M-Audio Keystation 88es

Flawless plug-and-play support under OS X Snow Leopard with Logic Pro.

Does everything I expect an 88-key midi-controller to do.

Sure, it is possible to get a large velocity range out of the keyboard, but it has no consistency between the white keys and the black keys.

In other words, the black keys are much harder to play (offer more resistance) than the white keys, so it is easy to play too hard/too little on them.

Additionally, the closer to the base of the key you are, the harder it is to play, and this is even more exaggerated for the black keys.

Because of this, I have to adjust the velocity curve in Logic to 50% (losing half of my dynamics) and then boost the velocity to +20 to get a reasonable response.

The build quality seems ok, seems pretty sturdy.

88 Keys
Semi-Weighted (awesome action.)
Velocity Sensitive & Channel/Polyphonic Aftertouch
No onboard display.
All 88 keys are assignable given the patch used suites an 88 key controller, or is edited to do so.
Powered either by the provided USB(a) to USB(b) Cable, or 9 volt adaptor.
Constructed of sturdy plastic.
This controller is currently being used to control Reason 4, Ableton Live 7, and True Pianos(all for Mac's OS X.

Onboard, I wouldn't consider this unit to be feature rich, but when using a controller, the software and computer used can easily make up for this.
The options that are available are the basic needs, and they all work very well.

There is a pitch bend wheel, as well as a modulation wheel onboard. There are also octave buttons, and one advanced feature button. Additionally, there is a very comfortable and convenient volume slider.
There is an input for a breath controller.
There are both volume and sustain 1/4" jacks housed on the back of the unit.
All work very well, and are conveniently located.

Small on off switch is located on the back control panel. It could have a better location, but it is only pulling USB 2.0 power, so I am not worried about turning it off.
This has Midi, and USB 2.0 connectivity. It is both Mac OS 9 and OS X compatible as well as PC compatible.

This controller came with the Ableton Live Light 7 software, and a drivers disc.
Both work well. Both are PC and Mac compatible.
The Live Light 7 software is a little confusing to get used to and hard to figure out how to pull sound from initially.
There are octave up/down(transpose) functionality.
It easily does splits and layers.
Lacks the ability to insert sound cards, but it is very much easier to integrate sound banks from the controllers software on the computer itself.

This product performs great. It is definitely usable live, and for recording.
The action is wonderful. The semi-weighted keys are hard to describe, but overall I am definitely impressed with them. You can easily make quick synth runs, or play emotional piano bits.
I would recommend this to other musicians most definitely. Reason 4 for Mac users is a must.
I'm not so much PC savvy anymore, but the Live Light 7 is not so highly recommended. Reason is much easier to use and feature rich. This has to be the best controller money can buy.

Straight forward, plug and play (you don't even need drivers for Windows XP), with 5 minutes reading on the "advanced functions" everything are in control right away.

It doesn't have too much to offer, and you can find the information through m-audio website and that's about it, so I won't go deep into it.

It has 88 semi-weighted keys, while it sucks as a "piano touch", but it actually works great as a synth-style key, with a little more resistance on keypress hence a greater control over velocity compared to other regular synth-style keys. However, some people may not like it, but compared to my Roland XP-80, they're more or less the same feel, just with the extra resistance. Oh, if you want to hit velocity 120 and above often, stay away from this keyboard, or if you have velocity control software/plugin to manage it as it doesn't have any velocity curve control as far as I can see. Mind you, I'm a pianist and I know it's not a good "touch" but it certainly offer good playability, especially talking about the price versus quality/features.

The key/octave range label on top of the keys, to me, is great to have. Sometime when you want to "sight-sync'ing" your keyboard with the piano roll, you'll know right away which key you want to find on the keyboard or on piano roll.

Again, for the price, I can't complain. It's really a simple and nice keyboard to have and it's light to carry around consider it's 88 keys keyboard.

As mentioned, it doesn't have any sound onboard.

The velocity respond is also mentioned above, it's on the heavy curve side, where you need to hit pretty hard to reach velocity 120 and above. But as far as velocity is concerned, it's easy to control compared to its big brother Keystation 88 Pro, which you'll get very unstable velocity output because of the way the keys are built.

The rest are pretty standard, nothing much to mention.

I just got this for a few days, no problem whatsoever. But since it's simple to use I can't think of anything potentially unreliable except for built quality, which is pretty much reasonable for the price offered. In fact, my colleague use it for gigs and carry around, seems fine after using it for a year.

Nothing yet, since it's brand new as for now. It has got 1 year warranty, though.

I bought this because my 8 years old Roland XP-80 suffered from "dental surgery" while I'm in the middle of a project. It's time for it to retire anyway, so I rushed out to buy one to replace it. But since I don't have much budget in the hand to buy the Yamaha KX8 which is what I intended to buy soon. So I opted for this 88es, since I only want the basics - sustain switch, pitch bend, mod wheel, 88 keys.

Tried it on the spot at the shop, triggering a few VSTi and I'm pretty happy about it, so I bought it right away.

All in all, it's not a perfect keyboard for everyone, but if you don't want to spend much money, and want a semi-weighted 88 key controller (although to me it's non-weighted anyway) with excellent simplicity and low price to offer, this is really a good choice.

PS: There's no Studio Logic Fatar series keyboard dealer/distributor in my country, so I can't compare them but I can see they're in the same price point. I think Studio Logic will be a better choice, but I got no choice, so I settled on m-audio instead.

100% Plug and play. Anyway, would apreciate labeling of the advanced options, instead of having the name of each note on each key... make you manual-dependant.

I tested it using KeyRig software, Reason 4 and some Ableton Live plugins. I agree with some of the reviews above: there's something wrong with velocity. Since it's my first midi keyboard, I can't efectively compare it with other controllers, but with KeyRig I felt like I had to hit the keys with my head jumping from a shelf or something to get the expected semiweightened efect. Works good with other software, so i'm not sure if it's something about KeyRig software or if the keyboard actually lacks velocity.

But hey, remember the price? It's not a pro tool; i'm a guitarrist and i'm studying musical theory, so it's a PERFECT KEYBOARD for my purposes. It has keys, you push them and sounds come out. So far, so good for me.



I have to mention that I had some troubles trying to run it trough my Eee laptop; lots of latency (even though I use a Phase 26 USB soundcard). I tried it with my desktop PC and everything ran smooth. My guess is that my laptop sucks for midi stuff.

No sounds, it's a midi controller.

Seems pretty solid to me.

No problems so far.

The perfect midi keyboard for guitarrists. Not sure if experienced users will like it.

I use it to control my Triton Rack (and sometimes Garageband), so it is incredibly easy to use, literally just plug and play! Same goes for Garageband on Mac!!!!

For the money it can't be beat. All it basically is is 88 velocity sensitive (I'm not sure if they're actually weighted, but they are definitely velocity sensitive), a pitch bender, a mod wheel, a volume slider, 2 octave buttons (one + and one -), another assignable button, power switch, volume pedal input, sustain pedal input, USB input (which also powers it), and MIDI out. That's it!

Like I just said, I use it as a controller for the Triton Rack. For me it is extremely responsive to whatever I want it to sound like.

I have had it for 6 months now. I play pretty hard, pretty regularly, and so far it's as good as new.

Can't say, have never had to deal with them.

I would DEFINITELY buy this again!!!! It is MORE than worth what I paid for it in my opinion. If you're just looking for 88 velocity sensitive keys to act as a controller and don't need any knobs or sliders (or you already have them on whatever you're controlling), you can't go wrong with this!!!!!

It's plug and play and there are very few options, so it is very easy to use.

Very few features, but that was one of the selling points for me. Less bell and whistles, the less bells and whistles can break, interfering with its original purpose.

Attention! This keyboard is worthless, at least as it works with Logic. I'd read the other reviews before I purchased mine and I kind of figured, "You know, these audio people are so picky, it's probably fine." It's not fine, and the main beef is with the velocity. I don't even understand could release this kind of product. Bring up a fender rhodes and it's impossible to reproduce a near sound because no matter how hard you hit the key, it registers mild. It's also very hard to get a soft tone from this keyboard. Maybe it's the "semi-weighted" action -- the way they have it just seems a short cut to weighting -- there's just too much resistance on the keys.

My radium 61 was broken, which is why I went after the 88es. I returned that 88es and fixed my radium, which is really quite expressive and performs perfectly for my purposes.

Don't know much about M-Audio, but I'm sure glad for Guitar Centers return policy.

Really, listen (as I didn't) to the warnings -- this keyboard is useless if you want any expression born out by your playing.

It's mostly plug and play but the attack and velocity are not correct by default. No I know that's mostly controlled by the software (Reason) but my Roland PC-200mk II just has the perfect attack & velocity which allows for great tones through my software synth.
Anyhow, USB power is brilliant.

Barebones. I bought this cause it was the cheapest full sized keyboard I could find. The semi-weighted keys are nice. There's a slider, two octave buttons and a program button.

None.

I would opt for back-up but I'm sure you can get away without one.

I got this used. I'm studying music theory via piano lessons and I think this is perfect for beginning piano students. My teacher plays Chopin and Fats Waller on it just fine.

It's a MIDI controller; it always works and doesn't require any configuration.

It's a MIDI controller; it doesn't do anything fancy. Keys are pressure-sensitive, and it has pitch bend and mod wheels and a volume slider. I would really have liked a handful of programmable buttons or sliders; the next keyboard up in their line has a massive console, but they have plenty of space here to stick a jog dial and three buttons, which would make it much easier to record while I'm sitting at the keyboard.

It's a MIDI controller; it doesn't have any sounds. Velocity response is not bad, although with light keys it's hard to be super-expressive.

Always works.

Their website provides easy access to drivers, FAQ's, and manuals.

This was the cheapest way to put 88 keys on my desk when I bought it, and it's been everything I hoped it would be. I wish it had just a couple more programmable buttons/dials (without being larger), but basically it's the right product if you want a box with 88 keys in it.

Plug it in to the USB port on my PC and it works. No driver installation or anything - it just works.

Really basic keyboard with a pitch bend and modulation wheel. Best thing about it is that it is an 88 key keyboard.

The action isn't great, it's springy and not really very well weighted. It's not very expressive for piano playing, but is fine for something like an organ sound.

Never had any problems with it. Not sure how much I would trust it for a gig.

M-Audio has great customer service. I asked them about bundled software, as mine came with something other than the catalog, and they guy just asked what I expected and mailed me a couple of additional CDs.

Basic product that doesn't have the best action in the world, but for the money it was well worth buying.

Pretty hard not to rate it highly here...it's a keyboard and two mod-wheels, plug it into an XP PC and it just works...not much room for confusion.

To be honest, I can't reach maximum velocity without banging so hard on the keys I fear I'm gonna break something. Extremely poor quality control at M-Audio. I have an Edirol PCR-M50 keyboard which I can run at the same time in Sonar for direct comparison, and it is impossible to play with full velocity range as you have to beat the crap out of it. On the plus side, sonar has a velocity tool you can insert into a midi track which gives you various ways to modify velocity response (eg. Multiply velocity setting by % of itself). So I can basically lower the force I need to reach max V by artificially giving the keyboard a new velocity curve. So it's not a deal-breaker for me, and I haven't noticed any other flaws mentioned in other reviews, so I probably got lucky and got a board with a narrow range of inconsistencies.

Seems really sturdy. There's not much to it, so as long as the 88 keys hold out, it should last a long time.

I've gotta say, other than that one problem with the obvious velocity-range problem, which I can work around, it's a pretty sturdy, good-looking and playable piece of gear.

If you're making music on your PC in a home studio (a non-live-performance environment), and you've already got a small keyboard with lotsa bells and whistles and just wish you had more octaves, I'd say the 88es is a great buy for the money. Just make sure your host app is capable of tweaking incoming velocity data. I've got my 49-key stacked on top of the 88es, to the far left (like an organ), and I find myself prefering to use its mod/pitchbend joystick over the wheels on the 88. Sonar also accepts input from both, so I can program all the buttons/knobs/sliders on the small board if needed, while playing on the big one. If you already have a small board with lotsa controllers, and your host will let you play an instrument with either of two keyboards, the 88es is a great add-on...at least the one I got is. It's definitely a plus for using some of those multis in Kontakt 2 sample libraries (some of which are programmed to span 7 octaves).