This video just keeps on giving. Two years later, Elektron has added all three of your most wanted features and also hired you to present them in a launch day video. Digitakt just keeps getting better and better.

Watched a febreeze advert for you, bro. Lol

Ricky is such a good dude. He has helped me so much in past few years with getting right gear, giving me tips for live setup, song and structure ideas. I wish so bad that I could spend a day talking with him and asking questions and picking his brain about production ideas. Thank you so much for your videos and the wealth of knowledge and wisdom you kick down for your audience

The missing velocity sensitive pads point is a pretty funny one for me personally, for me a big reason why I wanted Digitakt over many other products WAS that it DIDN'T have the pads. I'm so inaccurate with the pads and wanted clicky buttons like something like sp1200, and the velocity sensitivity wasn't much of an issue. I usually even turn off velocity when recording drums with my midi keyboard or midi pads (which I still suck with).

i was gonna watch a movie, then i remembered it's new ricky every saturday. leggo!

Ricky, I need to thank you again. I went hybrid in 2020 and bought a Digitakt and decided to treat the rest of my studio as sample material for it. I needed a stereo filter as well and got more than I expected with the Ottobit. With this minimal config, I was able to complete 6 tracks in a mere 2 months and they're out in Distrokid servers somewhere, waiting to be released. My last EP was back in '12. With all the great tools DAWs offers, in *8 years* I wasn't able to release anything I felt totally comfortable with. Your invaluable insights and advice have led me to a more straightforward approach to music, so thank you so much for helping me get back in the game.

Watching your videos I’ve come to realize you’re really a cinematographer moonlighting as a music producer.

Just got mine yesterday, I feel really inspired so far, really liking the happy accidents

All I can say is love my digis and I’m totally inspired by them and the new update. I made a synth track on the digitakt today using single cycle waveforms from samples and it blew me away.

Hello, I discover your channel when I wanted to buy the Digitakt, and I bought it because of your videos. It's the only gear I never sold, I use it all time and I love it so much. It's so simple to use and there is so many tricks to make everything you want. I personnaly never use time stretch, pitch adjust with micro chopping give better results. Start point trig lock make good slices too, I like to use my ears first to make music. Stay healthy, peace !

Mister Tinez I just wanted to state that I really really love your videos. Even just the way they look I don't know if you do something in the after production or if it is your camera or just how the light naturally falls because of the way your apartment is built and furnished but it just looks a certain way and I like it! And your whole manner of speaking so calmly and the way your dressed and everything just make your videos a real joy to watch. Thank you for doing that :)

please send this video to elektron !! maybe it gets them to look at those issues :D Update: Just checked the release notes of 1.20. First point under "Bug Fixes" is: Chords were not trigged when trigged manually on MIDI Tracks. Isn't that what you just described?

Having used elektron gear for I think almost 15 years I will say. There’s really nothing like elektron gear. Once ya get into it creativity just flows. What I also noticed is the guys who are really good on them make insane music. I have my live and my X so akai is in the game. I’m personally really stoked there’s a company like elektron. What was hard was when they came out many years ago, utube was not a thing. So we were on our own as far as learning how to use them. Now people help each other out and show all their tricks of this brand. Love Elektron

Literally just got the DT a week ago. Your videos have been very helpful/inspirational. It definitely has its own workflow, somewhat hindering in some aspects, but I still love it.

Doing alright, thanks for asking! Ps, good to hear support for the MPC One; looking forward to that.

beat in the background throughout the video is fire 🔥

Great honest assessment! I LOVE my Digitakt, and it's very fair (and healthy) to point out it's quirks. You really know your way around it too, which makes this an especially credible critique. For me, the last 2 updates have been great with welcome practical features (scale per track, and trig preview esp.), and I totally agree that song mode is something to keep wishing for :)

It's the first bit of gear I bought and probably will always have it. It does need an arpeggiator and scale mode though

I found your vids a year ago when I first got a Digitakt and needed some visual guides to truly figure it out - huge help man, thank you for those (and this video as well).

Just got mine and it's awesome, but using it is still a bittersweet experience lol. Great video!

1. I just woke up and thought something had gone wrong with your hair in lockdown. 2. I love Elektron but it seems a lot of synth manufacturers put in arbitrary limitations. For example, by now, 30 years after the MPC revolution, you could literally make the perfect sampler.. but nope.

My only gripes with Digitakt are: 1) only 1gb of memory. I'm not after something like 250gb, but even 2 or 4gb would be a world of difference, or a support for SD card or an external storage. 2) the slicing, how cumbersome it is and how the combo of these 1) and 2) effectively makes me not use it for sampling. I've just put all the needed samples in it and that's it (as the 1gb is full really fast). 3) No built in distortion. This all said, it is one of, if not THE most used instrument I own and it has given me an endless stream of inspiration. And I still find new tricks from random KZfaq videos for it. Absolutely no regrets, would buy it again in an instant, if I didn't already own it. :)

Literally bought mine this morning, thought the OS update was a good sign but Ricky bringing things back down to earth, haha 🌎 Hope Elektron is taking notes on this, peace.

13:00 You just need to use additional MIDI tracks. Use one Midi track to lay down chords, the next Midi track for a lower octave melody, another one for higher octave lead, etc. You have 8 Midi tracks to work with, and I rarely ever sequence 8 devices to need them all (I usually only sequence 2 devices, so that's ~4 Midi tracks each.) These allows also you to mute the solos and other melodies easier.

Your videos are so much more natural than when I started watching last year. Love the passion

You should make a sequel “What I wish I knew before I sold the Digitakt”. This machine is becoming a magnificent piece of art.

Sold my Digitakt got the Deluge never looked back!

The no song absolutely kills this machine. That’s why I sold mine.

Love your videos SO MUCH and when you join us in the DELUGE universe you will be greeted with open arms and have none of these complaints.

I LOVE my Digitakt. It was my first piece of Elektron gear (now also have a A4 and Rytm mk2 and returned my Octatrack because it was too convoluted.) The lack of song mode is my major pain point, but the Digitakt still acts as the core master clock of my dawless setup. From there I record into the computer through a multitrack mixer. But for the cost..... it should have a song mode. I'm currently tinkering with an Arduino-based MIDI song mode project (by sending out pattern change CCs) that I'll open-source. But I can see a Digitakt mk2 on the horizon.... :)

I've struggled with elektron gear in the past, such as the original monomachine & the machinedrum, and that was enough to keep me focused elsewhere for that 'multi-box' fix. However, im still hopeful there's something i can fly with (literally, as i travel a great deal, even though coronavirus has curtailed it for now), such as the model cycles or samples, as I've been watching/ reading with earnest and noticed how much easier and user friendlier the gear has become. Thank you for sharing this. Not everyone shares the downsides, perhaps for fear of being a moaner or whinge bag. But the reality is that every piece of gear has a tough spot in its UI. Sometimes it's a part of its charm. Other times it can leave it to gather dust and become a shelf ornament.

YOU taught me how to use my Digitakt properly! Then I bought the Akai Force. Coming from am Elektron workflow, I hated the MPC way of doing things. Couldn't understand the clunky way Akai differentiated between drum samples, plug-ins, audio tracks, keygroups and sampling. What the heck was up with treating sounds differently?? Why couldn't I mangle everything 'democratically' the way I could with the Digitakt? The MPC workflow felt like it was tied into a way of doing things back from the days when their gadgets weren't powerful enough, and their "work around" to those limitations has been baked into being the MPC workflow. Now they are stuck with it. And I feel the Force is miles ahead than the MPC in pulling in new users, but it's no Digitakt. Since then I have bought a bunch of samplers/drum machines (it's a disease). I have an Octatrack, SP16, Circuit, Force, DT, Drumbrute Impact, RS7000, I'm getting a Yamaha RM1x tomorrow (on a side note, Yamaha release a modern groove box already, stop slacking!) and there's only one gadget I will never get rid of, and that's the Digitakt. It's way too much fun to use.

So cool watching these early videos now that Digital II is out and I'm edging ever closer to buying one! 😜

Would love to hear your take on the Roland MC 707

It's so annoying how far Elektron would go in order not to cannibalise any products. Every single one is gimped in one way or another, so that you have to buy at least a couple. I'm so glad I went for a used Toraiz SP-16 instead of a Digitakt.

The 33 seconds max recording time should be lifted off when used with overbridge as an audio interface......

I don't even have a Digitakt nor do I want one, but having this video play while I fixed my wife's watch strap was strangely relaxing.

One workaround for getting “more” polyphony. If you want to keep a chord sustaining, and then play another new note before that chord ends, use another midi track set to the same channel to add additional notes or chords. It’s not exactly fluid, but an easy work around if needed when programming a sequence for an external device.

This is a full and thorough exploration of the shortcomings of this device and I can see this video definitely answering some questions of potential buyers. That being said, I think a very common misconception about the Digitakt is when people think of it as a workstation. This is not a "Midi Production Center" and it never claimed to be. It's not a "Sampling Workstation" either. Look right on the face of the unit... "8 Voice Digital Drum Computer & Sampler" the Digitakt tells you what it's designed for before you even turn it on. Much in the same way that ingredients are listed on food packaging (size order), Elektron is trying to communicate the fact that this is first and foremost a "Drum Computer" and THEN also a "Sampler". Complaining about the way this unit handles the sequencing of chords is missing the point. It would be like complaining about the sampling time of the SP-1200 ("look at what this can do... it's so close!!! If only there was more memory!"). The SP in SP-1200 stands for "Sampling Percussion", it's designed to sample drums (which are short samples). I see the Digitakt as a modern SP, all the way down to the clicky no-velocity pads, which I love.

Your videos are super inspiring while being very chill and enjoyable/relaxing. AND informing, such as in this case.

Thanks for posting this. I would have never known about the Blackbox and was on the fence about the digitakt. I went with the Black box. It’s seems much more user friendly and being able to link patterns was key!

I kept mine for about six months, then sold it and never regretted it. I bought the Synthstrom Audible Deluge, which is for me the best groovemachine on the market right now, and never felt any frustration as I did with the Digitakt.

The Digitakt can now time strech and slice thanks to a workaround with the LFOs. Assuming you already found about it, I would love to hear your thoughts on it! This functionalities brings the Digitakt to a whole other level!

Thanks so much for bringing this "True polyphony?" thing up, because it made me realise how it actually works: trigs can have 4 notes, but they share all parameters (most importantly: length). What you did there at 12:40 is record another trig on top of the trig containing the 4 chord notes. Which is why DT replaced the existing one. How should it have known you wanted to add that note to the existing trig? Overdub mode? It's a bit like having two hands on the piano, I suppose. Both hands can play four notes, and they can sound one over the other, but on digitakt those hands can not hit the keys at the same time. Like Exiles TV says; you need another midi track to make that happen. I don't see how elektron could have done this better. At heart this is still a souped up 808 style sequencer. That means there are (severe) limitations, but that's what makes the sequencer so inspiring and fun, IMO.

I really like your honest reviews...no bullshit, no marketing ...only valid information. Thanks for that Ricky !

Just discovered your channel, it's a real gold mine. Keep it going !

if you want exact slicing, you can go by the number that is displayed (offset for the start point). Sample length is always 120, so half is 60, fourth 30, eight 15, 16th at 7.5. Its a bit tedious but you can get the exact slices

Ricky, maaan, your rants are the best. The "everything starts off the root note" explanation was really good. I know this machine pretty well but have to admit, I did not know that.

Whew..... thanks Ricky. I always wondered what kept me from pulling the trigger on getting one of these. Never knew about the "cant do" issues but now I know. Gracias

I hope elektron are working on a true flagship that’s basically a rytm and an octatrack

That midi sequencer example was exactly what I needed, thanks!

So glad I went with the MPC Live as the main heart of my rig. I was pretty keen on the digitakt initially but I just didn’t gel with it at all.

Oh boy I'm finally ordering one for myself. Luckily friend let me borrow his for a month. So excited to use own samples

This is hands down one of the best synth reviews I’ve seen. I’m getting back into music after a 16yr break and you’re making me think I should hold off on model:samples and pony up for this.

Dude I love it when you do the more hip hop beats

The main gripe of the new mpcs is the buggy ass os. I had a force for a month or so and returned it. It’s very powerful but it just feels like work instead of jamming.

I understand maybe 20 percent of what you're talking about at any given time, but I still dig watching someone so knowledgeable and passionate about this stuff talk about it.

I sold mine I too thought I never used it .... after smashing out an entire 1 tb hard drive of Trax with some friends one dasy they favored ones with digitakt playing some main roles so I rebought it lol

To be fair about the absence of velocity-sensitive pads - external MIDI devices can record velocity information. Pro tip: If you go to the lowest octave on a midi keyboard the first 8 notes will control tracks 1-8, respectively. I do this with my Arturia Keystep and it works beautifully!

I just bought the Digitakt after watching you talk about how special it is for months. It was your desert island pick and now you point out these limitations.

enrique, you just did the world a favor 'cause this really, really helped me to get a wee bit less GASsy. ;-) thanks much, man. very informative. very helpful.

I went through a whole phase in the beginning (I've had mine since it was released) where I was trying to use stems more, and loops, and over time I realized that yeah the DT can do stuff with longer samples, but it really shines with one shots. Not just drums, but synth notes, bass notes, longer ambiences, etc. When I just embraced it for what it is, and changed how I did tracks, I got even more into it. That's when the sequencer really shines for me. But yeah, it's not the best machine if you're dealing with loops or drum breaks, at least for me.

Literally the the day before receiving mine, Elektron releases the OS upgrade. I say it was devine intervention, lol.

I've had this gear for couple of weeks now and I'm so frikking happy with it. Compared to my songwriting usually I feel like I'm able to bring out ideas easier when I'm toying around with own vocal samples and crazy stuff and accidents that become the premise of a new song et cetera. Thanks for inspiring me for few months beforehand.

Nice content! Fan of the channel forsure. That’s interesting what you say about the Digitak. I came from a Maschine Mkii to the elektron flow, not having all the ease of playability was a big fear of mine. I like the point you made about it being more of a programming sequencer then a instrument. Something about cold hard old skool programming grabbed my attention a few years back and the digitak is beautiful for that. I don’t know why I like that it has limitations honestly, might be nostalgic! I’m a big fan of electronic producers like: Squarepusher, AFX, Trickfinger..they all have insane programming skills that I hope to achieve. 👋

I think is more for using one shots and short vocals, not loops

wow I didn't know what Digitakt had these kind of limitations

Totally agree, also why only 8 audio tracks? I never used the midi tracks, would have been cool to be able to choose for every track if being audio or midi. Working only with samples i would have preferred to have more audio tracks. the parameter lock to load different samples in one track is so annoying!

Elektron flying the "Back to mono" flag in 2022! Only joking, most groovebox type devices have this limitation, except Roland MC101 and MC707. I think an Elektron Digitakt MK2 that addresses some of these limitations would be a great idea, hopefully Elektron is developing it!

It would be so nice of you‘re making a new Video like this one After Two years of use :)

I love my Digitakt. It's my go to sketch pad for ideas, mainly because it's the device where my muscle memory is the strongest - if that makes sense. Its limitations force me to think in a different way, which is nice, but because of that, it has me drifting away from my original idea in minutes. If I need to get actual work done, I hook it up to / sample into the MPC One which is an awesome controller for the Digitakt. But that's not considered dawless I assume.

REEEEALLLLLY hoping the guys at elektron take note of the vid. Loving the update but the points you’ve brought forward are what grind my gears the most. 😬.

Mathematically speaking, the digitakt seems like more of a _studio addition_ rather than the answer, especially if you are comfortable with the MPC workflow.

MPC one blows it out of the park for me, never used the older ones due to my age but this one's great

If you've never tried the rytm mk2 before, I couldn't recommend it enough. The analog drum sounds are super good and it has digitakt-like sampling with velocity sensitive pads.

My workarround for the layering of Midi sequencer: Use Midi A for your Chord, use Midi B for the other melody (and then C, D, ... if more layers) and configure these midi sequences to send on the same midi channel ;-) Works well, only drawbacks = it reduces the number of midi sequences available

I wonder if they could fix the MIDI sequencing bug if they just wrote in a code that cycled through the voices 1 through 4, then inverted the cycle to go from voice 4 back to 1. Then they could program the DT to listen to the most recent voice, and replace that voice with the new registered note. It's not perfect, but it kind of remedies the limitations of 4 note polyphony.

Appreciate the candid longer-term reviews. A lot of bad information around hardware, you can spend thousands on things that do the same thing in a slightly different way and most of the reviews completely gloss over negative aspects.

Completely agree. I had a Digitakt for over a year and it was too much hassle to use with breaks. Having slicing (slice to pads) and timestretching would be such a plus for the Digitakt. Breaks + Random/Conditional Trigs = WIN!

Loved the original Electribes for their ease of operation, but sold them for a MPC 2000xl back in the day. Miss the ER1. The new series still maintain great UI and sound.

Man those captions though, lol... although I don't create the type of music you do, I do love the content.

Owning both, I’d say that the MPC One is a serious competitor - the only real advantages for the Digitakt are the sequencer tricks, Overbridge and its immediacy. It’s a very focused piece of kit, which in part is because of the restrictions it has, and that can be a positive. But things have changed a lot in the relatively short time since it came out, and I think it’s now at a perilous price point where it either needs updating or discounting in order to compete. It’s still a great little instrument that can quickly produce excellent results, and I think it’s sufficiently well designed that time won’t really change that, but if I was buying today I’d have to give it some serious thought. Re. slicing - I agree it’s a feature the Digitakt should really have, but the position locking method you show here does have its own advantages, like being able to modulate the start point. I tend to think of it as part of the Digitakt’s charm, the way it invites you to interact manually with the sample - its a very tactile instrument, despite the lack of velocity sensitivity etc - but of course there’s no reason it couldn’t have all that *and* slicing, and I think that’s the kind of update Elektron need to think about for the Digitakt to stay afloat. And just to avoid being too negative, I should add that the Digitakt blows both the Blackbox and the MPC away as an experimental, performative sequencer. You don’t have true polyphony or song mode, but you can do stuff with trigs and ctrl-all that simply cant be done elsewhere. It definitely has its own space, it’s just that it doesn’t seem to have quite as much space as it used to. For anyone interested in the Elektron way, I’d say the Digitone is the best point of entry right now.

Lock down is getting to you man 🤣 The no song mode bothered me at first because I planned on saving long sequences, but it forced me in to learning to perform and be more expressive with the hardware instead of just sitting and programming. Which in turn led me down a completely different creative path. I guess time stretch could be an issue if you’re trying to use the sampler like an Octa, I normally use it to live sample bass lines from the mono station which is midi clocked to the DT, so it’s at the same speed anyway but then there’s more sound manipulation available. Just these two boxes together make me really happy. The midi sequencer voicing thing looks really annoying though.... Take it easy, stay safe ✌️

I think with the Digitakt (among many other boxes and synths) you find what you really love about it and dial it in for your workflow. My DT is incredible, but I admit I leave a few features on the table because I have a few other boxes or synth that does that feature better. I personally love mine and it's the main box in my setup, but I do have songs where it's simply adding one shots and a few samples. I don't think you can ever own enough gear and it's part of the fun of the synth journey.

I think Digitone is better suited for poly sequencing, Takt for mono. If you have both you’re golden.

i get the issues but, one year in, digitakt has unlocked my creative potential. i use it for what it is, and it’s so fuckin ballin 😎

Hey Ricky. I feel you on those gripes. I wish they added xfade loop points, zero crossing snap, ping-pong loop, and a 16 levels mode for velocity live programming (like chromatic). Here's a tip for when you lay down something totally shifted. In Step Rec mode, press Func+Left or Right and it will shift the whole sequence left or right. For the cutting off notes, you only lose the previous one when you live record and end up placing a trig right on the previous one. (so for example if your long chord started on the 1 and you riffed over it and hit on the 1, it'll disappear). To get around this you could try using a longer loop so you won't end up going over top of that initial trig. Regarding the missing notes on chord settings only being played during playback. It's because they aren't triggered by the initial trig - only calculated during playback.

Thank you for this video Ricky! You saved my money!!!

I wish I could use the headphones outs as additional outputs in my DAW, because I like to use Digitakt as my audio interface, but I can't monitoring with headphones via Digitakt while recording with mics (there's only one master volume for both headphones and main outputs). Taking out the problem with loops, time stretching and zoom, if I could just add one CC note to a trig (in Live Recording mode) to making chords, Digitakt would be perfect for me. Anyway, I'm really thankful for this little box :) I hope to get the Octatrack soon (in Brazil it's not easy), and I think the Digitakt is a really good start to the Elektron world.

Noticed you never really mention Maschine devices when you mention alternatives - just an observation. Not a fan?

This is the most damning review of the Digitakt on the internet. And the issues brought up are... relatively minor to my personal situation. Watched this video and ordered one immediately after. If these are your biggest gripes after deep diving into it, then I have nothing to fear.

Ricky.... I need to go to bed! But I can't stop watching your videos!

I LOVE my digitakt. I use it just as if it were an MPC (FOR DRUMS) and the microtiming, velocity adjustments, retrig settings add for some dope experimentation. I sequence my SP404SX on a midi track to work around the lack of stereo sampling. This small box is great for drums, bass, and short sample stabs

Chill room! Nice rev, thx!

Would love to see you review the MPC One!

im good bro, thanks for asking. also thanks alot for staying honest

I hear what you’re saying about the midi side of things. More programming than playing. It seems like a lot of hard work to go dawless with a Digitakt but what do I know I still use a DAW and don’t get on with step programming for melodic stuff 😬It does what it says on the tin very well though - ‘drum computer and (drum) sampler’. The MPC looks more like a (very nice) miniDAW with the conplexity of a DAW. The Digitakt keeps things relatively simple and if you just want to program progressive dynamic beats ... it does that well. Just nice to draw the distinction as these two seem to be compared a lot lately in comments but they’re really meant for different things.

Great video thanks , just clarified a few things for me , as a contender for a new hardware sampler.

I so agree. MPC is my favorite, the velocity sensitivity is a must for me. I have the MPC One, I love it. I am now considering the MPC X just because I use it that much (I am a guitarist and keyboard musician). I love synthesizers and for the 700+ I have so many synths that I want that another sampler that isn't an MPC just doesn't do it for me, I also have the MC707 and TR 8S (these are also great for my workflow).

Learning new stuff on my digitakt everyday and I’ve been having it for 3 years. I cant believe I wanted to sell it at some point 😂 I knew nothing about this machine at the time