Ah, those wacky folks at CME. CME is China’s big music tech distributor and manufacturer, and for the last couple of years they’ve been wowing the US market with quite-decent keyboards priced way lower than they should be. (Their keyboards are even showing up free in software packages, kinda like a really sweet Cracker Jacks prize.) If anyone else said they were introducing a one hundred-dollar, ultra-thin keyboard, I’d scream and run away. But CME’s kit has proven to be pretty nice (Thomas Dolby seems to like his controller keyboard, for one). So the new M-Key actually looks pretty interesting.
Yes, it’s a cheap keyboard, and yes, it’s ultra-thin — which means you probably don’t want it as a primary keyboard, just a mobile backup or keyboard for programming synths in tight spaces. But it has some interesting features, like a joystick and semi-weighted keys. Specs, let’s just copy and paste here:
- 49 ultra thin, velocity sensitive, full action semi-weighted keys
- 1 x Programmable Joystick
- 1 x function button, 2 x data entry button, 1 x slider (assignable), 1 x power LED
- 1 x USB port, 1 x MIDI out, 2 x pedal connect
- USB MIDI, class-compliant with Windows XP and Mac OS X
- Firmware upgraded via USB
- Universal pedal connector, compatible with switch and expression pedal
- Note-key shortcut function
- Firmware upgraded via USB
There’s a nice software bundle, too: “Magix Samplitude SE, Arturia Analog Factory SE, Waldorf Edition LE, TruePiano demo, Keytosound Remedy VST and Musicator MW5 UF Edition.”
Press release
M-Key product page
Hmmm, $99 CME keyboard, kinda boring looking. You know what this means. Get out the paint, give it a new livery and create a music video in the process. (Unlike the good people in the picture, I do remember a little masking. Unless that’s what they meant with the line “Reject all the masks.”)
I need to get my hands on one of these to see if it’s any good. Stay tuned. And, uh, CME — forget that I said anything involving the word paint.
