TRAKTOR S5 LAUNCHED AT LOOP
22 September 2015
Last night, Martin and Patrick from Native Instruments stopped by The Loop Bar in Melbourne for the Traktor S5 launch party hosted by Australian distributors CMI. A handful of DJs and dealers were on hand to check out the new mid-tier controller, and hear Stems in action.
The new ($1049) S5 sits perfectly inbetween the ($799) S4 and ($1599) S8; in price and features. It’s the exact same dimensions as the S4, so if you already have a roadcase, you don’t have to ditch it if you upgrade. But it’s got all the looks of its newer, older sibling, the S8. That is, high-resolution displays that can show you all five (four tracks + master) waveforms of your Stems files, and touchstrips instead of jogwheels.
Martin ran through the benefits of Stems again; the ability to remix tracks without relying on filtering, and a new revenue generator for artists. But seeing CMI’s NI expert Boz replacing a bass track from one song with another on the fly brought everything into perspective. During his demo, it didn’t seem like NI had cut much off the S8 to make the S5 — a few faders and standalone operation were a couple of features to go.
On the Stem Creator side of things, it’s still in beta with the final details still being nutted out. The file format is essentially fixed, it’s just down to the mastering controls which are designed to be applied by Traktor on-the-fly.
It’s anyone’s guess as to whether Stems will become a standard. But if enough customers demand it as a feature, eventually Pioneer will have to cow-tow to those demands.
Other news included a recap of the Native Kontrol Standard, which will allow softsynth manufacturers to pre-program the same level of integration with NI’s Kontrol keyboard as its own products. So far, Arturia has already committed to developing for NKS. Also, a new iMaschine 2 app will debut some time in the new year.
More info:
Australian Distribution: CMI Music & Audio
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