New Controller by Mackie

[BillyK]

Mackie just introduced a new controller at NAMM.

Here is a link for info on the MCU Pro

http://www.mackie.com/products/mcupro/splash.html

[Carey Langille]

WOW, That looks expensive....That would Slow down Sawstudio for me.....Too many controls....;)

[BillyK]

I am checking to see if pricing has been released. Will post when I get the info from Mackie.

[trock]

its 1200 for the MCU part. here is a GS link from the mackie guy who ran the project. and the old line will be discontinued

here is what the project manager says

Hi there everyone, I'm Dan Steinberg, a product manager at Mackie who worked on the new MCU Pro line. I'd like to take a moment to address some of the issues brought up on this thread.

Pricing: The original MCU has had, for its lifespan, a minimum advertised price (MAP) of $1000, with some dealers selling for less as they end their lifespan. The MAP of the new units will be $1200. So, the price increase we are talking about is actually $200, not $600.

I think the confusion from the original post came from comparing street price of the old unit to retail price of the new unit, which is apples and oranges. Darn “retail” prices, they’re meaningless I say !

What’s different on the new MCU Pro:

Here’s what you get on the new units:

USB connection to the computer, instead of MIDI. This saves users setting up the unit in new studios the hassle and extra cabling of setting up a MIDI interface just for our unit.

Built-In 3x3 MIDI Interface: There are 3 extra MIDI ins and 3 extra MIDI outs, so part of what the new higher price gets you is a 3x3 MIDI interface. This is useful for a couple of things. Folks who buy Extender Pros or C4 Pros (which still connect with MIDI, as before), can just run really short MIDI cables to the MCU Pro, making for a much neater cabling setup. Users who don’t buy those, or don’t buy 3 other pieces, now have some MIDI ports left over for synths, drumpads, outboard reverbs, etc.

Newer, better feeling Jog wheel: We have put in a completely new jog wheel with a more professional feeling weighting and rotation to it, it’s much nicer to use than the old one.

Skinnier side cheeks: In the new industrial design, the sides are much narrower, with the result that multiple units used together fit together much more closely, resulting in smaller gaps between each 8-fader group. This results in a much more integrated "console” look

New metal casing and new industrial design: We have redesigned the casing of the all three units to geta more modern look. Pretty much everyone who saw the new setup at NAMM, and AES before it where they had their debut, fel the new design had a more “high end console” look to them than the old design, which was more plasticy (in comparison). As with all things like this, it's subjective so we can still be friends if you say "The old one looked better". :)

"L" shaped overlays for all DAWS. With the old units, some overlays (Pro Tools, Vegas, Tracktion), had proper “L shaped” overlays that displayed proper labels for ALL of the DAW specific buttons, including the group of buttons over the master fader.

But the other overlays, for reasons unknown to me, had square shaped overlays that did not properly cover the button labels above the master fader, resulting in incorrect labels for those buttons. When we started this project, I undertook the task of researching and documenting what those buttons above the master fader did for each DAW, and making sure that when we re-did the overlays in the new silver color, we made them all L-shaped as they should be.

As for some other issues that were also brought up:

Fader Issues: As mentioned by some posters, it is true that for a while we were having reliability issues with faders. This has been sorted out and we have implemented some new testing strategies. That is indeed the reason there were some availability issues last year, we put a stop ship on units so we could sort the issue out and not put bad units out in the field, if we could help it.

Multiple Units: You can absolutely, positively, use whatever amount of extenders with the new units as you could with the old one. I think the press release was worded a bit misleadingly, it just meant that you can only add 3 units using the built in MIDI interface. There is nothing stopping anyone from using a 2nd, dedicated MIDI interface for units when the built in MIDI ports run out.

For that matter, the new MCU Pro, if no USB cable is inserted, reverts to “standalone mode” where the 1st set of MIDI I/O becomes the MCU connection to the computer. So you could even connect all the units through a MIDI interface and not even use the USB connection if that makes more sense in your studio.

New features with the DAWs: Some posts mentioned how they wish the new units would work better or differently with the various DAWs. That is actually beyond our control, since the interaction comes from code written into the apps, by the folks working at the DAW companies. I know that sounds like finger pointing, but for us it is the harsh reality.

What we do try to do is be as much of a pest as possible (something I'm told I'm good at) with those companies, doing stuff like courting them for C4 support, or making sure they are aware of MCU bugs that have popped up when they release new versions. For example, some of our forum users posted on some issues that arose with the new version of Digital Performer and Adobe Audition, and we have made sure the details have gotten to folks at those companies. But, there’s not much we can do to make them treat these matters as a priority for them, it’s their decision.

Pro Tools and the C4: There’s nothing we’d like better than for the C4 to work with Pro Tools, but Digidesign has to want it to happen, because they need to code support for it into Pro Tools.

Back when the original HUI came out, Digidesign wanted us to make a control surface for them, and we worked with them as they coded support for the originl HUI into Pro Tools (I believe version 4). Later on, when they preferred to only support their own control hardware, we got around this for the Mackie Control by having a ”HUI emulation mode” that works great, and also allows use of extenders since you could always use multiple HUIs. It is extrmely unlikely Digidesign will ever remove HUI support since it would also "break" Pro Tools support for many units that also emulate a HUI, from companies like Yamaha, Euphonix, SSL, Tascam, and even their own M-Auio projectmix.

But, the C4 did not exist back when we worked together on the HUI protocol, so there’s nothing for the C4 to emulate. With the C4, Digidesign would need to cose support for it into a new version, as has occured with Logic, Sonar, Reason, and Tracktion. We've been bugging Ableton and MOTU a lot to support C4, but if they have higher priorities we have to respect that.

I hope that all answers some of your questions. We are very excited about the updated control surfaces and encourage you to check them out. Between the scribble strips, the custom overlays, the sheer amount of control buttons, and modular expandability, I honestly feel that there’s not anything else out there that competes on the same level, in the same price range.

Thanks!

and the link

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/showthread.php?t=104776&page=2

[Naturally Digital]

Thanks for posting that Trock. To me, the build quality on this new controller looks much better than the old. It might have me jumping on board. Especially when SAC comes out.

[Microstudio]

My question is: will the SAW templete work the same with the new unit or will Bob have to write a new templete?

[Bob L]

I'm sure hoping the codes are backwards compatible.

Bob L