Performane question about Keylab

[realhelp]

Hi Arturia --

I just received an ad for the Keylab 61 and I have a few questions.  I am a performance keyboardist who does NOT use a laptop or other computer on stage (I have a desktop system I can use at home to configure), but I use three MIDI keyboards. 

(Please note: There are a lot of reasons I don't want to drag a laptop to a gig, but one reason is that I don't own one suitable and have no plans to buy one.  Also, I am an accomplished professional jazz/rock pianist/synthesist and I really dislike the ASIO/CoreAudio latency of just about everything out there - if that doesn't bother you, then great, but I play very fast and it's quite annoying.  So I will be sticking to hardware synths for quite a while).

I also understand that a lot of keyboard synths today really require a laptop, so if the Keylab isn't for me, that's fine.

So I have a couple of questions:

1.   Is the Keylab a standalone synthesizer with onboard sounds, or is it just a MIDI controller when used without a laptop?

2.   If it is a standalone synth with onboard sounds, can those sounds be modified in real time (ie changing cutoff freq, filter attack, etc) during performance WITHOUT a laptop?  It’s OK for me if the main synth programming is done at home WITH a computer.

3a.   It would be great also if I could define multiple keyboard zones, some of which are MIDI zones, so I can control other keyboards/modules in my rig.  Can the Keylab split the keyboard into multiple zones and play for example an external MIDI module with one zone while playing an onboard MiniMg V sound with another key zone?

3b.   If you can split the keyboard into multiple zones as I just mentioned, can these zone configurations (aka “templates” using Novation X-Station parlance) be saved as internal presets (again, with no laptop involved)?  If so, can each zone send out a MIDI bank select and program change message automatically whenever that preset is selected, so my modules will be playing the right sounds at that time?

4.   If zone configs or templates can be saved, how many presets can be stored onboard?  I really need at least 80, and ideally it would be great to have 128 or even more if possible.

Thanks!

[Adrien]

Hi

1 -> It is an evolution of the old MIDI keyboard controllers.

You can set the MIDI channel .

i'm sorry but for what you want you should more look at a workstation perhaps.

Best

[realhelp]

OK, I'm not sure why you gave such a terse answer, but it would help me to understand better if you had answered my questions in more detail.  I have already looked at all of the available workstations and none of them are what I am looking for right now.  And if the Keylab did everything onboard that I described, it would be nearly perfect.

Now, since I posted my original question, I have noticed that the Keylab is not anywhere near as expensive as I was expecting - based on the advertising I received I had gotten the impression that it was more like a powerful MIDI controller that also had Origin built-in (Origin DOES contain all of its sounds onboard, correct?).  So for a street price of $400 or so, I don't expect it to be much more than a MIDI controller.  But my questions about a good MIDI controller still stand:

1. Can you set up multiple zones on the Keylab keyboard, each with its own MIDI channel and key split points?

2. The ad stated that it allows "snapshots", which I interpreted as meaning that you could save the MIDI bank select and program change data for each zone in a configuration.  Can it do this standalone, or can it only do this using a laptop?

3.  If the answer to both of these questions is yes, then how many keyboard configurations (aka "Templates") can you store onboard without performing using a laptop?

BTW, it should be mentioned that I already own MiniMg V, Mg Modular V, Arp 2600 V, Prophet V, Jupiter 8 V, and CS-80 V, so I do already have those sounds for use with sequencing.  But I would really like to be able to use them live and I do not want to use a laptop to do this for all of the reasons I stated earlier.

[BobTheDog]

An origin built in for $400!

If only.

[Rebecca@arturia]

Hi Realhelp,

The Keylab is only a midi controller, so it can not do anything without a laptop.
With the software that comes with it you can split or layer the keyboard, however that is done with the software not the controller.

Regards,

Rebecca