Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

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Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby Drumstruck » Wed Aug 30, 2017 1:33 pm

Brains trust..... what is good and portable?

I'm thinking of travelling but want to be able to compose and jot down ideas..... so am thinking a portable keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi??????

Thiughts?
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Re: Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby Text_Edifice » Wed Aug 30, 2017 3:29 pm

It's a bit expensive but the teenage engineering op-1 will do everything you want. Tiny keys though...
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Re: Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby Drumstruck » Wed Aug 30, 2017 10:26 pm

That's an interesting little device Dave - thanks for the link - the things it lacks are the ability to record MIDI scores and the GM soundset....

I looked at the surface devices - they're probably the closest thing to the right tool, but $4K is a lot of moola even with i7/16GB/1TB SSD.....

Probably just an electronic kb with sounds and CF card will be the answer.

You'd think there would be enough demand for something like this?

rambling thoughts....
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Re: Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby lonearranger » Thu Aug 31, 2017 1:19 pm

Have a look at the products here: https://www.sweetwater.com/c512--Keyboard_Workstations

I know its US so you would need to see what is available locally.

Apart from that a basic midi controller with or without drum pads and an iPad may also work for you. Depending on the DAW you use normally, you may even be able to upscale your projects back to your primary DAW - eg Garage Band -> Logic or Cubasis to Cubase (possibly others not sure).

Cheers
Michael.
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Re: Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby Drumstruck » Fri Sep 01, 2017 9:32 pm

Thanks Michael, I had a look at all of those. It doesn't look like anyone makes a KB with sounds and scoring capability.

fwiw I have a MacBookPro (i7/16GB/500GB SSD) running Finale 25 and Reaper with samples from EastWest and SoniCouture for my composition and mixing tool..... the MBP is struggling to run larger orchestrated songs but I probably should just persevere with it for travelling and put some money into a much higher spec machine for mixing my album.
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Re: Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby lonearranger » Sun Sep 03, 2017 9:58 pm

Hi Ian,

Looking at the spec of your Mac you may only get a minor improvement even if you drop $5K on the latest macbook pro (depending on the CPU speed). You might get some benefits by freezing or submixing tracks/sections that you are not actively working on to reduce the ram and cpu load.

Guess you will be looking at the yet to be released iMacs or Mac Pros or 32GB Macbooks. Or perhaps look at splitting the load onto multiple machines somehow - not really a solution for the road though.

Cheers
Michael
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Re: Portable Keyboard with inbuilt sounds that records midi?

Postby Drumstruck » Mon Sep 04, 2017 10:58 pm

Hi Michael,

thanks - I was thinking along similar lines to you.

There doesn't seem to be anything on the market that's portable and powerful with a 17" or larger screen - my MacBookPro is a late 2011 2.2GHz model and unfortunately they haven't really improved on it much. fwiw I'm using 16-bit samples whilst composing so it doesn't stutter too much.

When the composition is complete I'll split each song into single instruments in Finale and use 24-bit samples to export each .wav one by one. Then will load the stems into Reaper and do the real mix there - probably on a big Hackintosh..... When I've got the stereo mix done it will be off to see someone with good gear to get it mastered...... now who do I know with good mastering gear????

Then I'll be looking for someone wanting a movie soundtrack......

I'm guessing there is no demand for powerful portable composition tools - does everyone just sit in the dungeon to compose nowadays?
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