More Info on the iPK25 Now SynthStation25

See the update in this post.

The Akai iPK25 Still Lives?

It's listed for $99 on the Nova Musik website here. No release date listed, but according to Chris in the comments of this post, Guitar Center and Musician's Friend have the release date listed as March 3rd. Still nothing on the Akai site.

Update: I heard from Akai. It is still on track, same price and release date. The name has officially changed to the SynthStation25. The info page was removed at Apple's request.

"The Akai iPK25...now renamed SynthStation25 does in fact live. When developing hardware for Apple ipod products, Apple has a large number of hoops for developers to jump through. There was one hoop we missed so Apple made us take down the information from our web page. We are now working our way through this issue and it will be back up on the web page when we are allowed to put it back there. This has not affected shipping dates or anything, just our ability to have info regarding it up on our web page."

A New World in Synthesis

YouTube via Pic2008Lex

Note the above video does not feature any synths. It is a concept video for a tablet UI. The hardware looks like the majority of artist renders for the upcoming Apple iPad/iSlate. If you haven't heard, tomorrow, Apple will announce their new tablet device. Rumor is it will essentially be an iTouch with a 10" screen, more power, memory and may have the ability to run multiple apps at the same time. [Update: it most likely will]

Why is this a new world in synthesis? In short this is a new hardware platform for synthesis. Yes it is an extension of the iTouch platform, but the obvious key difference and game changer in my opinion will be the size of the screen. For example, imagine controlling all of your synths running Numerology on the device in that video. Imagine interfacing with your modular with a UI optimized version of VOLTA or Expert Sleepers. Imagine running Way Out Ware's iSample, or how about an ARP2600 emulation with sliders. Imagine running Audio Damage's tattoo on one, etc. And don't forget the accelorometer. Processing power, additional memory, and potentially running multiple apps at once will only add to the advantage the slate will have over the iTouch.

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