Allen & Heath AH-XONE:K2 XONE:K2 Professional USB DJ MIDI Controller

Product Information

The K2 doubles up as a great sounding audio interface and comes with a carry case, but the F1 is marginally cheaper and includes a Traktor Pro licence.

Then you’ll be able to specify the Hue (color/tint), saturation (fade between full-color and white), and Brightness (the intensity of the light) via MIDI Messages.There’s nothing else on the market that can handle such a task with arcane hackery, so if you’re dead set on travelling down NI’s new road, the F1 is the controller for you. Download the latest driver and connect both Xone:1Ds, run the installer, when this has finished, restart OSX then once restarted, check the OSX MIDI device window to ensure 2 instances of the Xone MIDI Device (direct) icon are present and not greyed out, this indicates the installation was successful. The default is channel 16, please see page 13 of the 1D user guide describing how to change the midi channel of the second 1D to channel 15.

What I mean by that sentence is that the F1’s full scale RGB lighting can only be accessed in Traktor’s ‘F1’ mode, though, as opposed to being able to specify basic lighting parameters via MIDI CC value in ‘MIDI’ mode. drivers are currently available for Windows XP 32bit, XP 64bit, Vista 32 Bit, Windows 7 32bit, Windows 7 64bit and OSX 10. Perhaps this is a different folks, different strokes issue, but both lumps of gear have their own incentives for purchase. I do mean just, though, and it’s mainly because I think most users will do the majority of their mapping on a single layer whether they have the option to use multiple layers or not.On the one hand, the K2’s layering system gives it lots of options when configuring it to work with just about any software, but on the other, the F1’s super tight integration with Traktor is a huge feather in its cap.

Both the F1 and K2 are well built, sturdy units; it’s quite difficult to choose a victor in this area. To be able to Map both the 1D devices in Traktor Controller manager, add a new Generic MIDI device and assign the In-Port and Out-Port to the Xone MIDI Device, there will be another instance titled Xone MIDI Device (2), leave this for the moment. With both installed you can now map them in Traktor making sure to set both XONE devices to transmit MIDI on different channels.I would specify that this is not a gap of the controller since any other software actually fully support HSB messages over midi.

Actually, you can obtain complete RGB control of the Pads via MIDI, it’s simply not the default mode for the controller when in MIDI Mode. The F1 can be configured to work in standard MIDI mode, but you only get a single layer of control – so the K2 has an advantage there – but considering that Traktor is such a powerhouse in the DJ software world, and for a lot of users a single layer of control is all that will be configured, the F1 just squeezes this one. When it comes down to it, it’s the F1’s Traktor integration that’s the major differentiator between the two products; if you use Traktor, then unless you have absolutely no interest in the Remix Decks the F1 is a no brainer purchase. Download the latest driver from the link above and run the installer, connect both XONE:1Ds when prompted on-screen, once driver installation is completed there will be 2 instances of the XONE MIDI device in the Sounds, Video and Game Controllers section of the Windows Device Manager, this indicates the installation has completed successfully. The K2’s extra controls and layering mean it’s probably the better choice if you use other software or just want to control standard Traktor functions… and that’s about as much of an official line as I think you’ll get out of me, guys!But if we’re talking about MIDI controller vs MIDI controller on a level playing field, the issue becomes considerably harder to resolve. The bottom line is that because both units are so good, and their added extras are worth roughly as much in ‘real money’ as each others, I’m declaring this area a tie as well. Whilst the F1 has RGB lights (although they only work properly in Traktor mode right now) and slightly bigger and nicer buttons, the K2 has more knobs. At the time of writing, the biggest differentiator is the F1’s ability to handle Remix Decks fully and completely.