All iPads iPad mini for live music production?

[roccobladr]

I play in a band that gigs often, usually 6-8 x per month. I have a Line 6 mobile keys 25 keyboard and would be pretty cool to use live with GarageBand.

I currently have an iPad 4 that I will use to experiment my idea with, but it is my work and personal device so I'd probably end up getting something specifically for the band.

Has the iPad mini been reliable for everyone? I'm not sure how much power the line 6 keyboard draws, but I assume the battery life from the mini should withstand 2.5 hrs straight of music?

Has anyone tried using an iPad live for music production?


Thanks!

 

[Jessica Lares]

My Mini started to get really warm the other day when I had GarageBand open for a long period of time and I was using the keyboard within it. That's the only thing that has come up so far.

The bigger iPads have more RAM to take advantage of.

 

[Almy]

I'm hoping alesis will release a new version of their digital interface soon. I'd really like to do some multitracking with my iPad 4. What are you using?

 

[roccobladr]

hmm our sets are usually 45-50 mins long and then we get breaks in between for a total of 2 sets. Hopefully the heat/battery wouldn't be too much of an issue for that amount of time.

I plan on running an adapter to a 1/4" cable and then I assume i'll probably need to go through a DI box.

 

[roccobladr]

A little bump before I make the plunge

 

[Almy]

I would explore interfaces more carefully first. I like alesis', but it's not updated for the new connector the ipad 4 has.

 

[akdj]

I'm hoping alesis will release a new version of their digital interface soon. I'd really like to do some multitracking with my iPad 4. What are you using?

We also use the Alesis I/O with the iPad 2s. We've got iPad 4s as well...and I'm excited for an update.....with these you don't have to worry about the battery draining. They're powered and continuously charge the iPad. It's got XLR, 1/4", MIDI, RCA...headphone output and volume...even phantom mic power. Extremely versatile. We use them...and record sets sometimes up to 10 hours long....with sporadic 15/20 set breaks. Between bands and/or performances, we spin with Serato on our iMacs.

If you can grab a second hand iPad 2, the Alesis I/O is indispensable.

J

 

[roccobladr]

We also use the Alesis I/O with the iPad 2s. We've got iPad 4s as well...and I'm excited for an update.....with these you don't have to worry about the battery draining. They're powered and continuously charge the iPad. It's got XLR, 1/4", MIDI, RCA...headphone output and volume...even phantom mic power. Extremely versatile. We use them...and record sets sometimes up to 10 hours long....with sporadic 15/20 set breaks. Between bands and/or performances, we spin with Serato on our iMacs.

If you can grab a second hand iPad 2, the Alesis I/O is indispensable.

J

I was looking into the IO dock but would it work with the line 6 mobile keys? It doesn't seem to have a spot for the 30 pin adapter

 

[Almy]

We also use the Alesis I/O with the iPad 2s. We've got iPad 4s as well...and I'm excited for an update.....with these you don't have to worry about the battery draining. They're powered and continuously charge the iPad. It's got XLR, 1/4", MIDI, RCA...headphone output and volume...even phantom mic power. Extremely versatile. We use them...and record sets sometimes up to 10 hours long....with sporadic 15/20 set breaks. Between bands and/or performances, we spin with Serato on our iMacs.

If you can grab a second hand iPad 2, the Alesis I/O is indispensable.

J

Nice. I'd still like to wait for a new cable connector version. I noticed they have something new tho, looks cool and reminds me of the first Tascam reel to reel 4 track I used back in the day:

https://www.alesis.com/iomix

I'm also very curious about this. Anyone have any experience with it or the company:

http://www.akaipro.com/eiepro

 

[Almy]

Looks like the Akai has midi and the Alesis doesn't. That definitely gives the advantage to the EieiPro. I'm very familiar with Alesis but not at all familiar with Akai.

 

[92jlee]

Why don't you look at using the ipad as a midi controller to trigger evens in logic/ableton/cubase etc?

You can get some amazing software that's either cheap or free with tonnes of midi layouts- just you have to set up what they do.

This is done through wifi to your mac and I've seen bluetooth too.

 

[roccobladr]

Why don't you look at using the ipad as a midi controller to trigger evens in logic/ableton/cubase etc?

You can get some amazing software that's either cheap or free with tonnes of midi layouts- just you have to set up what they do.

This is done through wifi to your mac and I've seen bluetooth too.

While this is a great idea, my whole concept was to use the ipad mini without needing any other hardware (besides a keyboard plugged in). Would rather use and abuse a 329$ ipad mini than a 1500$ macbook

 

[92jlee]

While this is a great idea, my whole concept was to use the ipad mini without needing any other hardware (besides a keyboard plugged in). Would rather use and abuse a 329$ ipad mini than a 1500$ macbook

I see what you mean. I'm not sure with an ipad but I had a nexus 7 and plugged in a midi keyboard using USB otg and took that to band. Search YouTube for 92Jmfl to see a shirt video I put together if you want.

Maybe there is something like that for the ipad? Much better than just the touch screen.

 

[Tristanlong]

I play drums in a sixties tribute and use an ipad mini to run backing tracks, recorded using logic on Mac then all files transferred to the ipad mini and into garage band, click panned right music left, tweaked within garage during rehearsals, volume changes until we were happy with the mix. So after a few months rehearsing with the ipad and running the tracks in garage band we then saved the as a stereo wav file and now play the files using backtrax app. The app is awesome, create the set list, the songs delete themselves from the list to avoid playing twice, I even create lyric notes to be displayed telling me how many bar clicks etc, how many chorus's to end etc.
We play 2 one hour sets and to date never had an issue.

Hope this helps?