cheers!😄
@@Silent_Stillness Great reply, I really appreciate it!
Yeah I do think bringing a hardware sequencer to the iPad is pretty interesting, such as a Digitakt, OXI One, or a Hapax.
From the iPad side of things, what about tools like Drambo (Elektron like step sequencer), or Koala (sampler); do you think either of those apps rival the usage of a Digitakt?
@@DJ_Personal Digitakt/Digitone do transmit and receive audio over USB on top of MIDI and they effectively allow users to dodge having to invest in a dedicated audio interface (for my setup at least). The OXI is not on the same level in terms of value because of this difference even though the sequencer implementation itself appears to be compelling from what I understood (even though I have not tested it). I'm instinctively doubtful that the Hapax has the same level of flexibility and robustness of implementation as modern Elektron boxes for the routing of the audio aspect either (I hope I'm wrong on this of course).
Drambo is the perfect (and best possible) example I could think of to illustrate what I hinted at in my first response to your original message. The dev behind it is a 1 man operation and represents a textbook example of someone with good intentions running out of breath and ultimately falling short of actually delivering a product with the level of polish and attention to detail it takes for it to become undeniable, specifically as it relates to the core elements of the app (the sequencer implementation in particular, both in terms of robustness and UI implementation). I know this first hand because I was close to the project for a period of time and I invested a LOT of energy in testing and reporting very significant issues to the dev. Time has proven that these serious (and at times critical) problems haven't received the attention they needed, in my discerning opinion.
I have had no choice but to completely eject Drambo from my workflow within the first few months of my iPad music making journey, which deeply saddened me at the time. Ultimately letting go of Drambo was the right decision, as the most important problems I've identified with it still have not been addressed to this day and it has now been 1 year since I went for my "all out pro bono push" for the dev back in December 2023 and early 2024. I couldn't think of a worse decision than to invest time and energy on a music production platform that is profoundly flawed (in ways that aren't apparent to new users) hoping for critical core issues to get addressed only to look back a year later and to realize I've been crippling myself investing time learning to use a tool that would forever be bound to cause unnecessary friction and frustration over technicalities. I don't really want to go into details regarding Drambo's issues at this time, but at least I'll share that Drambo is effectively incompatible with key Fabfilter plugins such as Pro-C 2. In Drambo, Pro-C 2's ratio knob behaves as if it was at maximum value regardless of the ratio knob's position, which effectively makes the plugin unusable in Drambo. One year after being reported this is still going on (which is in my opinion 100% unacceptable) and represents one many reasons as to why I abandoned the tool completely.
In my opinion Drambo to this day remains the self contained app that has the most potential on iOS on paper, because of how much it intersects with Elektron machines functionality and in some aspects surpasses it (I'm thinking of the Bezier curves parameter modulation implementation in particular). Based on the tangent Drambo took over the last year though, the changes it would need to go through to become the powerhouse I thought it could be from the beginning seem HIGHLY unlikely to happen, to the point where the thought of going back to Drambo doesn't even cross my mind today, even though I would happily go back to it if the critical issues related to its core elements were addressed adequately. Now more than ever, I'm completely independent from needing to involve Drambo in any way because I've committed to acquiring the Digitone 2, and I'm a firm believer in AUM as a new "music production tech paradigm defining" host, as it allows me to do things with my iPhone remote control (such as quickly navigating the UI) that neither Drambo or any other iOS host ever would.
To this day I've steered clear from Koala because I do not like how it implements things like amplitude envelopes among other things. Basically it's too simplistic even though the interface definitely has some compelling attributes. I do not own Koala and contrary to popular perception it is NOT exactly a cheap product (relatively to other apps on iOS), as in order for it to become viable, multiple in-app purchases have to be made. I view it as a tool that ends up occupying a key role but doesn't offer the level of depth and control that I would expect out of a "professional" instrument as an electronic music artist looking for compelling tools. In the early days of my iPad journey, I ended up taking a chance with Sitala, which I ended up regretting unfortunately, as it didn't behave in a way that I found satisfactory in the context of my needs, and if I had the chance to switch my purchase decision in favour of Koala, I would 100% have done that. With Sitala, the main issues came down to 2 things basically: it was impossible to set the decay/hold time of a sample below a certain threshold which was still way too long and effectively made the tool unnecessary restrictive in the context of electronic music in particular, and it was impossible to put focus on a sound corresponding to a pad without actually triggering the sound in the process, which is very disruptive in the context of building a live groove from scratch using step sequencers (it constantly breaks the immersion - similar problems with Drambo btw). I gave feedback to the developer who acknowledged my message, but 1 year later nothing was done and I added Sitala to my "wasted money" purchase list (which only exists in my mind LOL!) .
To my knowledge none of the sampler (or sample player) style apps on iOS offer functionality that even remotely approaches what the Digitakt does even though the lines are getting blurred as the platform evolves. Drumcomputer sort of blurs the lines for example. Even the recent mega release of OneShot by Klevgrand on iOS has some deal breaking flaws that I was fortunately able to pinpoint with the PC version before making the mistake of committing to a purchase, the main flaw being that the decay parameter of a sound is not exposed by the plugin to the host due to the fundamental structure of how objects are arranged in Oneshot, which means that OneShot is incompatible to be used within the context of a parameter locking capable sequencer such as the Digitakt/Digitone sequencer. It's fundamentally not meant to deal with electronic music sounds as modulating decay of percussion sounds is THE most important bread & butter move I rely on to inject depth in my music. At some point an app named Async Sampler emerged which on paper had some potential but the devs behind it were committed to keeping that instrument limited to some sort of experimental music tool concept, which ended up heavily restricting its versatility (especially again with managing amplitude envelope and LFO behaviour) and therefore pretty much lost most of its appeal for my use case as it was lacking key features (I was offered the app for free after discussing with the dev as I was asking very specific info that was not obvious to deduce - which ultimately confirmed that the app was not for me). Lastly on the sequencer front, the Prism sequencer is emerging (I do not own it but I'm following its evolution) but again the "theme" of a "one man operation"' app being almost invariably guaranteed to be underdeveloped instantly jumps to mind. I 100% admire the dev's efforts though that's for sure. At the end of the day I want to use my tools to make music as opposed to becoming a full time unpaid tester, so every single time I would recommend the Elektron Digitakt 2 or Digitone 2 to resolve the sequencer problem at the source.
Hopefully by now it should be much more obvious why modern Elektron boxes are THE single most important item to pair with an iPad. Cheers!😅
@@Silent_Stillness Incredible response, and very very helpful by the way, so I appreciate it greatly.
What I hear is that while iPad has some absolutely incredible sound sources (synths), as well as effects available, competing with the sequencing and sampling capabilities of a company like Elektron with the years of expertise and testing is just no realistic for iOS developers.
One more slightly related question if you don't mind: What's the primary benefit of bringing the Digitone 2 to the setup when there are so many great synths on the iPad? Is it primarily to have the extra tracks of Elektron MIDI sequencing power with the bonus of internal sound design?
@@DJ_Personal In my mind when it comes to involving the Digitone 2 it's not a matter of just 1 single primary benefit, it's a combination of many key factors:
1. It acts as a class compliant audio interface (although a very minimal one)
2. It opens up the possibility of sequencing 16 tracks within just one machine, up to 16 of which can be dedicated to act as purely MIDI tracks to control external instruments (AUv3 plugins on iPad).
3. For the first time in Elektron machines history, up to 16 CC parameters can be mapped PER MIDI track (destined to control external instruments) which are accessible over 2 distinct pages at the tap of 1 button (no key combination or multi button press cycling needed)
4. All of these parameters can now actually be NAMED (as opposed to what can currently be achieved on the original Digitakt/Digitone)
5. All of these 16 mappable external CC parameter control slots enable external instruments to effectively be massively augmented by the KEY Elektron sequencer parameter locking functionality (a "signature" parameter value modulation system/methodology), and this effectively allows the user to break free from the need to rely on Elektron Machines as sound generators while maintaining access to p-locking, which opens up a world of possibilities (with the limitation that each of these mapped CC parameters can only be controlled with a resolution of 128 - it's low outdated MIDI resolution and without the option of involving NRPN stuff basically). The AUv3s controlled DO need to be responsive enough to be compatible with p-locking though and there's no control on Elektron boxes to apply a negative timing offset specifically for p-locking data. Still, there's a lot to work with, especially with the LFOs that can also control external MIDI.
6. All the intricate configurations that a user would want to make over a MIDI track on the Digitone 2 can now be saved as a MIDI machine preset (and therefore recalled), which represents an unfathomably important step towards seamlessly being able to adapt the Digitone 2 (and the Digitakt 2) MIDI tracks to whatever AUv3 plugin the user wants to control for a particular project. By comparison, with the first iteration of the DT/DN this was much more difficult to manage but between the 2 machines there was just a maximum of 12 total MIDI tracks available to control external stuff, and each track could only have 8 CC parameters mapped. With the DT2/DN2 combo there would be a theoretical (although unlikely to be used) limit of 32 MIDI tracks available to control external instruments, which would be unmanageable without the addition of the MIDI machine concept.
7. The Digitone 2 drum engine effectively surpasses anything that exists on iOS on top of not being bound by the resolution of 128 for all of its parameters (in modern Elektron boxes, many key controls - but not all - have a resolution with 2 added decimals of precision which dramatically augments the potential (and therefore appeal) of the instruments as this detail effectively pushes these machines in "premium quality sound generators" territory. The internal engine itself operates at a CRITICALLY important 48kHz/24bit resolution.
8. On iOS, once you start doing some heavy processing to significantly elevate the perceived audio quality of all the elements in your production, if you involve "advanced" synthesizers in your project it's not difficult to build an AUM project to a complexity level where it hits the limits of what can be sustained with perfect stability for very long periods of time on the iPad (I'm talking 3h+, basically 100% flawless). What the iPad Pro can sustain for long periods of time is MUCH less than what it can sustain without any error for short periods of time, due to thermal considerations. In that context, having access to up to 16 simultaneously accessible high quality additional timbres (distinct synth sounds) that don't tax the iPad CPU in any way becomes critically important.
9. The immediacy (and ultra low latency) of having access to synth sounds while interacting with physical buttons (which represents an user input error tolerant interface by contrast with the iPad's touch screen surface) is priceless, as it effectively allows the user to access an ultra low latency physical MIDI controller device WITHOUT invariably needing to involve an additional external MIDI controller like a keyboard or pads which would disrupt the ergonomics of my highly immersive setup. With TWO Elektron boxes all of a sudden it becomes possible to physically/manually control multiple instruments in parallel (while potentially playing different notes on different instruments) which is incredibly beneficial/flexible during the creative process.
That about sums it up (even though I'm probably still missing some important stuff). By your questions I can tell you're probably the type of person that would see the value in the dedicated content I already released revolving around this kind of topic, even though these comments I'm writing to you represent the first time on my channel that I release information articulated like this specifically as it relates to the inclusion of the Digitakt 2/Digitone 2 in an iPad based setup.
You might want to have a look at these in particular:
*Real Talk & Chill #1: The future of music production on iOS and the platform's issues*
th-cam.com/video/uUUm0HhOIx4/w-d-xo.html
*Real Talk & Chill #2: The iPad Pro's touch screen potential to revolutionize electronic music*
th-cam.com/video/I-dw478XVKs/w-d-xo.html