SmartAV Tango DAW Controller

[bobsandifer]

Originally Posted by Nowak

Nup, just either of those 2 EQ's

Stef

Any chance that is on an update list? W should really be able to select what we would like to come up in those slots.

[HHaynes]

That's among the things they're looking into for the future roadmap. I think it has to do with being able to map parameters to UI elements on the Tango for those alternate displays - kind of like the various brands of soft compressor and the challenge of getting the "Dynamics" section of the Tango to map appropriately. It's actually quite a big undertaking to consider all of the third party EQs and compressors out there - particularly when you look at it across all of the various DAW engines.

Just curious - how many other third-party control surfaces do this? or is this a wish that's unique to the Tango because of "how close" it comes to making the feature possible?

[bobsandifer]

To me this is kind of like making an ice cream sunday but not putting the cherry on top. They are giving us a great feature but not finishing it out.

Is it possible to add a saved channel strip or buss preset to a channel or do you have to add each individual plugin?

[HHaynes]

Well - it's on the roadmap. You get ice cream, chocolate fudge, whipped cream and nuts for now - you'll have to wait a while for the cherry on top.



There's a remote command for opening the track preset window, which allows you to do what you're looking for. The really fun part is to use the arrow keys to navigate through the selections in the preset selection dialog, and watching the plugins hot-swap in and out on the insert locations.

[philbone]

Hi all,

I am the Tango product specialist/distributor in the Southern California area.

I have been reading these posts and would like to offer to help with any questions that I can answer about the Tango.

Houston Haynes can answer most about Nuendo / Cubase and I try to cover Pro Tools, Pyramix and Logic.

PLease feel free to ask us anything...

Kindly,

Phil

[George Necola]

or you can ask your computer mod George Necola.

got one here.

[matt thomas]

Originally Posted by George Necola

or you can ask your computer mod George Necola.

got one here.

I gotta come see that soon george

matt

[George Necola]

Originally Posted by matt thomas

I gotta come see that soon george

matt

only if we go for a Pizza afterwards matt

CH or AUS at the moment?

[matt thomas]

Originally Posted by George Necola

only if we go for a Pizza afterwards matt

CH or AUS at the moment?

pm'd george (so everyone else doesn't have to be bored by our conversation)

matt

[Jon Con]

out of interest, will this control surface be able to support Sonar??

[philbone]

Originally Posted by Jon Con

out of interest, will this control surface be able to support Sonar??

The Tango is capable of controlling any software that allows control through an external protocol. Having said that, there is no support for Sonar and may other possible softwares, but as soon as the mapping software is written it will be possible.
The beauty of this device is that it is a constantly evolving and growing controller that can continue to grow purely through software updates!

Phil

[Roc Mixwell]

Originally Posted by philbone

The Tango is capable of controlling any software that allows control through an external protocol. Having said that, there is no support for Sonar and may other possible softwares, but as soon as the mapping software is written it will be possible.
The beauty of this device is that it is a constantly evolving and growing controller that can continue to grow purely through software updates!

Phil

[Roc Mixwell]

Whoa! Almost a year since I've visited this thread!

Anyway - I just wanted to chime in and let you guys know that there is a Smart AV TANGO scheduled to land @ the METH LAB shortly. If anyone is interested in checking TANGO out, and able to take a drive to good town of Foxboro, MA on Thursday September 16th, 2010 - Peter from Smart AV will graciously give us a tour through the unit and demonstrate its extremely cool technology in our demo room. Should be a good hang with some "smart people". We are excited to have a demo unit available, as we think this controller is a very excellent choice for our clients who demand a pro desk for their applications.

PM, or shoot me an email - if you require more details.

peace
A/B

[DeyBwah]

Originally Posted by Roc Mixwell

Whoa! Almost a year since I've visited this thread!

Anyway - I just wanted to chime in and let you guys know that there is a Smart AV TANGO scheduled to land @ the METH LAB shortly. If anyone is interested in checking TANGO out, and able to take a drive to good town of Foxboro, MA on Thursday September 16th, 2010 - Peter from Smart AV will graciously give us a tour through the unit and demonstrate its extremely cool technology in our demo room. Should be a good hang with some "smart people". We are excited to have a demo unit available, as we think this controller is a very excellent choice for our clients who demand a pro desk for their applications.

PM, or shoot me an email - if you require more details.

peace
A/B

So cool! Wish I could attend.. Have fun!

[Washington]

Originally Posted by George Necola

or you can ask your computer mod George Necola.

got one here.

aHA ! Now that's interesting news...

[Roc Mixwell]

A TANGO has been living in the lab for a few weeks now - and I am getting work done with the computer 30 times faster, easily. It is really a great product so far in my experience and I very much admire the feature set the TANGO offers. The Grouping makes you lightening fast with relative gain changes and solo's and mute groups. The touch screen gives straight ahead layout, and the "chair" mode with the MONARC - easily wrangles a large multi-track right before your eyes. When your working on many tracks - you can "hold" them so they stay on the fader board while you dial through the various tracks. Using the Logic EQ and Compressor with a touch of the finger and swift move to the right hand encoders, really saves me time and keeps me engaged with the application in front of me. One finger and they are on/off. You can even call up a LARGE screen shot of the equalizer and sweep gain and center points with your finger. Also, calling up any of our plugs and dialing them in is simple!!! What normally takes 10-15 min. with the mouse, takes less than 1 minute with the TANGO.

[TRW]

Got one for sale in the classifieds...

Sorry to spam. Just so much traffic there now.

-T

[matt82aust]

I think i noticed Nowak was seeling his online as well.. Why are people selling?

[Geert van den Berg]

Nowak is selling his because he is going analog.

[laser]

Originally Posted by Geert van den Berg

Nowak is selling his because he is going analog.

Houston Haynes, another big proponent of the Tango, also sold his--presumably for the same reason.


Laser

[matt82aust]

Does anyone still have theirs? There was so much hype and excitement. When I first looked at one Pro Tools control was just not happening. Now it is, and people seem to be selling. I know these aren't related, but it seems despite continual development these consoles do not seem to have longevity for various reasons. (or it really makes people appreciate analogue...?!)

Any good news stories? Post Production happiness?

[EelkeKleijn]

I was looking at a DAW controller for a long time. Used to own a Project Mix i/o but got rid of that because updates were lacking. For the last 2 years I didn't use any controller (just the Steinberg CC121) but really kept an eye out for anything that might suit my needs.

I recently got a Tango, using it mainly in a composition and mixing environment. And so far I love it, it speeds up my work considerably. Also I love how I can have plugins open automatically on screen when I just touch the channel. The thing that annoyed me most about Cubase was having to open the channel settings, open the plugin, closing the plugin, selecting another channel, open the plugin, close the plugin... etc. Lots of pointless clicking. Especially when working with multi channel VSTs and selecting MIDI channels, the focus would often get lost.

Now with the Tango I just touch a channel and it opens the right plugin. I've also just got into the programming on custom buttons, I'm almost blown away by the amount of customization I can get out of this.. !

I think the Tango will be the center piece of my studio for a long time to come.

[crg28]

Originally Posted by EelkeKleijn

I was looking at a DAW controller for a long time. Used to own a Project Mix i/o but got rid of that because updates were lacking. For the last 2 years I didn't use any controller (just the Steinberg CC121) but really kept an eye out for anything that might suit my needs.

I recently got a Tango, using it mainly in a composition and mixing environment. And so far I love it, it speeds up my work considerably. Also I love how I can have plugins open automatically on screen when I just touch the channel. The thing that annoyed me most about Cubase was having to open the channel settings, open the plugin, closing the plugin, selecting another channel, open the plugin, close the plugin... etc. Lots of pointless clicking. Especially when working with multi channel VSTs and selecting MIDI channels, the focus would often get lost.

Now with the Tango I just touch a channel and it opens the right plugin. I've also just got into the programming on custom buttons, I'm almost blown away by the amount of customization I can get out of this.. !

I think the Tango will be the center piece of my studio for a long time to come.

Could you share a pic of your setup? Is C6 fully integrated now?

[crg28]

I can just imagine using a Tango with 2 Extenders along with two 43" Ostendo Curved Monitors!!

[EelkeKleijn]

Originally Posted by crg28

Could you share a pic of your setup? Is C6 fully integrated now?

Sorry for the late reply didn't get to making pictures for a while. This is still a quick iPhone pic but you'll get the idea.



I still use the keyboard because I can't get used to working only on an on-screen digital keyboard on a controller. Plus I like to work in Wavelab and some other programs which is just much easier with a keyboard at hand.


I haven't tried it with C6 yet (still on 5.5) but according to Smart AV everything should be alright.

[HHaynes]

Originally Posted by EelkeKleijn

I haven't tried it with C6 yet (still on 5.5) but according to Smart AV everything should be alright.

I just sold my board to another composer here in town - but before that I got to try it with C6 - and it worked perfectly as far as I could tell. There may have been additional remote commands in the new version that I hadn't mapped in yet, but all of the commands that were mapped based on Cubase 5 worked well as far as I could tell.

[EelkeKleijn]

That's good to hear Hopefully I can try it out with Cubase 6 soon. I think Cubase 6 enables MIDI CC to quick controls mapping, that would be wicked with the Tango.

I finally got to making good pictures of my setup so here are some new pics with the Tango as my main controller

[MKM]

Are these beauties available for the general public yet? What's the going rate for these and do they perform as well as advertised? Do they play nice with Pro Tools and Cubase (I used Pro Tools way more but still need Cubase)?

[HHaynes]

Welcome to the party



You can check out the Tango at SmartAV

FWIW - Pro Tools support is basically HUI+key commands, but there may be some movement on that front at some point - since I heard AVID (who now owns Euphonix) talking about making the EuCon protocol available to other console vendors to add Pro Tools support. That was a year ago at a Cubase 5 demo at ToddAO, so we'll see if that ever comes to pass.

As for Cubase 6 - I saw a really neat new feature where the 8 Quick Controls were auto-mapped into tracks, and then those auto-mapped QCs showed up automatically on the Tango. That meant that Instrument tracks where you have Native Instruments' "Massive" instantiated, the Macro Controls on the plugin get auto-mapped into the QCs, and therefore they show up immediately on the Tango console.


It's really slick and really useful.

[Scoox]

Originally Posted by philbone

The Tango is capable of controlling any software that allows control through an external protocol. Having said that, there is no support for Sonar and may other possible softwares, but as soon as the mapping software is written it will be possible.
The beauty of this device is that it is a constantly evolving and growing controller that can continue to grow purely through software updates!

Phil

The beauty... not so sure. Software always has bugs, and this Tango thing seems pretty complex not to have any bugs. A device that's pure MIDI is future proof, but a device that requires drivers and updates is not. If support is dropped, and it will be dropped because nothing lasts forever, should a new DAW come out it probably won't work with it and then all that's left is a pretty piece of hardware.

Is the master fader on the back of the unit? It seems to me that all DAW controller manufacturers keep missing some really basic aspects. Before designing a new product it is always worth skimming through the thousands of threads about similar existing products that don't quite cut it.

I think most of us don't need so many bells and whistles, but we do need something that works as expected and is future-proof. I owned the Mackie Control Universal for 1 year from new. After the first 15 minutes of use, the leftmost fader jammed and wouldn't move, and then the power supply fried. Got a replacement from the shop and then it worked OK. However it worked terrible with Cubase becasue Steinberg have the worst implementation of MCU out there. Worked stellar with Reaper, Reason, Live, Tracktion and FL Studio. Then it was also too big to sit in the middle of my desk, where the computer keyboard and so many other things belong. If you put it in the middle, then you've got too many things in front of you and the displays end up being too far, so I couldn't see the screen clearly. If I put it on the side it was not good for mixing because one must sit in the middle while mixing. I ended up selling it on eBay and now I mix with the mouse.

I will consider buying something small like the AVID Artist Mix as it is well built and is small enough to sit on my desk.

Another thing that really bothers me about controller manufacturers is that they don't support Reaper and Studio One, which are in many ways way better than many of the 'big' DAWs and are likely to become far bigger in the future (particularly Studio One IMO).