[marcbyron]

Hi,

I have the Xkey 37 Air and I am not able to get aftertouch to work on any app except the Xkey Piano app.

I have tried:

Garageband (iOS)
Logic Pro (MacOS)
Mono/Poly (iOS)
Waldorf Nave (iOS)

Please let me know what to do, I am about to return the unit.

Thanks,
Marc

[Zhao Yitian]

Dear Marc,
The Xkey Air is sending the polyphonic after touch by default, but if you want to listen it’s effect, it depends on the sound of received software. For example in Garageband the organ sound (and some synth leads) is responding the aftertouch, but the piano sound did not.
For LogicX, you can record the polyphonic aftertouch message into the sequence, but if you want to listen the effect, you also need to select correct sound which was set to aftertouch responding in the software.

[marcbyron]

Hi Zhao,

Thanks for your message. My keyboard must be broken then, because I have another aftertouch capable keyboard, and there is no issue with aftertouch on these apps. Furthermore, when I use Waldorf Nave, I can specifically choose aftertouch only sound, but nothing happens.

I am assuming the keyboard is defective, I am going to return it.

Thanks,
Marc

[Zhao Yitian]

Hi Marc,
I do not think your keyboard is defective. Because the polyphonic aftertouxh uses same sensor with velocity, so if you can receive midi note, the aftertouch feature could not be broken.

Please be aware the polyphonic aftertouch in Xkey is different than monophonic aftertouch from any other keyboard, it is more professional feature and only Xkey has it today. You can simple test with a midi monitor software to see that you can receive it from the Xkey. So the only issue is your sound selection which can respond this message.

[marcbyron]

Let me try a couple more things before I return it.

Are you planning any updates to firmware and XKey Plus anytime soon?
I am having issues with connecting sometimes, which requires me to restart the iPad

[Zhao Yitian]

We did not have report to same issue. Did you already use Apple official lightning to USB camera adapter?

[marcbyron]

I got it to work via USB camera adapter and MIDI interface, to use it with a Roland D-05, but only after switching to mono aftertouch. The synth doesn’t respond to polyphonic aftertouch at all, but that’s ok,

I used the same “trick” via bluetooth or USB camera adapter and the Mac and iPad. Both in Garageband and Animoog, aftertouch works when switched to Mono.

Aftertouch doesn’t work at all with Waldorf Nave.

Do you know any app that works with polyphonic aftertouch?

I decided to keep the keyboard. Thanks for listening.

[Zhao Yitian]

From what I know, your can try the App from Moog Music and Arturia, they are supporting polyphonic aftertouch.

[SteveConslaw]

For what it’s worth. I just got my XKey air, and I am having similar issues. I am continuing to troubleshoot.

[Zhao Yitian]

Dear Steve,

What kind of issue are you having? No effect for polyphonic aftertouch or connecting problem?

[SteveConslaw]

Good news, I got the poly-aftertouch working. I figured out a couple tips that should be useful to other people. First regarding the aftertouch, for me the default – linear curve in the XKey Plus app just didn’t give me useful results. I switched it to the logarithmic scale alternative, then I tried it out with the Memorymoon ME80 CS80 clone software, which I knew is made for poly aftertouch, and playing around with the aftertouch settings got very useful result. Then I tried it on some other soft synths with various levels of success. TIP Keep the XKEY Plus app active, at least if you are working with a MAC with logic, because you’ll probably want to switch between channel and polyaftertouch depending upon your instrument.

I was shocked to find out that almost all the presets in Arturia’s CS-80V do NOT have polyAT activated as default. You have to go in there and assign Poly AT to stuff, which means you have to read the manual probably.

I am going to shift my attention to getting the Xkey Air working with my Mac. It worked fine via bluetooth with the iPad right out of the box. So far I only have it working with USB on the Mac. I think I might have a conflict with the driver to my Yamaha BT-01 driver. I am getting an error message from BLUETOOTH MIDI CONNECT.

Once I get it working with the Mac, I will either try to get it working with the Windows 10 michine via a WIDI adapter or with the iPad working as a network midi host.

(All of these things when I should be working. Well, that’s why I buy this stuff.)

[SteveConslaw]

The ES2 Synth built into Logic responds to PolyAT.

[Zhao Yitian]

Dear Steve, thanks very much for the feedback! We really appreciate.

[Author]

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