Melbourne Instruments Roto-Control

I use Ableton for over 8 years now, and I’ve had this controller for three weeks. The most important part is that it feels like hardware and stepping the knobs helps me to compare slight changes, without loosing reference and staring at the screen.

Assignment:
The assignment is simple, but can get a tiny bit straining after the 10th plugin you assign. Yet once you’ve assigned the plugin, it works on all instances you load up. You should plan some time for this (I’ve currently spent nearly 2 days updating my workflow).

Haptics:
you have three options:
- a subtle indent at 12 o’clock / you can also add indents at preferred spots
- choose 2–24 steps (yet only up to 16 can be labeled; after that all labels vanish, unfortunately)
- continuously smooth

The key layout and menu navigation is well desinged, It uses a typical WASD finger positioning.

Resolution:
The pots can make very fine adjustments in the 0.01 dB range depending on the settings and the controlled plugin of course - tried via the USB connection.

MIDI capabilities:
works as expected, and I'm using the MIDI I/O to control my Synth. I had a issue which is not necessary the fault of the roto, as the synth receives MSB/LSB CC Messages, but the roto apparently gets confused when receiving these kind of data (knobs jump to wrong positions), so I had to clean up the incoming messages through my midi interface.

Negatives:
If you’ve once made an assignment to a plugin, it will always appear to the Roto in this setting. This also has a downside. for example, using an EQ in different ways (broad shaping, precise cuts, only mid or side channel cleanups). This becomes a workaround where you have to put the EQ into an Ableton Rack, by which you are consequently limited to 16 macros.

Another minor problem is bunching a lot of plugins into a single macro rack in Ableton. The Roto Control plugin selection menu now becomes crowded and makes it hard to navigate your plugins. It would be nice to have a collapse/expand option here.

Also, in Plugin Mode, it would be nice if you could expand track groups by accessing the “Func” setting; this is currently only possible through “Mix” Mode.

In General:
I highly recommend this controller. It has improved my approach to music production, which is amazing - and worth the money in my opinion.



PS: Also check out the M4L ShortcutBuddy in combination with this controller it really sped up my workflow

Diesen Controller nutze ich in meiner Band an den Drums um Logic Pro im Studio zu regeln. Sprich: Aufnahme, Volume Levels, Sends, Marker-Sprünge. Letzteres angelernt, das vorherige alles 'Out-Of-The-Box'. Es macht einfach richtig Spaß den Controller zu nutzen, da die Regler einfach traumhaft leise, genau, leichtgängig und zuverlässig laufen. Richtig schön wären einige weitere Parameteranzeigen, aber vielleicht kommt das ja noch in einer zukünftigen Software.

Genau das was ich mir von einem Controller wünsche. Funktioniert tadellos, extrem leise und schnelle Motor Potis. Tolle Software (läuft auch unter linux!), sehr detaillierte Einstellungen möglich (z.B. alle Potis auch als 14bit MIDI CC möglich - wohlgemerkt MIDI 1.0!), dadurch extrem smoothe Einstellmöglichkeiten.

Absolutes Alleinstellungsmerkmal (meiner Kenntnis nach gibt es nicht einen vergleichbaren Controller) sind die genialen Motor Potis. Mir ist nicht ansatzweise klar, wie die klassischen Synth Platzhirsche Geräte für mehrere Tausend Euros verkaufen können, OHNE Motor Potis einzubauen. Es ist ein absoluter Game Changer nach einem Preset Wechsel automatisch alle tatsächlichen Parameter Werte an den Potis direkt zu sehen. Das Problem ist bei Moog, Roland, Sequential ... ja bekannt: Sie lavieren sich mit "JUMP" oder "CATCH" Optionen durch, statt einer solche Company wie Melbourne Instruments die Sachen aus den Händen zu reißen.

In jedem Falle klare Kaufempfehlung. Der Preis ist kein Schnäppchen, aber angesichts der State of the Art Technik mehr als angemessen.