OT mk I + DT is obviously the more powerful choice
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Funny you mention that,
With every other Elektron I have always used my āKitsā in the same way a Part is setup, as a block of 4 patterns.
So it would just fall inline with my usual mode of operation.
But DTās immediacy and 1/2 price cost of entry are tugging my heart strings.
The fact that all my Rytm chains are already compatible helps too.
Firmly on the fence between the two.
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If you had already dived deep with the octa, thereād be no doubt in your mind 
With the DT, one can already envision āwhat it doā if rytm is familiarā¦ But the OT is a pandoraās box
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Itās not fair Adamjay, an OT will give you too much power 
, the rest of us need more time to finish tracks before we can let you have oneā¦ 
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I just succumbed and now have a new DT in front of me.
Form factor, focused functionality and GUI are instantly gratifying. It also sounds great - thanks to the reverb and delay, fairly useful filters and overall quality. Usage is very inviting - straight away more immediate than OT or RYTM for multisample messing and creation. Performance wise it is very friendly for livetweaking.
First counter thoughts are - all the other stuff OT can do, RYTMās filters. But that is fair and expected.
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Some great insight here, thank you for sharing 
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Thank you for this. I pre-ordered on the day they were announced because I loved the Digitaktās buttons so much, and reading your thoughts gets me really psyched again, even though I figure it might be a month before I finally have an Octatrack for the first time.
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If you loved the Digitakt mechanics, youāre gonna love your new Octatrack. Itās a beautiful piece of engineering, for sure.
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just submitted a rental application with storedj lol ā¦
hoping they say yes to an abstract audiovisual arranger person.
merely thinking about the awesomeness of the mkII features prompts me to prepare much content in various mix formats ā¦ drums only, drums without bassdrum, bassline, ensemble without bassline, hihat solo, 4-bar snare fills with the first three bars played straight ā¦ and so on and so forth.
in order to perform improvised club trance, psy house
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IF I have a complaint about the OT it is around the ordering or the UX of the box. I think this is mostly due to the buttons and what is immediate. I find the DT to be a perfect front door. It is so immediate. The button that gets you right to sampling, the visual confirmation that you are indeed sampling, which is HUGE I canāt tell you how much frustration appears because you think youāre sampling, but youāre not. The fact that the DT gives you immediate visual feedback that you are indeed sampling is, I think, a huge piece of why it feels so open and immediate.
What Iām wonderingā¦is the OTMKII suddenly more simple and elegant because a few tools are suddenly on the top layer?
Do you mean that in order to appreciate it you have to be using it beyond simple sample playback?
Was sampling also more immediate?
ā¦What I really want is a box with capabilities of the OT but the front access of the DT.
I just want to throw out that sampling is actually pretty quick on OT mk1. You just need to set up the recorder first, but itās really just a few parameters like input selection, length, etcā¦
You only need to set it up once and all you do after that is press the track button of the recorder plus the rec button for inputs or midi button for resampling.
Samples can be pre assigned to tracks already so they immediately appear.
There is a quick record mode that makes it so all you do is press rec a/b or c/d to initiate samplingā¦
Really itās just a little setup and then lots of immediate sampling after thatā¦
By pressing one button alone, I can have my inputs sample a perfect loop that plays on a track immediately and also gets choped up and warped on multiple other tracks all simultaneously as well!
x8!
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glad to hear this information, i never really did the sampling thing with the mkI
iām planning on using the Machinedrum as a control surface to access the 8 machine levels immediately from one page
via ā¦ two Midi Machines
then a Ctrl 8p to gain immediate access to 8 parameters from one page
Ctrl 8p remote-adjusts the two Midi Machineās parameters to directly control the 8 Octatrack track volumes
Similar for freq/res
Machinedrum master tempo, single lead connection from MD to OT
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I think, at this point, further comments from me on the MKII would be too much assumption and guessing. About the DT being immediate versus the Octatrack, I generally donāt agree with this statement. I get where itās coming from, but the DT is jut easier to get to that point because thereās less to get to grips with and as such, you learn some things faster.
But as @Open_Mike says, once youāve got the Octatrack, I donāt think itās less of an immediate sampler than the DT, mainly because I think the DTās reputed super fast workflow is a bit like the emperorās new clothes - itās there because you want to see it and because compared to other Elektrons, yes, itās immediate. But as a sampler in general, itās a head scratcher for many at first. Iāve got two friends who got the Digi as their first Elektron. They love it now. They didnāt, at first.
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I donāt have a DT, but from what I understand you press a button that brings you to sampling, maybe adjust some settings?, sample, and then you are brought to an editor and assign section?
To me that seems a quicker way to jump into editing, but it seems less direct to just sample and have the new sample playā¦
We all use these machines differently, for me my samples are usually a defined length and I want them to play immediately after sampling, I rarely go to audio editor with my live samplesā¦
I think I understand how some people would think the DT is quicker for sampling, but the way I use samples it seems the OT is faster and allows for my immediate sample replacement across tracks. Iāve adapted my style of performance towards sampling with OT and the DT seems like a whole nother style of sampling, more built for grabbing sounds, trimming, and then building things with them, where the OT seems set up to pre program ideas in tracks with recorder buffers, and hear them come to life live by samplingā¦
Oddly, the OT seems like the quicker sampler to me as once your setup from then on you just push a button or two and donāt have to deal with editing or assigning, but I also find that most things that frustrate people about Elektron devices, I usually find perfectly suited for what Iām up toā¦ 
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I agree.
The OTās daunting not because of how itās designed, but for all it can do. With all its potential, you gotta keep it cool and be comfortable that itās not always comfortable. I love how that thing challenges the artist.
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When I was learning the OT I admit there was a few times it drove me to the brink of insanity having me contemplate if I should get rid of all my electronic instruments ang go live in a tepee with only natural instrumentsā¦
After learning its ways by spending many a long sleepless nights encoding and decoding the frequencies of life, music, and everything, Iām now super comfortable with it and find it easy. The lab remains my tepee and Iām reminded how even an OT is made out of Earthā¦
(Edit: it was little bugs and weird unexpected behaviors that drove me nutz rather than it being fundamentally difficult, but still)
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Brillant haha
just got approval to rent a new one when it arrives ā¦ estimated time of arrival slightly hazy, i guess that is due to rewiring the units to allow Machinedrum Orange mode.
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Sweetwater told me late August. Now Iām hearing September 15th? 
Sounds about right