It’s all very easy-to-use and flexible, making the Launchpad X an excellent option for creating custom performance setups to control your favourite instruments or creative effects. It’s just a slight shame the unit has no MIDI Out, allowing these to be patched directly to hardware. Marking ten years since the arrival of the original Launchpad, we’re immensely proud to release the latest full-sized and portable versions of the world’s favourite Ableton Live grid controller: Launchpad X and Launchpad Mini [MK3]. Made to perform. The velocity sensitivity is put to use elsewhere, too. As with the higher-end Launchpad Pro, it’s possible to control the speed of mixer parameter changes simply by how hard you press a pad - hitting a new mixer, send or pan position firmly will make an immediate change, while a gentle press will trigger a slow fade between settings. Probably the highlight of this updated Launchpad is its four Custom Modes. As with previous Launchpads, these are user-configurable setups whereby the pad grid can be assigned to send out a variety of different MIDI messages.

Includes Ableton Live Lite, one of four XLN Audio Addictive Keys instruments and over 4GB of Loopmasters samples. velocity-sensitive RGB pads – see and control your Ableton Live Session View and play instruments expressively Program Change allows you to have the pad send a program change message on a chosen channel. This is useful for selecting certain patches on VSTs or hardware. Although Ableton Live remains the Launchpad’s primary focus, the X also comes ready-made for use with two other Novation-built tools. It's class compliant and doesn't need any drivers: you just install the software, plug it in and start performing.As we said in the introduction, the basic Launchpad design is over a decade old now, and that says something about how popular and adaptable the platform is. Launchpads work for newcomers or more seasoned types who need a portable way to trigger clips and scenes. These maybe aren’t worth abandoning your current grid controller for, unless you really want the Mini’s clip colours (or the X’s MIDI out), but they are viable candidates if you’re starting out and budget and/or mobility is important to you. The Launchpad is a well-established name and the inclusion of Ableton Live Lite means that you can get busy immediately. These two ‘pads are incredibly compact and portable. Who knows, perhaps the next incarnations of these will have to be foldable! Do I really need this? While the Launchpad X retains the same core design, there’s a lot of additional functionality on offer here compared to the original design. The most notable change is the addition of velocity and pressure sensitivity to the pads. As you’d expect, this immediately makes the Launchpad X a considerably more expressive controller when it comes to playing drum and instrument sounds. Creating a template on the Launchpad is done through the use of Widgets, each of these has different functions:

That letter, we assume, relates to the controller line’s decade anniversary, as it certainly doesn’t indicate increased size - in fact, this latest Launchpad is considerably thinner, more lightweight and all-round sleeker than the controllers that preceded it. Software Compatibility: Ableton Live (Version 10 or Greater), Launchpad X Also Works as a Standard MIDI Controller Used with an instrument, it displays the familiar style of ‘scale’ mode used across most modern pad-centric controllers - whereby notes of a scale are highlighted from left to right across the grid with root notes delineated by a change in colour. There are 16 preset scales to choose from, and both Scale and Chromatic modes for a choice of whether notes outside of that scale are available or not.As with previous incarnations, this is still primarily an Ableton Live controller, and users of that DAW benefit from simple plug-and-play compatibility. Used with Live, engaging Note mode from the top row of buttons will configure the pad grid to one of two layouts. Four Customisable Modes – You Can Use Components to Customise Mappings and Control MIDI from the Launchpad X. Wrong Mode: this means the device is connected and recognised, but is in the wrong state, in this case, it could mean the Launchpad is in Bootloader mode. Pressing the green pad at the bottom right will let it start as normal. If not, please try reinstalling the firmware from the Firmware tab. The Launchpad Pro can be used with FL Studio in accordance with Image Line's own development. This guide has been imported from this forum post:

The Custom Mode editor can be used with or without a unit connected, but this article will assume that one is connected.Launchpad Mini is our most compact and portable 64-pad MIDI grid controller, giving you everything you need to start performing in Ableton Live - and it'll fit in your bag. Bright RGB pads perfectly match your clips and scenes, making it easier than ever to see your Ableton Live sessions, while immediate and tactile access to Live’s performance controls liberate you from the mouse and keyboard, and Drum and Note modes let you instantly flip between playing beats and melodies. The Scale Keyboard includes up to 8 notes from a scale. You can choose which scale, which root note, which MIDI channel and which octave this uses. When dragging a Widget onto a slot with a Widget already in place, the previous Widget will be removed: Down the right-hand side of Components, you'll have access to your templates as well as the templates we have provided: And then set the Launchpad X DAW Out and DAW In (Launchpad_X_Input on Windows) for the Input and Output ports and then match the settings below: