So, what's a review of a computer keyboard doing on EM411?
It just so happens that this keyboard is ideal for my music workstation. It has a number of surprisingly useful features you might not have considered when buying that $10 keyboard on sale at Best Buy.
The first time I saw a picture of this keyboard, I counted the extra keys above the typing surface. There are two rows of twelve. Exactly twelve! My mind started spinning, twelve keys, twelve semitones in an octave. OMG!!! Must have! I'm using this as a four octave keyboard with Reaktor, and it's perfect for how I'm playing it... I'm not playing Mozart concertos.
This particular keyboard has an interesting feature called "n-key rollover" (note: feature available only over PS/2 interface, not USB). Your standard computer keyboard, as I'm sure you've noticed, will stop responding once you're pressing about 3 or 4 keys at the same time. The Cherry G80-8113 allows you to press as many keys as you want! In Reaktor (what I primarily use) this is extremely useful for playing chords. In Renoise, or any number of trackers, performing melodies + harmonies on a keyboard, and recording, is a commonly used sequencing technique. This keyboard won't fail when you're pressing too many keys, ever!
Another great feature of this keyboard is the large number of extra keys, all of which (everything but the typing keys) are programmable either through keymap editing software (available free of charge from Cherry's website) or from the keyboard itself. The keymaps are stored in memory on the keyboard. This means that once it's been programmed, it can be disconnected, hooked up to another computer, and the keymap stays intact. No drivers or software installation necessary. No doubt, you're already thinking about how nice it would be to have all your favorite Cubase functions assigned their own keys. I don't own a copy of Bome's MIDI Translator Pro, but if I did... well, that would basically turn the keyboard into a 100+ button MIDI controller!
These keyboards are designed to be used, and abused, on a daily basis, by professionals. The mechanical keyswitches are tactile. This means that the keyswitch actuation occurs about half way down the key depress. There is a little bump when this happens, so for all you touch typists, you don't have to bottom out the keys when typing, and you can save your fingers the wear and tear. The keyswitches are also rated up to 50 million cycles! That's a whole lot of play/pause on the space bar. As far as keyboards go, this is a tank.
Obviously, from the pic, this keyboard also has an integrated touchpad. Now, I love my mouse, but it's nice not to have to bring it to a jam session, or find desk space for a mousepad.
OK, this keyboard is actually designed to be used at a point of sale terminal, as you can tell by the credit card reader. Really though, doesn't that just add to the character of this resourceful controller solution?
I picked mine up off ebay for $30 + $10 shipping. It needed to be cleaned when it arrived, but I disinfected every key and polished the whole thing up, good as new. ($200+ for a new one, btw)
In conclusion, this is a control solution worth considering for anyone on a budget, and making music with a computer.
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James Nicholl
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Electronic Music review: Cherry G80-8113
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Written September 23 2009 , Tags: keyboard
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are you being sarcastic?
Not at all. This + a nanoKontrol is the ideal controller setup for me.
I've used pads... Not a fan. Too hard, too far apart, and I don't have any use for velocity sensitivity. That's not to mention the cost. there are also some keyboards that let you record routines and assign them to a key or a key combination.
Thanks, interesting review. I hadn't much considered the potential of a qwerty as a musical keyboard controller.
these are the programmable ones: link
As an aside, an old keyboard can make an AWESOME foot controller, just rip off most of the keys, leave for example 1, C, 7, L, Home and 5 on the numpad. You can now press each of these easily with your foot. Assign to controls in live, or use whatever key/midi mapping solution you prefer! Not bad for a couple of bucks.
delete said: "there are also some keyboards that let you record routines and assign them to a key or a key combination." This keyboard can play back a sequence of up to ~24 keypresses. Press key and release key are sequenced separately, so shift-c would be sequenced: press shift, press c, release c, release shift. Also, there are separately programmable ctrl and alt layers for all the programmable keys, effectively tripling the number of programmable keys (I think also there's an alt+ctrl layer, I can't remember atm). This thing is meant to interface with POS software, which comes in many, many flavors, so versatile programmability is a necessary feature. @dach - That's not a bad idea at all! I could see someone using their laptop as a guitar processor with a couple of cheap hacked up USB keyboards on the floor. I think that probably at least one keyboard would be stomped into oblivion every set, even if just for effect. Oh, I didn't mention that I'm a cashier supervisor, so I'm very comfortable with keyboards like this, though the keyboards at my work really suck in comparison. Most gamer keyboards allow extra buttons and macros. I have one by microsoft that has a removable numberic keypad, that can be attached to either side of the keyboard. It also has thirty macro keys, which can swap between three different profiles, which work out to almost ninety macros per application as you can program it to have different sets of macros for whichever program is open.
Sidewinder x6 For musical keyboards... maybe you might want to look into the creative prodikeys series? Unfortunately, its made by creative. Fortunately, it has a 2 1/2 octave keyboard underneath the typing keyboard. PErsonally, I would rather have the music keys above the computer keys, as I type lazily with my hands resting at the bottom of the keyboard. But still, if you are looking for an integrated music keyboard, it seems like the best choice. Prodikeys
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@ Taxis - I actually looked at both those suggestions when shopping around for a new keyboard.
It seems to me that there's no good way to integrate a microKorg style mini-keyboard and a computer keyboard, so the Prodikeys is flawed in concept. The Sidewinder requires USB, and hence it doesn't have n-key rollover (the problem is with the XP USB HID drivers). Plus, I quite like the old style keys as opposed to the newer laptop style keys. I don't remember, but I think the Sidewinder uses scissor switches, which is actually a step up on rubber domes. The keyboard I've got has Cherry MX Brown keyswitches, which are very nice, and quite hard to find. The removable keypad is actually kind of cool... but, in general, I'm not as interested in gamer keyboards as I am in typists keyboards. I do still write a lot of text with this keyboard, after all. My only gripes are with the button layout. I really wish that the Windows keys were out of the way a little more. I mean, the Windows key is primarily for launching apps. So, I don't use it so much. I don't know anyone that does. Then, why the hell is it in such a prime location?!? It should be much harder to reach than Esc, IMO. Either add a function key there, or just go back to the older Ctrl and Alt only layout, which was fine. eyesnine said: " It seems to me that there's no good way to integrate a microKorg style mini-keyboard and a computer keyboard, so the Prodikeys is flawed in concept. " Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say flawed in concept, the concept itself is quite a good one. You don't get something with mini-keys because you want to use it as a master keyboard. You get it because its just easy and accessible and small. Kind of the same convenience of having a calculator or notepad around your desk. eyesnine said: " The Sidewinder requires USB, and hence it doesn't have n-key rollover (the problem is with the XP USB HID drivers). " This is where gamer keyboards become useful. Where most keyboards are designed to allow 2 simultaneous keystrokes, gamer keyboards are designed to allow for more. The sidewinder x6 allows 6 simultaneous keystrokes. And I am sure there are driver hacks to allow more out there somewhere. eyesnine said: " My only gripes are with the button layout. I really wish that the Windows keys were out of the way a little more. I mean, the Windows key is primarily for launching apps. So, I don't use it so much. I don't know anyone that does. Then, why the hell is it in such a prime location?!? It should be much harder to reach than Esc, IMO. Either add a function key there, or just go back to the older Ctrl and Alt only layout, which was fine." You can reconfigure that key within the registry. I have mine disabled. I am pretty sure there are ways to give it other functions too.
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Awesome, thanks, I've been waiting for such a thing to float onto my shores.
Taxis said: "This is where gamer keyboards become useful. Where most keyboards are designed to allow 2 simultaneous keystrokes, gamer keyboards are designed to allow for more. The sidewinder x6 allows 6 simultaneous keystrokes. And I am sure there are driver hacks to allow more out there somewhere." I was on the MS product page for the Sidewinder, and I just want to clarify what "n-key rollover" ACTUALLY means, because the people at Microshaft apparently don't. If a keyboard is capable of a maximum of 6 maximum keystrokes, that's "6-key rollover". If you can press absolutely every last key on your keyboard at exactly the same time and have every one be recognized by your software, that's "n-key rollover", where n is an arbitrarily large number. Using that term to mean anything else is deceptive, to say the least. damn that's a nice find!
ok so does any one know how to create your own hot keys for things in live specifically loading plugins on the currently selected track?
this would be such a time saver. link
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I'm not familiar with live enough to know if what you want to do is possible. If you can configure live to load a plugin on the currently selected track using only keypresses, and if it's the exact same sequence of keypresses every time, then it should be possible.
The problem with key macros is they're not context sensitive. So, any variation will be a problem. The macro might not just fail, it might epic fail (i.e. select all -> cut -> save -> quit). Page 1 | 2
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