M-AUDIO Oxygen Pro 61 - 61 Key USB MIDI Keyboard Controller With Beat Pads, MIDI-assignable Knobs, Buttons and Faders and Native Instruments Sound Package (NKS Integration)

Wow! What a comprehensive MIDI controller with an amazing range of features that should satisfy most people. It’s hugely customizable and the keyboard’s nice to play.The key sensitivity is pretty decent. It’s not like playing a premiere brand concert grade grand piano, but doesn’t cost upwards of £50,000 either. It stacks up well against its competitors in its price range on this. There’s a single TS socket on the rear for a pedal and M Audio’s own one (not included) is also well priced. It’s hard to fault the keyboard controller and what it offers in terms of control, adaptability and features.This comes with a bundle of software to get you going. It’s a good bundle. But the process of downloading, registering, installing and activating is a convoluted, long-winded, time sapping, arduous drudge. This will have you filling in forms, creating a mass of passwords, verifying by email etc etc. You’ll end up with a clutter of supplier apps on your PC – before you get the software you want. To install everything you’re also going to need a substantial chunk of hard disk real estate.If you don’t lose the will to live in the above process you’ll end up with a decent set up and enough software capability to record your own backing tracks and do some basic mixing of your own pieces of creative genius.The user guide (paper) that comes with the Oxygen Pro 49 is well written. The larger downloadable PDF manual, which at 100+ pages is pretty comprehensive, is also well written enough to be undaunting.Overall its a great package. It’s just a shame that the concept of ‘plug and play’ is so alien to the music industry. In the meantime... most people lucky enough to get the Oxygen Pro 49 as a Chrimbo Prezzy will be very happy with it by New Year. It’s hard to argue with the value for money, quality and capability of what you get. It’s outstanding.

Where to even start with this?!I'm just elated that I took the plunge and went with this over the other options that I was looking at.First off, the keybed is just lovely, and an absolute joy to play. The keys are semi-weighted, but feel much nicer and more natural than other semi-weighted keys that I've played before. The keys are nice and quiet when struck, so there's no need to worry about distracting clicks and thumps when you're playing (especially if you play with headphones while others are present).The DAW integration is beautifully executed - you simply choose your DAW from the manual, then make the relevant adjustments in your DAW's preferences to allow control to the Oxygen.One of my favourite features is the built in arpeggiator (which can sync to your DAW's tempo when the Oxygen is set to DAW mode). While every DAW these days has some form of arpeggiator built in, I just love having this at my finger tips. The arp settings can easily be locked to the rotaries on the top right, making experimentation and live changes dead easy to execute, and your DAW will output the actual sounded notes (as opposed to just the chords displayed, when using an arp plugin).The pitch wheel is nice and light, with just the right amount of resistance, and the mod wheel is smooth and responsive. The drum pads have a satisfying feel and response too, with a nice visual feedback.The screen is nice and bright, and makes editing parameters a breeze.You also get a a decent transport section, with all of the expected controls, plus loop on/off, rewind, fast forward, and extra shift functions.In short, this controller keyboard is, in my opinion, the absolute best that you can get for this sort of price - and I've touched upon what it can do here!Closing note: If you are in two minds about buying this - DO IT! I would give it six stars if I could.

Early days, as I’m only just discovering the possibilities with the Oxygen Pro61, but I will tell you my initial findings thus far. M-Audio’s Oxygen Pro61 build is impressive, feels solid and made for the road. As a plus it also looks the business too. Keys are exactly as stated, they feel great, maybe a little noisy but only noticeable in a silent room. With headphones on, or on the road with amp and decent speakers no one will know.The pads, all fully lit, look great and work well. Sliders buttons and dials all feel solid and positive in action and function. Theres also adequate connectivity on the back panel. M-Audio also bundle some of the best software to get you going. Ableton Live needs no words from me, you’ll likely already know how good Ableton is, and thats just one of the options. This keyboard has complete freedom to program whatever DAW you like. Ableton and Apples Garage Band works seamlessly without any tech requirements from the user, pretty much plug and play. As I say, early days for me with this keyboard but first impressions are as the title says, 'possibly the best 61 key midi keyboard’.

I am a keyboardist and so have played many keyboards, so for it's price I would say it's really good as additional effects or as a second board. If you're not a keys player, then this will suit you fine for midi recordings etc. The only issue is that the drum pads aren't easy to set up and I haven't been able to get them working with Ableton yet. Also, the pitch bend is very slow in comparison to regular pitch bends, so as a soloist, this was quite disappointing. The aftertouch is great, the keyboard is very sensitive or not 100% like a piano, because sometimes it registers me playing certain notes a bit louder than they should be, but this only effects recording and isn't that noticeable during live performance.But overall, really great for its price. Couldn't ask for lunch more, just if you're looking for a pitch bend, this might not be the keyboard for you.