Comments on: Ruin & Wesen: Lovely, Petite, Hackable Controllers for Machinedrum, Ableton, More

By: Create Digital Music » Hard-Core MachineDrum Geeking with Wesen, and the Joy of Live Online Streaming

Sat, 27 Sep 2008 23:11:13 +0000

[...] already seen his DIY hardware, including a joystick for the MonoMachine. Hereâ€™s my favorite hack so far, though: using the MIDI [...]

By: Peter Kirn

Peter Kirn — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 03:38:54 +0000

@Mike: Note, made in small quantities in Germany by a tiny boutique firm, not made in large quantities in China by a big firm. You expect the price to be different. Then it’s up to you to determine whether this is worth it to you.

That said, of course, it means that this *does* have to be different as an option; I don’t disagree there. I think it’s a matter of need. But then, because this is a niche product, it only needs to please a select few to be successful.

By: Phil

Phil — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 03:29:30 +0000

I think its the fact that it is an open source midi-controller that is pre-built that warrants that price. sure the akai is cheaper but can you reprogram it to be a sequencer if you wanted to? or a midi filter? probably not as easily as this.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 02:48:58 +0000

I don’t intend to sound rude but $265 is a whole lot of money for just a few knobs. You can buy an AKAI MPD24 (I have 4 of them) and program your own patches right on the unit. For $199 you get 4 banks of 16 pads, 8 encoders, 6 faders and transport controls. If the unit was around $110 I might consider it but the current price is a bit ridiculous.

By: actuel

actuel — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 14:45:28 +0000

Vlad, you are to kind! thx for the kind words.

these boxes are hot. i did his site for free as i firmly believed in what R&W doing and want to see them succeed. it’s my donation i suppose.

i have been talking with Manuel from R&W quite a bit and there’s more fun to be had on these boxes.

all this open source development is truly an exciting time as Peter mentioned.

By: Vlad Spears

Vlad Spears — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 11:03:22 +0000

Damn my brain/finger connection! “Faubion” with an O! Luckily, I can still make beats, although I do sometimes drop a kick where a snare should be.

By: Vlad Spears

Vlad Spears — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 10:11:59 +0000

I’m hot to use both the MIDI Command and the Monojoystick with Live and my Elektron gear (CTRL-AL for Monomachine!), but I’m also very interested in interfacing these with my Max/MSP performance rig.

The Ruin & Wesen site shows a MIDI Synth in progress. Judging by the time spent and quality standards evident in various videos for the first two devices, I’m betting on amazing for that box, too.

To clinch the deal, Ryan Faubian aka Actuel of elektron-users.com designed the new Ruin & Wesen site. That’s like the Good Beat-Keeping Seal of Approval, right there.

By: lematt

lematt — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 06:34:37 +0000

smart people
smart controllers !

By: amoeba

amoeba — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 06:30:08 +0000

i mean, XY… Z!!! pads, please.

By: steve-o

steve-o — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 05:10:14 +0000

it has begun!