Roland Aira Compact series

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joeyluck
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10 May 2022

https://www.roland.com/global/promos/aira_compact/

With 4.5 hour internal battery and audio/MIDI over USB :thumbup:

$199 each



T-8 BEAT MACHINE
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Create infectious tracks in seconds flat with a miniature rhythm factory powered by pristine TR drums plus bass from the inimitable TB-303.
J-6 CHORD SYNTH
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Pairing a powerful chord sequencer with the lavish tones of the legendary JUNO-60, this portable synth toolbox has the building blocks you need to bring harmonic substance to your jams.
E-4 VOICE TWEAKER
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This outrageously jammable effects box harmonizes, auto-pitches, vocodes, loops, and glitches your voice and anything else you feed it.

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chimp_spanner
Posts: 2908
Joined: 06 Mar 2015

10 May 2022

Watched a long review of all three units over lunch. They look great! As someone who just recently got the TR and MC minis, not sure how these would fit in but if I was just starting out these would be very strong contenders. I mean tbh if I had the spare USB and audio I/O I might still get em haha. I love that the T8 has a full 303 built into it. Very competitive. And it's great to see that they're embracing patterns longer than ONE BAR with the J6. Really interesting take on the sequencer on that device and I can imagine it being a great tool for sketching out progressions for an entire song. Plus they look cute af too.

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BRIGGS
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Location: Orange County California

10 May 2022

no user replaceable battery, no buy
r11s

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DaveyG
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10 May 2022

More than a nod to the Volcas there. Chord sequencer looks fun.

Be interesting to see what the street prices are. Plus, of course, we've got a whole host of Behringer Volca-style things to come too. Happy days.

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Aosta
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10 May 2022

Here is a nice jam video by Rachel K Collier :thumbup:

Tend the flame

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joeyluck
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10 May 2022

chimp_spanner wrote:
10 May 2022
Watched a long review of all three units over lunch. They look great! As someone who just recently got the TR and MC minis, not sure how these would fit in but if I was just starting out these would be very strong contenders. I mean tbh if I had the spare USB and audio I/O I might still get em haha. I love that the T8 has a full 303 built into it. Very competitive. And it's great to see that they're embracing patterns longer than ONE BAR with the J6. Really interesting take on the sequencer on that device and I can imagine it being a great tool for sketching out progressions for an entire song. Plus they look cute af too.
Yeah I think I'm most interested in the T-8, but they all look cool. Not sure if the E-4 comes with an XLR to 1/4" adapter. That would be annoying.
BRIGGS wrote:
10 May 2022
no user replaceable battery, no buy
I'm just glad there's a battery haha. Every time something "portable" is released and it has no built-in battery or replaceable battery, I always say, "It's not portable" lol. On the bright side, I guess you can also power them with a USB brick, just like all those other "portable" devices which offer that as the only battery option.

Another plus for me is both the MIDI and Audio over USB. That's something else I'm always requesting.

What I miss from these is built-in speakers! While speakers on devices of this size, like the Volcas (which have speakers) don't do the devices justice, it's still really cool to be able to jam with just the device and not a single cable or headphones.
DaveyG wrote:
10 May 2022
More than a nod to the Volcas there. Chord sequencer looks fun.

Be interesting to see what the street prices are. Plus, of course, we've got a whole host of Behringer Volca-style things to come too. Happy days.
They are available to preorder now for $199

https://www.sweetwater.com/roland-aira-compact/series
Aosta wrote:
10 May 2022
Here is a nice jam video by Rachel K Collier :thumbup:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-ppHaetEA8
I had just seen this as well. Sounds really good :thumbup:

PhillipOrdonez
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10 May 2022

Pricey. The vocal thingy looks kinda interesting. But not that interesting for the price. If I was starting out these would have been perfect for me, though.

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BRIGGS
Posts: 2135
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Location: Orange County California

10 May 2022

joeyluck wrote:
10 May 2022


I'm just glad there's a battery haha. Every time something "portable" is released and it has no built-in battery or replaceable battery, I always say, "It's not portable" lol. On the bright side, I guess you can also power them with a USB brick, just like all those other "portable" devices which offer that as the only battery option.

Another plus for me is both the MIDI and Audio over USB. That's something else I'm always requesting.

What I miss from these is built-in speakers! While speakers on devices of this size, like the Volcas (which have speakers) don't do the devices justice, it's still really cool to be able to jam with just the device and not a single cable or headphones.
If the battery leaks or catches fire, there's no way to remove the battery quickly.

Your fun new toy, is now a door stop. :lol:
r11s

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joeyluck
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10 May 2022

BRIGGS wrote:
10 May 2022
joeyluck wrote:
10 May 2022


I'm just glad there's a battery haha. Every time something "portable" is released and it has no built-in battery or replaceable battery, I always say, "It's not portable" lol. On the bright side, I guess you can also power them with a USB brick, just like all those other "portable" devices which offer that as the only battery option.

Another plus for me is both the MIDI and Audio over USB. That's something else I'm always requesting.

What I miss from these is built-in speakers! While speakers on devices of this size, like the Volcas (which have speakers) don't do the devices justice, it's still really cool to be able to jam with just the device and not a single cable or headphones.
If the battery leaks or catches fire, there's no way to remove the battery quickly.

Your fun new toy, is now a door stop. :lol:
Is that a common thing? I've never had a built-in battery on anything go bad, yet alone leak. I guess any electronic component on anything could go bad, so might as well stay away from electronics altogether :P

Just a couple months ago, I had an old Samsung TV from 2010 just start randomly smoking. I contacted Samsung about it and they had me take it to a shop 5 minutes away and Samsung covered the repair. It was the power supply that went bad. I generally have good experience dealing with any support for products out of warranty when something goes bad. I also don't yell at people, so I think that helps lol. I've also never bought AppleCare and have had several out of warranty repairs at no cost. I'm thankful for the people that cuss out customer support and give them a hard time, because it makes it easier for me to get things fixed for free 😂

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BRIGGS
Posts: 2135
Joined: 25 Sep 2015
Location: Orange County California

10 May 2022

joeyluck wrote:
10 May 2022
BRIGGS wrote:
10 May 2022


If the battery leaks or catches fire, there's no way to remove the battery quickly.

Your fun new toy, is now a door stop. :lol:
Is that a common thing? I've never had a built-in battery on anything go bad, yet alone leak. I guess any electronic component on anything could go bad, so might as well stay away from electronics altogether :P

Just a couple months ago, I had an old Samsung TV from 2010 just start randomly smoking. I contacted Samsung about it and they had me take it to a shop 5 minutes away and Samsung covered the repair. It was the power supply that went bad. I generally have good experience dealing with any support for products out of warranty when something goes bad. I also don't yell at people, so I think that helps lol. I've also never bought AppleCare and have had several out of warranty repairs at no cost. I'm thankful for the people that cuss out customer support and give them a hard time, because it makes it easier for me to get things fixed for free 😂
If roland made batteries....maybe.

Stay away from teslas, and chevy bolts.
r11s


EdGrip
Posts: 2343
Joined: 03 Jun 2016

11 May 2022

Batteries leaking or catching fire is a very low-likelihood risk. Smartphones are usually not on fire, and we all use them every day.

Lithium batteries getting tired and simply not working after a couple of years, on the other hand, happens all the time.

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EnochLight
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Location: Imladris

12 May 2022

Yeah, the whole battery catching fire thing is simply a non-issue IMHO, and certainly not a reason to avoid these new machines. From iPhones to the OP-1, permanent batteries have proven quite reliable in the grand scheme of things. But not being user-replaceable on a cellphone, which you typically replace via an upgrade every 1-3 years is a whole different story when compared to a piece of music gear, that you typically would expect decades of use out of. This is one thing that worries me about my Akai MPC Live II - once that battery dies (and it absolutely will), I'm left with a piece of studio gear that just depreciated in features just by sitting in my studio. That sucks.
Win 10 | Ableton Live 11 Suite |  Reason 12 | i7 3770k @ 3.5 Ghz | 16 GB RAM | RME Babyface Pro | Akai MPC Live 2 & Akai Force | Roland System 8, MX1, TB3 | Dreadbox Typhon | Korg Minilogue XD

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Re8et
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22 Jul 2022

PhillipOrdonez wrote:
10 May 2022
Pricey. The vocal thingy looks kinda interesting. But not that interesting for the price. If I was starting out these would have been perfect for me, though.
Yeah, too pricey. KORG nubass costs 170 new and has a 50$ Vacuum Tube of high demand and low supply in it...
Just found a second-hand one in local at 99$ and was tempted to get it just for the NuTube...
And All Volcas PCB comes with plenty of indications useful for modding... huge community...
Roland has a lot to catch up... The Volca Drum is a no brainer over the T-8 :exclamation:

Kinda curious to see its noise when the battery will worn out and will have to run usb connected all the time...
Just a guess.... lots of noise!

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Re8et
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Posts: 1512
Joined: 14 Nov 2016

22 Jul 2022

EnochLight wrote:
12 May 2022
Yeah, the whole battery catching fire thing is simply a non-issue IMHO, and certainly not a reason to avoid these new machines. From iPhones to the OP-1, permanent batteries have proven quite reliable in the grand scheme of things. But not being user-replaceable on a cellphone, which you typically replace via an upgrade every 1-3 years is a whole different story when compared to a piece of music gear, that you typically would expect decades of use out of. This is one thing that worries me about my Akai MPC Live II - once that battery dies (and it absolutely will), I'm left with a piece of studio gear that just depreciated in features just by sitting in my studio. That sucks.
Op-1 Batteries are Easily replaceable, they have a separate slot under the hood, completely sealed off the rest of the electronics, to enhance safety for fire hazard, and reduce EMI parasitics. Its usb noise floor is the lowest in the Industry.
Whilst is true is not an issue, there's these guys overengineering the Op-1, which is not a bad thing...

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EnochLight
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Posts: 8405
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Location: Imladris

22 Jul 2022

Re8et wrote:
22 Jul 2022
EnochLight wrote:
12 May 2022
Yeah, the whole battery catching fire thing is simply a non-issue IMHO, and certainly not a reason to avoid these new machines. From iPhones to the OP-1, permanent batteries have proven quite reliable in the grand scheme of things. But not being user-replaceable on a cellphone, which you typically replace via an upgrade every 1-3 years is a whole different story when compared to a piece of music gear, that you typically would expect decades of use out of. This is one thing that worries me about my Akai MPC Live II - once that battery dies (and it absolutely will), I'm left with a piece of studio gear that just depreciated in features just by sitting in my studio. That sucks.
Op-1 Batteries are Easily replaceable, they have a separate slot under the hood, completely sealed off the rest of the electronics, to enhance safety for fire hazard, and reduce EMI parasitics. Its usb noise floor is the lowest in the Industry.
Whilst is true is not an issue, there's these guys overengineering the Op-1, which is not a bad thing...
I hear ya. Still doesn’t justify the laughable over price of the new OP-1 Field, IMHO. ;) :lol:
Win 10 | Ableton Live 11 Suite |  Reason 12 | i7 3770k @ 3.5 Ghz | 16 GB RAM | RME Babyface Pro | Akai MPC Live 2 & Akai Force | Roland System 8, MX1, TB3 | Dreadbox Typhon | Korg Minilogue XD

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