Arturia MiniLab 3 Champagne at a glance

The MiniLab 3 from Arturia is a USB keyboard controller with a velocity-sensitive 25-key keyboard and is compatible with the vast majority of DAWs (Ableton, Logic, Cubase...) including Arturia PlugIns and AnalogLab. Any parameters can be assigned directly to the faders and knobs in the DAW, making the software very easy to use. The eight color-coded, velocity-sensitive pads offer a defined pressure point and are ideal for dynamically recording percussions and firing off samples. Instead of the familiar handwheels for Pitchbend and modulation, there are two ribbon controllers that can be operated with the swipe of a finger. As playing aids, there is a simple chord function that remembers the last notes pressed simultaneously and an arpeggiator with the usual repertoire of playback patterns in the 1-4 octave range. The transport keys, which can be accessed via the shift function, control the main functions such as recording, tempo, stopping and playback in a DAW. Thanks to the MIDI output, the master keyboard is also ideal for playing hardware synthesizers.