Korg Nu:Tekt NTS-3 KAOSS Pad Kit

The power of KAOSS is in your hands! Build your own NTS-3 featuring the iconic XY pad interface, a massive effects engine, and versatile connectivity.

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Korg MINIKP Mini Kaoss Pad

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Run a stereo line-level source into this compact Kaoss touchpad, and tweak your sound with 100 different effects -- great for DJs or electronica live sets.

The MiniKP is the Kaoss Pad that fits in your pocket, offering touch-pad effects for all types of music. Since it first appeared, the Kaoss Pad series has been enormously popular with artists around the world for its intuitive touch-pad interface and its revolutionary effect programs. And now, the series is joined by its smallest member, the mini-KP. While providing the same interface in which multiple parameters of the effect program are controlled by a single fingertip, the mini-KP brings the advantages of battery operation and mobility, making it an ideal choice for DJ club performances, home studio applications, as well as outdoor live events or for use with a portable audio player. Wherever you are, the mini-KP brings new possibilities to any music scene.

Features:

- Intuitive touch-pad interface gives you fingertip effect control in real-time
- The smallest body in the Kaoss Pad series
- Battery operation and an optional carrying strap make it an ideal choice for any scene
- 100 effects including filter, delay, and looper meet the needs of any musical style
- Numerous BPM effects are provided. You can use the "Tap/BPM button" to synchronize the mini-KP to your song's tempo, and apply a wide range of effects to your music
- "FX Release" function provides a natural decay when changing effects or removing your finger from the pad
- Hold function lets you memorize the position at which you touched the touch-pad when you release your finger
- Use the 2 memory keys A and B read more to store your favorite effect program settings, including the effect depth and the Hold on/off status

Use the touch-pad to control the effects in real time

The Kaoss Pad series lets you control the effect entirely from the touch-pad in real time. Different effect parameters are assigned to the X-axis and Y-axis of the touch-pad and can be controlled simultaneously, meaning that you can vary the delay time and the feedback at the same time, or simultaneously change the cutoff and resonance of a filter. This means that complex effect operations that otherwise would require two hands on a conventional knob-based controller can be performed easily and intuitively with just one hand. It's also easy to apply complex effects by rubbing or tapping the pad with your fingertip as though you were playing a musical instrument.

Small size for use in a variety of situations

The mini-KP features the smallest body in the Kaoss Pad series. It can be operated on batteries, and provides a strap attachment hole for easy portability. This means that you can now use the Kaoss Pad series' unique and intuitive one-finger operation with a wide range of instruments or sound sources, in an even greater variety of situations. Here are some examples:

- DJ practice at home, or DJ performance in a club
- Performance with synthesizers or other instruments (indoor or outdoor)
- Listening to your portable audio player, or using your portable audio player to rehearse a DJ mix for a party (indoor or outdoor)

100 effects covering a variety of musical styles

The mini-KP contains a total of one hundred effects, many derived from the larger KP3, including filter, delay, and a looper, covering a wide range of musical styles. There's a "low/high-band pass filter" that lets you cut specific frequency ranges of sound to add variety to a song, a "decimator" that intentionally degrades the audio quality of the input to give unique impact to the sound, a much-requested "delay & reverb" combination effect, a "looper & pitch shifter" that captures and repeats incoming audio, retuning it in real-time as the pad is manipulated, synth sounds derived from the KP3 -- and many more effects that can dramatically transform the sound.

"BPM effects" and "FX Release" for natural effect transitions

You can use the "TAP/BPM button" to detect the BPM (tempo) and synchronize the mini-KP to an audio input source, and then take advantage of the many BPM effects that are synchronized to your song or performance -- an excellent way to use effects. There's also an "FX Release" function that lets the effect sound decay gradually when you remove your finger from the pad or change effects. This makes it easy to blend the mini-KP's effects into your performances and songs. Some effect programs do not support the "FX Release" function.

"Hold" function and memory keys for your favorite settings

When you're touching the pad to apply an effect, you can use the "Hold" function to "freeze" the effect settings at any desired point. There's also a Memory Key function that lets you memorize the selected effect program, the Hold function on/off status, and the effect depth. This lets you store your favorite effect settings for instant recall anytime, so you can boldly use effects to transform the character of your songs or performances.
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mini-KP Effect List:
LPF (Low Pass Filter), HPF (High Pass Filter), BPF+ (Band Pass Filter+), 72dB/oct LPF, LPF & Delay, HPF & Delay, BPF+ & Delay, LPF & Reverb, HPF & Reverb, BPF+ & Reverb, Morphing Filter, Radio Filter, Radio Isolator, Isolator, Isolator & Distortion, Isolator & Delay, Jet (Manual Flanger), Manual Phaser, Talk Filter, Digi Talk, Ring Mod & HPF, Pitch Shifter & HPF, Mid Pitch Shifter, Pitch Shifter & Delay, Broken Modulation, Fuzz Distortion, Decimator, Decimator & HPF, LFO LPF, LFO HPF, LFO BPF+, LFO HPF+ & Delay, Infinite LFO HPF+, Random LFO LPF, Random LFO HPF+, Flanger, Deep Flanger, Mid Flanger, Flanger & LPF, Flanger & Delay, Infinite LFO Flanger, Phaser, Mid Phaser, Phaser & Delay, Step Phaser, Auto Pan, Mid Auto Pan, Slicer, Mid Slicer, Slicer & LPF, Slicer & HPF, Delay, Smooth Delay, Low Cut Delay, Ping Pong Delay, LCR Delay, 3 band Delay, Multi Tap Delay, BPF Time Slide, Reverse Delay & HPF, Reverse Delay Mix, Gate Reverb & Delay, Delay & Reverb, Tape Echo, Dub Echo, Feedback Echo, Reverb, Reverb 2, Spring Reverb, Gate Reverb, Reverse Gate Reverb, 3 band Gate Reverb, Grain Shifter, Mid Grain Shifter, Mid Grain Shifter+, Grain & HPF, Grain & HPF+, Looper Forward/Reverse, Vinyl Looper, Rewind Spin Looper, Looper & LPF, Looper & HPF, Looper & Flanger, Looper & Pitch Shifter, Looper & Decimator, Looper Isolator & HPF, Looper & Isolator+, Bass Looper, Looper & Oscillator, Looper & Noise, Unison Saw Bass, Unison Squ Bass, Unison Saw Synth, Unison Squ Synth, Metalic Synth, Siren, LFO Sin, LFO Squ, Noise, Synth & Looper

Numbers of Effects: 100

Connectors: Line In jacks (RCA phono jacks), Line Out jacks (RCA phono jacks), Headphones jack (stereo mini jack)

Sampling Frequency: 48kHz

AD/DA: 24-bit linear

Power Supply: 4 alkaline AA (LR6) batteries (6 V)

Battery Life: approx. 5 hours (with alkaline batteries)

Dimensions:
4.17 (W) x 5.08 (D) x 1.14 (H) in.
106 (W) x 129 (D) x 29 (H) mm

Weight: 154 g / 5.43 oz. (without batteries)

Included Item: 4 AA batteries

Optional Accessories: KA193 AC adapter

For support or warranty questions, please contact the manufacturer:
Phone: 631-390-6800
Web: https://www.korgusa.com/support

Reviewers gave this product an overall rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars. (20 ratings)
Submitted June 7, 2010 by a customer from yahoo.com

"Warp Your Music Up"

Overall: 4.5 out of 5 stars
(see rating details)
This review has been selected by our experts as particularly helpful.
I'm pretty satisfied with this unit overall. If it were lost or if it broke I'd replace it for sure, but I'd probably buy it used or refurbished because I don't have as much money at my disposal as I used to. If someone stole it, I'd be the one going to jail. That's all I'll say about that. If I had the money I'd purchase either a Kaossilator or KP3, but for right now I'm thoroughly content with what this thing offers.

Sound
The sound of this product is entirely dependent on its user. It's an effects unit, so you have to plug an external audio source into it. It can't make sounds of its own (with the exception of a handful of "drone" like oscillators towards the end of the effects bank) so you need something else coming through it to use it properly. The sound quality is okay, it could honestly be better. I've noticed that while using it live (this could be a problem with individual PA's), certain effects are not as loud as others, there are sharp spikes in certain frequency bands that are hard to avoid. I normally use flanger, phaser, and different delays to enunciate what I play on keyboards, and I've found that sometimes the audio output will clip even if the peak light to the upper right of the LCD screen is green and not red. Otherwise, I can't gripe too much about this product. It's incredibly small and battery powered and is a wonderful addition to my sound. I play a variety of music, from Industrial to EBM to Drum 'n' Bass to Symphonic read more Black Metal, and the MiniKP fits right in to whatever I want to pull off, whether its a super deep flange (program #36) that sounds like time is slowing down for psytrance, a grain shifter (program #72) for glitching out drum beats and samples for industrial, or a phaser delay (program #43) that adds an eerie ambience to choirs, strings, and pads I play in my metal band. I've also use the miniKP in tandem with a Boss SE-50 I purchased from a fellow industrial musician, as well as various tube amplifiers (an old IVP Intersound tube preamp and an Artcessories Tube Mic Preamp) to warm the digital sound up a bit. If they could make an analog version of this I would be in heaven. This little pad plays well with others, you just have to place it in the correct position of the effects chain.

Features
When I purchased mine, I only got the unit itself, I have yet to purchase the power adapter for it because I use rechargeable batteries. However, the unit did come packaged with 4 AA's so you can use it literally within minutes of taking it out of the box. The most useful feature is the fact that the effects are bundled together into groups that are related to each other. For example, the first ten or twenty programs are different types of filter effects, ranging from low pass to high pass and everything in between. There's only one true distortion/ fuzz program in the entire bank of 100 effects, so if you're looking for overdrive find another effects unit, distortion pedals are a dime a dozen. If you feel creative look up some schematics online and go to Radioshack and pick up a soldering iron and some resistors, capacitors, and transistors, you can feasibly build a distortion pedal for about the same price as a generic stompbox anywhere else. There's also two or three variations of the sample rate/ resolution altering effect known as bitcrusher (or decimator), which is a really gritty, dirty digital effect that's useful for adding some grunge to just about anything. There's also sections dedicated to filters modulated with LFO's, to create a sort of "auto-wah" cyclic effect. After those comes the flanger and phaser variations, then auto panning, then slicers, then a myriad of delay settings, and some reverb. Another useful feature is the tap tempo. Personally I rarely use tap tempo because I mostly dabble in electronic music, but I can identify its necessity in other genres (especially those with live drummers). The tap tempo button is the largest red button in the top right corner, press it twice and the tempo automatically conforms to the duration of the two beats in which you pressed it. If you only press it once, the BPM setting pops up on the LCD screen and allows you to use the dial to manually toggle the tempo. After 90 BPM, it beings to decrease in increments of 0.1 rather than 1.0 (allowing for weird settings such as 88.8 or 76.5, etc.). This allows for long, huge sweeps with some of my favorite effects, and with a bit of simple math, you can get 16/1 quantization for higher BPM beats and synth lines, something I could never pull off with my MicroKorg back in the day. What's also useful is the memory A and B buttons below the tempo button. These allow you to assign two of your favorite effects programs so you can call them up immediately upon turning the unit on, or during live use. This saves you in the fact that it's such a pain to dial through a bank of effects and trying to remember the number of the program you like the best, especially in a live setting. One of my favorite and quite possibly one of the most useful features of this unit is the effects hold button on the bottom left corner. There's a red LED down there to denote whether the effect is on hold or not. This allows you to keep an effect on without having to obligate yourself to keeping a finger on the pad at all times, so you can free your hands up in case you need both of them while performing. Also, if you want to change the X-Y coordinates of the effect while its on hold, it saves this automatically and keeps the program's parameters at the values they were at when your finger leaves the pad. The less useful features are at the end of the program bank, the last 25 programs take a bit of practice to use correctly. These programs ranging from sample loopers to drone oscillators. The looper settings take a little splice or section of whatever you're playing through the miniKP and start repeating it over and over again. Depending on where you place your finger on the pad, the duration of the sample and how often its repeated is effected. While this sounds awesome when pulled off correctly, I have yet to acquire a knack or feel for initiating this correctly with some of the looper settings, most often than not I don't catch the sample I'm seeking and have to constantly try over and over, so I rarely use the looper in a live setting and prefer to use it when recording so that I can cut out any failed attempts and single out the correct application. As for the oscillators, those are good for genres of music in which you need drone type synth sounds or weird pitch/ filter sweeps. Going left to right (X axis) alters the pitch, and going up and down (Y axis) alters the filter setting. While these settings do have their uses, I don't use them very often because I have a ton of synthesizers at my disposal already. But for a little live improv with an X-Y pad, these settings can't hurt.

Ease of Use
If you can't figure this thing out within the first half hour of getting it out of the box, you need some serious help in the form of Wikipedia and electronic music forums to gain a better understanding of audio effects. All you need is cables with an RCA connection (quarter inch phono plugs, NOT quarter inch guitar plugs). I bought two generic stereo RCA-1/4" (grey and orange to denote left and right channels) cables for use with this unit because my studio's standard is regular guitar cables. Everything I own is relatively easy to use with this unit, I just swap out the regular cables I use to hook my equipment up to my mixer and I'm ready to roll.

Quality
The reason this unit is so inexpensive is because it is made out of plastic (the red part), the only metal as far as I can tell is the black frame screwed on top. If I had the money I'd probably buy another one of these to use as backup (or to use two in conjunction with each other, that would be sick). But so far I've taken it on the road and to the practice space and it has yet to fail me.

Value
I purchased this unit because it was cheaper than the other Kaoss Pad models out there while still providing the basic functionality I was aiming for. It was a good deal and a good value, and I'm glad Korg released a trimmed down, scaled version of their line of Kaoss Pads that tend to be a bit too much money in my honest opinion.

Manufacturer Support
I have yet to deal with Korg directly or indirectly, none of my Korg gear has died yet and their products dominate my studio. I cannot rate support because of this.

The Wow Factor
The only thing that would make this little wonder any "sexier" would be if it had the same LED "trail" effect the KP3 has on its X-Y pad. The red plastic also looks pretty awesome under blacklight (a lot of industrial clubs I play at have UV light that gives it a neon pink hue). The fact that something so small packs such a live punch is the biggest attraction to this unit.

Musical Background:
Active Musician

Musical Style:
Industrial, Psytrance, Electronica, Drum 'n' Bass, Black Metal
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No longer available at zZounds