M-Audio had a big role in popularizing the cheap, simple USB/MIDI keyboards that are ubiquitous today. By about a year ago, though, M-Audio’s own options were looking somewhat lacking: while still very affordable, they lacked the variety of controls on some of their competitors, plus higher-end features like aftertouch that had begun to make their […]

I spoke last night to Robb Mason, Director of Consumer Sales for M-Audio, at the DigitalLife press reception in midtown Manhattan. He was able to confirm some additional details about M-Audio’s new entry-level software product for Windows: GarageBand for Windows? That’s really how M-Audio sees this product. Their argument is that other entry-level software, like […]

Unless you do all your music work in some combination of Apple Logic (Pro/Express), Ableton Live, and/or Reason, it’s still a little premature to go buy that MacBook. Native Instruments, for example, recently updated their timetable for release. Fall sounds like the sweet spot for most musicians to upgrade, thanks to more shipping software with […]

From the forums, corporation has been kind enough to give us a glimpse at his fantastically cool studio, complete with a nicely-decorated DM2 USB control surface. The Mixman DM2 was intended as a toy for computer DJ newbies, but the hardware feels surprisingly nice and, thanks to apparent overstocks of the DM2, often shows up […]

I love CME. This Chinese manufacturer came out of nowhere with a new keyboard so overloaded with features and priced so absurdly low, initially some of the staff at Keyboard who saw it at NAMM thought there was some kind of translation error, like they didn’t understand the currency conversion. They’ve come up with bizarre […]

M-Audio isn’t the only game in town for affordable wireless MIDI. CME, the Chinese music equipment manufacturer distributed by Yamaha, has their own MIDI interface. And it looks like they might beat M-Audio to shipping a standalone MIDI interface — with a far greater range, to boot.

In a somewhat ambiguous quote in Macworld, a top Intel exec says Apple is starting to inform Intel’s chip engineering: “They push us to think about things that we may not always think about.” Computex: Apple pushing Intel in new directions [Macworld News] I say, bring it on, Apple, because Intel customers on both Mac […]

M-Audio has a new application called Session that they’re trumpeting as a Windows-only answer to GarageBand. In a story at Digital Trends (formerly Design Technica), M-Audio’s consumer group VP Tony McCall says the new app will bring some of GarageBand’s accessibility to Windows computer music newbies: “Apple’s GarageBand has done a wonderful job of bringing […]

Kinetic 2 is here for Windows, and it looks promising not only as a way of getting beginners into music making, but as a really good buy on soft synths for everyone else, as well — especially at US$80.

Since the previous story on using joysticks with MIDI and music applications, I’ve been getting more tips on how to make this work. First up is a very powerful application for managing joysticks and gamepads on Mac OS X: ControllerMate v4 The software just got a major software update, and it looks terrific. (That is, […]