Actually that's the first dedicated controller to catch my eye since the ancient M-Audio piano action 88 key (if memory serves, Jimmy liked that one). I am not actually good enough on keys to make use of it, but my fantasies in idle time have me buying one to practice for about a decade now. Meanwhile I work work work and the time slides by, but one can always dream!
In any case, for this Roland it's clear the knobs and pads will do Midi 2.0, but I'm curious to know how MPE is implemented on the keys in terms of aftertouch. All the initial press releases just say 'Coming Soon' for 2.0, and not much mention about PolyAT on the keys.
yeah, so hmm after digging around a little. Looks to be MIDI 2.0 "ready" whatever that means - maybe marketing. Doesn't look like they plan on MPE for this one. I guess Roland plan on debuting it at NAMM so we'll see.
The very first announcements by bloggers mentioned it as a global thing, and later it became clear Midi 2.0 was focusing on the knobs, so it may have simply been poor reporting. We shall see, agreed.
CES is where Roland decided to reach more people to unveil its new controller.
Couldn’t get answers if the pedals were reassignable per preset or constantly global.
Still nobody can get close to the Physis K4 which was discontinued.
MIDI 2.0 sounds cool though.
Better resolution is needed to sweep Omnisphere’s Cutoff Freq. knob.
It works with LFO’s but with a 0-128 Expression pedal it skips @ 9 o’clock and really chaps my ass.
If this doesn't do Midi 2.0/MPE on the keys and it's only the knobs, I would love to see a version that isn't encumbered with the purchase of an 88 key controller. Still, I expect we'll see Behringer and many small boutique makers (Midi fighter perhaps, or perhaps new meeblip/blokas style upstarts) offering such things very soon.