New KORG Nautilus AT

[Radagast]

Checking on Sweetwater’s site, they list both AT models.  The price for the 88 key is $100 more than the previous pre-sale price of the original.

[K K]

Also, to anyone interested in buying a Nautilus 88 with AT, wait to see new owners' input about it. I don't want to rain one anyone's parade, but if the AT parts they will add in the Nautilus 88 are identical to what is in the Kronos 88 (after all, the RH3 action is still exactly the same as years ago), you might not enjoy paying for a feature that is very hard to trigger. I solved this problem on my Kronos designing a little hardware mod, basically modifying the AT op-amp circuit. So hopefully they rewrote their AT PCB and/or improved their AT software calibration.

[ElmerJFudd]

13 minutes ago, K K said:

Also, to anyone interested in buying a Nautilus 88 with AT, wait to see new owners' input about it. I don't want to rain one anyone's parade, but if the AT parts they will add in the Nautilus 88 are identical to what is in the Kronos 88 (after all, the RH3 action is still exactly the same as years ago), you might not enjoy paying for a feature that is very hard to trigger. I solved this problem on my Kronos designing a little hardware mod, basically modifying the AT op-amp circuit. So hopefully they rewrote their AT PCB and/or improved their AT software calibration.

Y'all wanted AT, pay up!

[K K]

13 minutes ago, ElmerJFudd said:

Y'all wanted AT, pay up!

 

Yep, thank you for your purchase, now proceed to the checkout.

 

[pjd]

Don't know if anybody mentioned it here -- the Korg UK site advertises £429 (about $560 USD) for the upgrade. 

 

At least Korg is providing a software/hardware upgrade. I've crawled through a lot of service manuals for up-market keyboards. The upgrade approach seems so do-able in many instances. If Roadkill Garage can drop a big block engine into a Pinto, why not swap out a digital motherboard? 🙂

 

I'm watching this carefully and hope it is successful for Korg and customers.

 

-- pj

 

P.S. Yeah, not so feasible if an upgrade needs new front panel gizmos...

 

[Synthaholic]

On 7/14/2023 at 2:34 PM, ElmerJFudd said:

lol, do you think?   
we can get aftertouch on a $139 X-Key.  Arturia, Maudio even Alesis controllers have AT.   

But not on a $1700 Roland Fantom 07, $1700 Yamaha MODX7+, $2000 Korg Nautilus 73, or even a $2000 Nord Lead A1, a pure synthesizer which would benefit most from Aftertouch. It's what pushed me to Kurzweil, which I was not excited about after my prior experience. But this one, fortunately, is not a lemon.

 

I don't buy $139 keyboards. They may be great for inputting in a home studio, but I have no use for them in my live rig, where I do my actual playing. That's where I need Aftertouch.

[ElmerJFudd]

9 minutes ago, Synthaholic said:

But not on a $1700 Roland Fantom 07, $1700 Yamaha MODX7+, $2000 Korg Nautilus 73, or even a $2000 Nord Lead A1, a pure synthesizer which would benefit most from Aftertouch. It's what pushed me to Kurzweil, which I was not excited about after my prior experience. But this one, fortunately, is not a lemon.

 

I don't buy $139 keyboards. They may be great for inputting in a home studio, but I have no use for them in my live rig, where I do my actual playing. That's where I need Aftertouch.

That’s exactly the point I was making.  How ridiculous is it that $1.5k+ synths ship without AT when the feature is available on cheap stuff?  Granted we would expect it to work very well on these higher tier boards.  They’ve all  been notorious though about withholding quality actions and AT on designs below $2k.  

[Synthaholic]

It continues my belief that these companies listen to their engineers without ever consulting musicians. I've come to believe that Gator has never asked a working musician about the design of their cases and racks, either. A lot of head-scratching about some of these design decisions.

[jerrythek]

1 hour ago, Synthaholic said:

It continues my belief that these companies listen to their engineers without ever consulting musicians. I've come to believe that Gator has never asked a working musician about the design of their cases and racks, either. A lot of head-scratching about some of these design decisions.

It’s often not about either of those sources, it’s about hitting a target price. People will argue passionately about the need for it, and engineers are often fine to do whatever tasks are assigned to the project. But Product Planning/management are aiming for a target street price, and when the BOM (materials cost) is estimated and is over, then things get trimmed. Often there is no clear proof to use to argue whether something is absolutely essential to making the sale or not, and so only when it comes to market will they find out. 
 

Im not convinced that aftertouch is the magic bullet that will cure the Nautilus sales issues, but we’ll soon see. 

[GovernorSilver]

Korg put up a video with somebody actually using aftertouch 😀

 

 

[Motif88]

Well, the Korg video with Jordan is a very poor example of AT utilization. While tried the Osmose (bought and returned) and had a Kronos, the best implementation of AT outside of CS-80 for me is the Hydrasynth Deluxe and not any of the “toy” keyboards mentioned. I’d be using a Fantom 8 instead of my RD-2000 and a Hydrasynth of the AT in the Fantom was worth a damn.

 

Now, if I could actually get my hands on a Nord Stage 4-88 without buying it first, that might change things. It appears that assigning and using AT on the Stage 4 is simple and it actually works.

[K K]

On the same video but appearing on the Korg UK YT channel, they erased all the "negative" comments (like 95% of the total) appearing since a few days. Some of those actually included good ideas, but hey this is not good for sales. And what I see in the above video (look at how the guy leans forward to initiate AT around 0:20) seems to confirm what I wrote earlier about them using the same AT components as in the Kronos 88.

[Motif88]

The AT effect is hardly pronounced. How about some patches with filter sweep, rotary speed, pitch bend or differentiated LFO modulation triggered by AT?

 

I might be getting old, but I didn’t hear any of that….

[David Emm]

I'm hard-pressed to recall AT having been very good on anything I've played. The Kawai K4 had the nicest release velocity I'd ever heard (great for strings/brass/choirs), but again and again, when I lean in a bit for AT, most synths express a wild jump in the value. If that's what the company presents as a Best Of moment, It leaves me puzzled. The resolution sucketh mightily. I'm sure the better instruments allow you to tune it for your own uses, but I've found no joy in most demo patches. I know it can be done properly, because *Hydrasynth*, so the means are there, just uninspiringly implemented.

[ElmerJFudd]

17 minutes ago, David Emm said:

I'm hard-pressed to recall AT having been very good on anything I've played. The Kawai K4 had the nicest release velocity I'd ever heard (great for strings/brass/choirs), but again and again, when I lean in a bit for AT, most synths express a wild jump in the value. If that's what the company presents as a Best Of moment, It leaves me puzzled. The resolution sucketh mightily. I'm sure the better instruments allow you to tune it for your own uses, but I've found no joy in most demo patches. I know it can be done properly, because *Hydrasynth*, so the means are there, just uninspiringly implemented.

K4 also had a very nice synth action! 

[K K]

36 minutes ago, David Emm said:

I'm hard-pressed to recall AT having been very good on anything I've played.

 

Kurzweil MIDIboard has the best mono/poly AT. There were also other such very good controllers in the 80s as well.

[Radagast]

I still don’t understand Korg isn’t offering the AT upgrade on the 73 key.  I wouldn’t think it would be much different that the 61 key.

[zephonic]

5 hours ago, David Emm said:

I'm hard-pressed to recall AT having been very good on anything I've played. 

 

IDK, I thought it was great on the XP80, the Fantom X7 was still pretty good, too. Both were intuitive to me. Even the D70 wasn't bad.

 

[CyberGene]

As an owner of the following keyboards with AT (ordered from best to worst):

 

Hydrasynth KB 49 with poly AT

xKey Air 37 with poly AT

Nektar Impact GXP 49 with channel AT

Numa X Piano 73 with hammer action and channel AT

 

I can say a good AT is actually a very useful and expressive control for synth leads and pads. And I've discovered that even the ones that have a rather erratic behavior (the Nektar and the Numa) can be made to work smoothly by using the so called Lag functionality in the U-He Diva plugin. Basically it is modulator that doesn't allow instantaneous changes of a control and instead applies smoothing curves to steep changes. Think about it for a minute: you never want aftertouch to jump immediately to the extreme values. I'm wondering why the manufacturers of "bad" aftertouch don't offer similar software smoothing to their AT implementation. 

[analogika]

The SY77 was my first real synth, and the aftertouch always seemed really useable to me. 
 

The Stage 3 Compact has an IMO near-perfect implementation. It feels absolutely natural and very nuanced to me. 

[zephonic]

man, just one month ago I was bemoaning the lack of aftertouch in suitable boards, and now Korg announced three of them.

 

This fall a new Korg is joining my rig, just need to figure out which one!

[AnotherScott]

On 7/14/2023 at 2:34 PM, ElmerJFudd said:

we can get aftertouch on a $139 X-Key.  

Well the Xkey is a different animal, it doesn't have traditional keys at all. They're essentially key-shaped buttons. I doubt their AT tech could be applied to a traditional keyboard action. Though the button approach nicely let them inexpensively do, not merely AT, but poly-AT!

 

13 hours ago, jerrythek said:

Im not convinced that aftertouch is the magic bullet that will cure the Nautilus sales issues, but we’ll soon see. 

Maybe they should have put as much of that tech as feasible into the Krome chassis, and come out with a lightweight souped-up "midrange" model instead of what people may be seeing more as a dumb-downed flagship model.

[jerrythek]

7 hours ago, CyberGene said:

I can say a good AT is actually a very useful and expressive control for synth leads and pads. And I've discovered that even the ones that have a rather erratic behavior (the Nektar and the Numa) can be made to work smoothly by using the so called Lag functionality in the U-He Diva plugin. Basically it is modulator that doesn't allow instantaneous changes of a control and instead applies smoothing curves to steep changes. Think about it for a minute: you never want aftertouch to jump immediately to the extreme values. I'm wondering why the manufacturers of "bad" aftertouch don't offer similar software smoothing to their AT implementation. 

That’s a great point: we often used that concept in voicing Kronos (and Oasys sounds) using the lag processor function available in the AMS Mixer parameter. You can change the slope of the attack to “soften” the curve, and then slightly extend the release to make the effect more “musical”. New Nautilus AT owners should explore that… even prospective customers checking it out in a store (can you still even do that these days?).

[EscapeRocks]

reading all these threads over the years when "new" items are announced, it is very clear that every company needs to make keyboards that are everything to everyone.

 

 

[analogika]

43 minutes ago, EscapeRocks said:

reading all these threads over the years when "new" items are announced, it is very clear that every company needs to make keyboards that are everything to everyone.

 

Of course not. 

But come on: Effin' aftertouch on a workstation??? 

 

This isn't some dinky microkorg or backpack-sized controller! 

[jazzpiano88]

Does AT seriously stand for After Touch???  🤣

 

That video demoing aftertouch for Korg reminded me of a combination of Hans Groiner Jazz Masterclass and James Pavel Shawcross demoing blues licks on the Rhodes. 

[brenner13]

Derailing a bit because that’s what I’m inadvertently so good at…AT keys I own, roughly best to worst IMHO:

Behringer Deepmind 12: Excellent AT feel with nice depth control. Absolutely fantastic simultaneous multiple mod matrix capabilities. 
 

Yamaha SY77: Very good, controllable AT feel. Limited internal mods, but pretty good given its vintage. Really like it to control Pitch Bend Up. Vibrato can be simulated with this technique.

 

Fantom X7: Very good AT feel if a tad shallow. Limited internal mods, but Filter control and Pitch Up are my two favorite uses.

 

Alesis Vortex Wireless: Very good AT feel and depth. Obviously controller only, but quite a nice keybed for such a lightweight plastic unit. Excellent vibrato or swell or growl control on SWAM instruments.

ASM Hydrasynth Explorer: Mini keys, but decent AT feel at the hardest setting, if a tad shallow. Huge bonus: switchable POLY-AT…didn’t think I needed it until I played with it…wow!

 

Arturia MiniFreak: The best feeling minikeys I tried yet and good AT expressiveness.

 

Korg 707: Very nice feel with decent depth, but very limited mod destinations with limited 4OP FM engine. A decent little, minimalistic controller.

 

Studiologic Numa Compact 2 and 2X: Good feel and depth, but a tad too sensitive where it must be turned off with acoustic and electric pianos. Very limited internal mod destination but a fantastic controller. However all models I’ve tried have some keys with velocity inconsistencies, especially noticed while playing softer arpeggios where some keys are shockingly louder than others; worst on internal Acoustic Pianos…better as a controller, but still annoyingly noticeable.

 

Yamaha EX5…AT is horribly over-sensitive with no way to adjust; so bad that I’ve turned it off on most patches.

 

Roland Super JX-10: Horribly stiff, and limited mod destinations. Mine’s actually broken with no AT at all with the onboard keys. I often use the Fantom X7 to control it with excellent results.

 

 

Keys I love and use extensively, but really miss AT in them:

 

Roland VR09: Goes to nearly every gig. Really good quick-trigger keybed for Organ and fast action for synth solos. Crappy plastic toy-like action for everything else. AT would have been nice, but might have priced it out of my interest at the time. 
 

Yamaha MODX7: Also goes to nearly every gig and is my rehearsal board of choice because of the variety and quality of sounds, super fast performance UI, and super light weight; but what a HORRIBLE keybed. I often consider a Montage 7 to replace it, but too expensive for me right now and far heavier to schlep around.

 

Korg OPSix: I really didn’t need this board, but could not pass up that three-day close-out pricing event. Aftertouch is GROSSLY missing from this otherwise fantastic little powerhouse of a synth. I’m glad Korg has released a bigger vers with AT, but one of the new Wavestates would be my choice to replace it because MODX really does all the FM I need and wavetable synthesis fascinates me right now.

 

 

Nautilus never really appealed to me because of the lack of buttons, knobs, and sliders. Kronos missed my GAS radar because it was so widely accepted as the board to replace all boards at its heyday (I’m an underdog-loving-kind-of-hipster that tends to disassociate with anything that becomes too popular from my narcissistic point of view). Good on Korg though, for finally understanding how important aftertouch is to so many keyboardists. 

 

 

[aronnelson]

I use the AT on the Kronos 61, but not that much. But I guess it is really useful when I use it. I just haven't programmed enough patches to use them.

I didn't realize the MODX7 keybed was that bad. 

[Mighty Motif Max]

Ironically, I just picked up an old Korg Triton LE 76 yesterday for peanuts...not only does it have aftertouch but it's actually a really decent AT IMO - it doesn't require me to put my full body weight into one key to trigger (*cough* Fantom 7, JV-1000 *cough*). Honestly it's quite comfortable. That wasn't a high-end board in its time, and I mean, the keys aren't the best keybed but after playing it for a while I wish the newer midrange boards I have had that keybed, because it actually feels musical, unlike, say, my MODX7's keybed or the Krome's.

[konaboy]

some thoughts from a nautilus owner, sorting out the facts from the rumours!