It’s more of a live looper. That’s what the KP3 is despite being called a sampler.
When you consider the Boss RC-505 MK2, which has been the mainstay live looper the past decade, is $700 I guess this starts making sense that it would target a $1000 price range. It still doesn’t seem worth it but a lot of us are coming from a production standpoint and this is definitely more DJ tool type gear.
but still it does feel weirdly backwards especially with the I/O and the firmware oddities we’ve seen so far, like the delay when selecting samples in the waveform view.
I’d been hoping for an updated Kaoss Pad for a while, so I got excited to see this. I don’t hate it, but there were definitely some strange choices in the design… Pretty much everything has been said about those design choices already.
I’ll wait for the deep discount, like with the Opsix and the Drumlogue where people have a hard time giving them away. I’ll totally dust off some RCA cables and buy this for $300 in a year or so.
Taetro gave another honest review, explaining why this was a massive miss by Korg, especially on the sequencing front. I think if we don’t think of the Replay as an MPC One+ or even an SP404Mk2, then the comparison won’t suck so much. Perhaps the messaging from Korg is a miss. If I buy this, it’s more of a live performance tool than a standalone groovebox. The Push 3S doesn’t have the same immediacy when performing (I think), and the dual DJ-style sliders look fun.
For example, I’d stem a “backing track” from Live and stem playable parts to layer on top, assign them to the pads to play live, and efx them live. That won’t require a built-in sequencer. And, if I do need sequencing, Replay can be driven by my other synths or groove boxes already, which I can bring the audio in via the input and perform live in sync.
It is weird that Korg included USB-C for power but added a micro USB port for data. I mean… really? Retro to that point? Why not just add another USB-C port?
Oh yeah, the price point. Maybe Korg knows this device is very niche to specific needs and won’t have that many users. The sales volume won’t be like the SP. Learning from my mistakes, I am lowering my GAS meter until I know more about it.
I just realized the extent of the USB fuckup. And you can’t use a battery pack with either port… Wow. I wonder if they had no choice due to part shortages in recent years or something… I mean, maybe there were only certain parts available and they ended up designing themselves into a corner (?) That’s total speculation, I have no idea what the hell was going on at Korg.
True! Another wackiness, the USB-C port can’t use a power bank apparently. Taetro demo’d it and it must use the included power adapter that uses USB-C as the jack. Weird. Choices. Indeed.
I think the parts shortage is mainly in the past. They already wired a USB-C port, so won’t it be easier to wire another inside the board? I’m not an industrial designer, so I say this with a lot of caveats. LOL… maybe when Apple switched over to USB-C, they bought up all the stocks
Right, that’s exactly what I meant. Maybe they were designing while there were still shortages and made decisions based on availability at the time. But hey, I have no idea… For all I know, the decisions could have been made because they took up smoking crack. Lol
This is good perspective. The RCA jacks definitely point to this being aimed more at DJs than synth nerds with a dozen devices. I’m still baffled by how bad the time stretching is though.
Since we apparently need to post music to have an opinion, here’s the album I released earlier this year:
Lol thanks for reminding me of this! I listened to the first track and was like “hot damn! This is awesome! I need to buy this!” But I already bought it
Edit: im gonna turn my brain off and jam this for the rest of the night
Okay, I’m really trying to understand. So, I went over this thing again, in more detail, with those two points in mind, and I’m still coming up empty.
No way to zoom in on the waveform
No support for time signatures outside of 4/4
No quantize for program cues
No crossfades for loop points
No normalization for sampled audio
No metronome
No overdubs for live loops
No envelopes
No editor
USB power only using the proprietary adaptor
Access to a single global effect at a time
Subpar time stretching
Tiny knobs
No matter which way I look at it (be it as a looper or DJ equipment), I just can’t see who would be in the market for this. I mean, a 404 or MPC could each be had for less, or you could even have both for roughly the same price point—and, together or separately, they kick this thing’s butt all over hell’s half acre.
Anyway, I surrender.
Do I have to post a song now, or can I just roll on street cred?
The only one thing I REALLY like with the Replay? The fixed bar sampling feature. A close second is the sliders. I wish Roland will add that to the SP404MK2 and that will blow the Replay off my gas list.
I’m also trying to understand this product, to be used in a dj setting. In this setting - during a live dj set - immediacy is kind, there is no time, patience or some will say skills for some deeper editing functions. Most of the functions you refer are great to have, but require some “homework” that is not the focus of this product it seems. I guess what Korg wants this to be is an easy looper - with you would use for transitions, adding snippets of songs from earlier in the set, later, adding a fx to that, etc. I guess this is the main use and market.
What makes us all confuse is the wannabe sp 404 functions that this thing has that are half baked, and makes this look as a very bad and expensive studio tool.
Maybe this is an idiot proof performance tool, with some barely useful more advanced tools ? I have not ever used a kaoss pad but I was a dj so I’m just looking this from that perspective. It would definitely be interesting to see this being actually used on a performance, instead of reviewed in a studio chair of a YouTuber
Ok, this thing gets a lot of flak, but let’s first see the real world application… The gear that can play long audio files with sync and timestretch are far and few between, and the pricerange is what is to be expected… Only thing that bothers the DJ approach is the convoluted loading of new files…
I use the OT as a DJ device, and can see the appeal of the Replay. If i can do stuff quicker than on the OT, picture me very interested.
I have not found a device i couldn’t get to run on USB battery yet. But it can be tricky since alot of USB batteries need a draw to turn on. But USB C can run 5v or 9v. So I suspect its running at 9v like almost all other korg gear. So if you need 9v to power the device a current USB standards won’t supply 9v and data transfer. So that would explain that. Only solution would be an inturnal 9v battery like in a cellphone. Dual USB c ports one for power and one for data would have led to many “my replay won’t turn on” so I get it… but still don’t like it.
