Komplete Kontrol S88+??

I just saw the Maschine+ video and it looks really cool. You can use it without a computer. It has integrated processing, solid state hard drive and wifi so you can download new sounds and play the NI sounds you already have.

So the obvious question is... when will we get the same functionalities in the Komplete Kontrol keyboard series. The current series of keyboards seems nice (I don't own one) but ultimately they are just midi interfaces and cannot produce sound on their own. However, I would totally be interested in upgrading to a Komplete Kontrol S88+ that I could use as a stand alone keyboard without requiring booting up software on my computer to play.

Anyone have any insights into this? It's gotta be coming eventually, right?

 

doubt it.

Keep in mind that Maschine+ is really designed to be used with loops and sounds, cannot work with ant VST at all only the specifically designed devices NI have created so nothing 3rd party.

What you are asking for basically is a synth keyboard and that is not what KK is designed to do. It is designed to offer that synth kind of feel while accessing everything in your computer already. Then, at some stage you will want to connect the keyboard to the PC to record something anyway.

If you really just want a keyboard that can play sounds without a computer, go to the music store and choose any ofb the millions of models already available for that... NI really wouldn't have much to offer that hasn't been done already.

 

I mean, yeah I know I can already play some crappy sounds on my existing 88 key keyboard. And I do, of course, connect it to my PC. But, it would also be pretty nice (in my opinion) if I could experiment with the 10’s of thousands of NI sounds i have accumulated over the years. Without having to boot up the old PC.

 

I assume you mean VST sounds tho which need a PC/Mac to run so unless a whole PC is inbuilt into the keyboard (at a cost) then I wouldn't count on that ever happening.

 

But, that's exactly what they are doing with Maschine+:
https://www.native-instruments.com/...duction-systems/maschine-plus/specifications/

I has an in-built quadcore cpu, 4 gb memory, and wifi.

Would be pretty cool in my opinion if the keyboards included a similar option. Though, others may prefer a midi only option that is a little cheaper.

 

Not quite...

It cannot run VST plugins. It runs specially designed versions of some of the NI plugins. You cannot load any 3rd party VSTs on it, it is really designed to use loops and samples which is how devices like the MPC, Elektron and other samplers work... it is a sampler and sequencer and of course it has a CPU and memory but it probably runs a special version of Linux like most embedded systems do.

I get where you are coming from but I also work in tech and know that for what you are asking would require a windows operating system embedded into the keyboard to run anything more that what NI would specifically design for it and it's never going to handle what your computer can.

The next thing would be, given there are a huge variety of really nice synths out there, would you look at a NI keyboard with some basic sounds on it for $2-3K+? Just not sure there would be the market given the cost of the S88 as it stands now.