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I just want something with... some amount... of keys and MIDI out. Just something dead simple and cheap that I can use with my Volca Keys. Shouldn't be any bigger than, say, two Volcas side by side. There's gotta be a CASIO thingy that goes for $20 used that would suffice.

Also interested in this.

Have a midi kit for one of those gakken synths I need to build still.

Swissonic and miditech each make a 25 key thing with a full 5-pin midi as well as USB midi, and they cost like 65€ new or something.

Maybe I'd look for a used keystep to be able to record some sequences and eventually perhaps send CV out if I needed to. If we are talking volcas I think that one also syncs with them

M-Audio Oxygen goes for beans (and/or about $50) pre-owned (so do many other cheapies from the early DAW era), but the real answer is a Keystep, which does a whole lot more for about $100 new

Reading all the stories on how bad Arturia stuff is, I'd go for an 80s casiotone or the cheapest Roland/Yamaha synth, but they are more like 200.

tremolo3 wrote:Reading all the stories on how bad Arturia stuff is, I'd go for an 80s casiotone or the cheapest Roland/Yamaha synth, but they are more like 200.

The Yamaha CBX-K1 is secretly the best mini MIDI controller of the old era (not for the Shrek-handed, I'm afraid), but it's becoming harder to find for less than the price of a new Keystep, and is probably a pain to program for most, especially if you are superstupid like me.



Since you don't need full sized keys, an older $200 synth-as-controller probably isn't what you're after, unless you really need another piece of eventual furniture/surfboard for your cat.

Also, the Casio GZ-5 is the thingy you're looking for, but good luck finding one for less than........$200 Alas, the mod & pitch wheels behave like buttons, so good riddance, maybe



But you know what costs about $20 shipped and has a MIDI out?

i came here just to suggest that same $20 controller lol. i wouldn't be surprised if it has better keys than the keystep too. but i'd check cragslist - you'll find people practically giving away midi controllers because they don't realize they have resale value.

coupleonapkins wrote:M-Audio Oxygen goes for beans (and/or about $50) pre-owned

Yeah I have one of these, but they are 49 key things. Could be cool with some more range to the volca keys though. Pretty sure I got mine for around 40€ or so.

That said the keys feel like absolute shite

Yeah I'm really just looking for tactile keys compared to the ribbon keys on the Volca keys. So anything that's like an octave and a half or something, and has an octave shift, is good. A really compact two-storey thing with three octaves would probably be optimal. But IDK if there's anything like that, that's cheap and dead simple. I've been contemplating that Rock Band thing, yeah.

Alesis Q25 looks neat too. Bit more expensive, but not extremely expensive by any means.

More than half of these are about $100 new.

https://www.musicradar.com/news/the-bes ... -keyboards

Ta for the list. I'll check it out. From a quick glance, the ones I checked don't have MIDI out though.

How do you hook up the Rock band keys?

I suppose my research thus far has led me to believe that the Alesis Q25 is the best bang for my buck, considering what I want. Unfortunately it doesn't come with a power adapter, since apparently everything these days just use USB. Annoying to have to buy a power adapter that probably costs like half the price of the keyboard itself...

mathias wrote:How do you hook up the Rock band keys?

I'm also delighted by/curious about this. Does it make any difference which console they're for?

I remember wiring up a Playstation2 Guitar Hero guitar to Ableton with a PS2->USB controller adapter, but the few buttons were not enough to really do anything with.

Guessing this has a USB cable or 1/8” TRS jack or something when the specs says “MIDI out” — at least, I wouldn’t expect to see a real MIDI DIN port on this (but don’t have one to look at in person.)

Edit: I was wrong. These have MIDI DIN - https://spinditty.com/artists-bands/Roc ... Controller
Seriously considering ordering since I have no keys right now.