Native Instruments: Maschine+ | Full Demo and Review

The new standalone production model from Native Instruments, Maschine+, packs everything you&ever need in an all-inclusive piece of hardware. We took a closer look at Engineering the Sound. With the Maschine+, Native Instruments attempt to go totally standalone on their flagship piece of production hardware. Building upon past iterations, the Maschine+ adds a number of features you&find in any conventional DAW, an onboard processor to facilitate those new tricks, plus WiFi support, eliminating the need for a computer entirely. Engineering the Sound was recently able to spend a week with this beast of a creative tool, diving into its many characteristics, testing the limits, and having a hell of a lot of fun while we were at it. Here&what we found. Right out of the box, it&easy to be faced with some option paralysis with the Maschine+. This thing is feature-rich. Thankfully the learning curve isn&as steep as some other gear, given the practicality of the interface. Similar to previous Maschine units, 16 MPC-style pads serve as the backbone of your workflow. They can be a drum rack, a step sequencer, or a keyboard with modes for various scales and chords, depending on what you need. They&velocity-sensitive too, allowing for some great expression across the board. Additional expression options come via the Smart Strip, essentially a mod wheel, pitch bend, keyboard, and FX strip rolled into one. Under the hood, a quad-core CPU processor and 4GB of RAM facilitates the use...