Kore Opinions?, MIDI controller Options

[tsuliman]

Has anyone used one yet? How does it fit into your setup?

My concerns are: 1. Inputs don't have preamps (although the NI Guitar Rig 2 does) 2. It doesn't say that it will contol RTAS plug-ins in Pro Tools 3. Will it work with the sliders in B4 II or will I have to get the drawbar thing?

[njohnson23]

i've had kore for about a week, but haven't spent a lot of time with it. i have a G5 2GHZ with 2GB of ram. i have been using kore standalone, i haven't tried it as a plug-in yet (logic). First impressions... i went to a preview that NI put on here in san francisco and was impressed, so i bought it. the "sound" cataloging feature and the zillions of sounds is wonderful. you can quickly pop through and audition things. i would like to see the ability to add your own categories. currently you just use theirs. the sofware interface is simple and good. the hardware interface is wonderful. just touch the knob and it tells you what it is and what the value is. you can program the knobs and switches to your heart's content. it is very simple to navigate through multiple interface screens for an instrument. and saving the settings is simple. this is a great tool for just playing around. the hardware interface is mirrored by the software. NI says that eventually you won't need to look at the computer screen. a kore "sound" is basically a layered sound using multiple synths and efx. you can map synths along a keyboard. for live stuff, this is great. if you change presets, kore does this quite nice crossfade so there is no jarring click or anything.

problems... if a sound has reaktor in it, i get really bad clicking and noise, especially if i play notes rapidly. CPU usage skyrockets to 65% or more. same reaktor synth standalone no problem... as to audio in and out haven't tried that yet, but was rather irked that the headphone jack isn't pre-wired, you have to use the software to hook it up to get sounds. there are either full mix or pre-filter settings that are switchable. the reaktor thing is the biggest problem so far. will explore more...

overall, this is a great "interface" to the whole NI battery (if you excuse the pun) of instruments. and the layering of synths and efx can get you some quite interesting things. the 9,000 or so "presets" that come with kore are good place to start.