Create and play with feeling – Velocity-sensitive keyboard and 16 velocity-sensitive pads enable expressive and dynamic performance at your fingertips. Buttons you'll later use to switch tracks in your DAW are used here to swap (surprisingly smoothly) between the two apps and the only glitches I encountered came when booting alternate synths in the background to play alongside Launchkey.

Whether starting out or locked in a groove, Launchkey is the controller keyboard to take you further on your musical journey. Mighty Strum Mode: Enabling users to explore new melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic textures, the Launchkey 88's Strum Mode can be used alongside arpeggiator modes to dive into some experimental tones. Ultimate CreativityExperience new melodies, rhythms and sounds flying from your fingertips with Launchkey Mini’s simple yet powerful arpeggiator. Never hit a wrong note – Scale modes transpose keys and pads to notes in the selected scale, so that you can focus on being creative and remove music theory frustration. The Novation Launchkey 49 Mk3 now includes HUI integration give you improved control over a number of other DAWs including Reason, Cubase, Pro Tools, Studio One, Reaper and more.There’s also a built-in arpeggiator with rhythmic controls and 7 playback types opening up plenty of creative avenues. Made To MoveThe Novation Launchkey Mini is their most compact and portable 25-mini-key MIDI keyboard controller yet.

With effects, instruments, sounds and all kinds of creative features included – everything you need to make any kind of music. Instead of a DVD full of goodies, your Launchkey box contains a registration card directing you to downloadable copies of Novation's V-Station and Bass Station, plus associated documentation, your copy of Ableton's Live Lite 8, and a free pack of samples from Loopmasters. During performance you can replace any sample on any pad without interrupting playback, and dragging a finger a short distance along any row activates all the loops on that row. Control release, delay and reverb or fade in experimental warped layers to add colour to your tracks and scores. You will have to learn how to setup the controller, how to make it work in your DAW and how to use it with your virtual instruments.Fixed Chord mode takes your ideas further, adding a customisable fixed chord shape that follows you up the keyboard. Coming with a copy of Ableton Live Lite, you can take advantage of the Launchkey Mk3's tactile features to intuitively control Ableton parameters on-the-fly. Novation have added a 5-pin MIDI output to the Mk3, so you can control external MIDI-compatible hardware (you’ll need an external power supply for hardware control).

You also get plugins and virtual instruments from Spitfire Audio LABS, Klevgrand, XLN Audio, and AAS. As is so often the case, the range lacks my personal ideal length for a portable synth controller, which is three octaves, and there's no 88-note version either. Novation's new controller keyboard has bright lights, friendly buttons and a newt-like orange underbelly.Th 8 knobs at the top allow for quick midi learn function in any software or digital hardware synths, and really make your performances fun!