Although it is perfectly logical to separate the primary functions in this way (all the functions relevant to the switching matrix/patchbay are accessed via the Matr button, for example), the jumping about between buttons and softkeys interrupts your flow, and I would probably have preferred to have less dedicated buttons and longer softkey acronyms. In use, this means that you do tend to hop around between the dedicated buttons (Matr, Seq, Drive, and so on) and the softkeys, which can take a bit of acclimatisation. The major menu headings, like those that deal with the MIDI matrix, the sequencer, the wave player, and so on, all have their own individually named buttons, and you then use the softkeys to dig deeper into the menu hierarchy via the slightly arcane three‑letter acronyms on the display. There's also a MIDI 'panic' function, and a reasonably straightforward set of menus. The interface steals double‑clicking from computers, but, sadly, only has a 2‑row, 40‑character backlit LCD display instead of a monitor. The software user interface is a mixture of dedicated buttons, the ubiquitous data wheel, and display‑related softkeys which double up as numerical keys for value entry. The remote very neatly combines the standard Transport controls used by the built‑in Sequencer with all of the other functions, and packages all of this into a robust box that would be equally at home on your master keyboard, or on your mixer (the front panel of the main rack unit is correspondingly light in controls!). You access the MP88W's host of functions with a very nice remote controller panel which looks as if it has come straight from a multitrack digital recorder. In fact, it might leave a few studio computers with more time on their hands, too. This unit is, in fact, so much more than just an 8x8 MIDI patchbay it can become the focus of all of the MIDI cabling and messaging in your studio, and on the road, it removes any need for a computer. The MP88W is described by its designers as a Multiplayer, presumably because it's quite hard to sum up everything it's capable of in an easy‑to‑digest title (as the above feature list shows). and, finally, a couple of optional extras - an internal 2.5‑inch hard disk and a CD‑ROM drive.Ĭlearly, you're no longer just imagining any old MIDI patchbay in fact, you're thinking about the MP88W from German manufacturers Miditemp.an internal (hooray!) universal power supply.
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