Foot controller with integrated displays, good usability and support

greiswig

greiswig

Power User
I have one of the industry standard foot controllers with built-in displays over each button. It is highly programmable, and supposedly could do whatever I wanted it to.

But it is poorly supported (can't seem to get help from the company anymore), and the lack of an easily-grocked overall mental model and generally poor usability of the editor makes it very hard to use. Then it has issues like firmware updates that add new features which conflict with things that you set up before, which creates a sense of fragility and instability.

I'd love it if Fractal or someone would engage a good User Experience Designer and make something that takes advantage of dynamic labels, facilitates easier MIDI programming, and makes it so we can spend more time performing rather than worrying about how to get our AxeFX to do what we want it to do.
 
What brand do you have?
i have a RJM MMGT-16 and it's great.
I got it set up exactly the way I wanted, the editor software was easy to use.
I haven't had a single issue since I bought it 8 months ago.
Since it does everything I want, I haven't had the need to change or update the firmware.
Ron is excellent with customer support, service and they have a forum.
 
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I just got an mmgt-16 and love it. Ron is amazing and updates things, though it's so feature-packed it doesn't need much more it seems. A few specific things to set for the Axe, but it's so easy and has a template ready to go.

I contacted the company the OP is talking about a while ago and inquired about doing videos and some support in trade for a unit since so many people were complaining. No response. Seemed like a good controller at the time, but the RJM is amazing.
 
Chris@KatsuKuriMedia said:
I just got an mmgt-16 and love it. Ron is amazing and updates things, though it's so feature-packed it doesn't need much more it seems. A few specific things to set for the Axe, but it's so easy and has a template ready to go.

I contacted the company the OP is talking about a while ago and inquired about doing videos and some support in trade for a unit since so many people were complaining. No response. Seemed like a good controller at the time, but the RJM is amazing.
Click to expand...

Hey Chris,

Glad to see you back!
Your MFC vids helped me immensely when I first got my Axe FX and MFC.
Enjoy the MMGT-16. Pretty crazy all the things you can do if you want.

jimnov
 
You guys can guess which company I'm dealing with. They're supposed to be coming out with a newest/greatest, but the features they have announced so far almost make me think they aren't bothering to listen to what their users are asking for (support, usability, etc.) and are more focused on cool. I'd rather have usable than cool, although both is ideal.

I may have to look into RJM again. Or pay someone to help me get my unit doing what I want it to do. You shouldn't have to be a programmer...
 
I'm also looking at the features of the new controller and have read your posts.
It's this that makes me doubt if I would ever trust this company.
RJM is a lot quicker in answering and the support seems a lot better.
But none of the controllers can do what my Gordius can at the moment.
So I'll have to wait to see which one will be the first to suit my requirements.

I was also hoping Fractal would come up with a controller with LCD screens.
The Gordius is no longer being developed any further and it seems that the lack of cooperation from Fractal may have something to do with this.
 
Hopefully the supposed "lack of cooperation" means FAS is working on new controllers of it's own (REALLY hoping one is a Mini MFC, LCDs are nice but smaller footprint would be even nicer).
 
doesn't necessarily have to be a choice of one over the other... with a little bit of design effort, I bet Mr. Chase could incorporate both.
 
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larry said:
doesn't necessarily have to be a choice of one over the other... with a little bit of design effort, I bet Mr. Chase could incorporate both.
Click to expand...

I agree. I think a company that would do some user research, find out what is really needed by users in terms of control, and figure out a way to make it so that MIDI programming is more WYSIWYG and still have the customized per-preset or per-song labels that are visible on a dark stage...that company would have a distinct leg up. I don't know how difficult to program the RJM is, but just trying to wrap your head around some mental models of the way some devices work is really not trivial. ("Ok...what's the difference between a song and a preset? Where does a set list fit into all this? What's an IA, when all I want is a button that turns this on and off?")
 
The thing where most controllers go wrong is in the following:
- not enough presets
most are limited to 374 - the RJM has room for 640 - the Gordius +1000
Why do you need more presets?
Let's just stick to the Axe-Fx to begin with
First of all you need to define a preset for every preset on the Axe-FX to be able to switch the IA's.
Then you need to make presets for combinations of presets on the AFx + IA's.
You can use scenes but most of the time 8 are not enough for every combination.
You need a preset per song if you want to set tempo and special fx setting using modifiers (I use three modifiers to set key and voice1 &2 for the harmonizer)
So that quickly can add up to a lot of presets on the controller.
More so if you use multiple fx units in your rack.
I never understood why you would need to program a preset for each button you use in a song.
My '88 Midi Mitigator did this with ease.
Per song you had five presets.
Per preset you could program 128 commands.

One place where the Gordius excels and it's a feature no other controller offers:
- variables
- conditional programming (if..the..else...)

So there's lots of room for improvement.
 
Different needs for different folks, I suppose MisterE. For me, I would just like something that gives me access to the different scenes and their various parameters and states, and makes it clear where I am, where I'm going next, and what is available for me to activate or deactivate. And that would allow me to easily arrange them in order. I think most of these will do that, but understanding how to make it do so and make it so your can easily change it seems to involve too much knowledge of the arcane MIDI language.
 
Scenes are easy.
Send a cc for each of the eight scenes.
The hard part is to keep different scenes on different presets apart.
On one preset scene one might be a clean amp with just a delay, on another preset scene one might be a lead amp with a drive, delay and pitch....
So that's why I'm not using scenes.
At least on my pedal I can name these.
Preset 1 : "Fender clean DLY"
Preset 2 : "HBE DRV DLY PCH"

Which brings me to another shortcomming on all pedals: only 16 characters on most to name a preset
 
MisterE said:
The hard part is to keep different scenes on different presets apart. t
Click to expand...

Agreed. And knowing what is available and how to get to it. Yes, you can use presets for that, and I guess you can organize the presets so that you can step through a song and land on the right presets automatically. But if you want something more like a stompbox pedalboard that shifts pedals on you and even amps, although the presets and scenes clearly allow that, the mental model for how to do that on the pedalboard and still stay kind of oriented as to where you are and where you're going aren't supported well.

I've been a professional usability guy for more years than I care to admit, and I'm used to delving into the details and translating them into something Average Joe can use easily. This is one scenario where it feels too close to the basic MIDI programming still, and too far away from understanding use models, conceptual models, and real user needs. Even the new features I'm seeing coming out so far...they are mostly about making it more convenient to connect to the pedal (look Ma! No cord!) and so forth than really making it much easier to use. If I had to choose between the same LCD displays as I have now but better usability and a better PC editor versus full color displays and wireless connectivity that required me to also buy something else to connect to my AFX unit anyway, I'm going to pick better usability. Because I believe that I haven't yet really tapped what can be done with what I already have, and it isn't for a lack of trying.
 
Hi folks!
First post in this forum. Please be nice!
Would it be possible to name each scene and have something more meaningful in the MFC display?
Also, would it be possible to know how many scenes exist for each preset, say by having the red led lit above the numbers 2, 3 etc. in the same way an effect block has a red led when not active?
Thanks for your outstanding products and support. Rock On!
 
marcodegiorgi said:
Also, would it be possible to know how many scenes exist for each preset, say by having the red led lit above the numbers 2, 3 etc. in the same way an effect block has a red led when not active?
Click to expand...

Hi Marcodgiorgi,

Welcome to the forum.

Each preset has always 8 scenes.
 
marcodegiorgi said:
Hi folks!
First post in this forum. Please be nice!
Would it be possible to name each scene and have something more meaningful in the MFC display?
Also, would it be possible to know how many scenes exist for each preset, say by having the red led lit above the numbers 2, 3 etc. in the same way an effect block has a red led when not active?
Thanks for your outstanding products and support. Rock On!
Click to expand...

One of the appeals of looking at 3rd party controllers with individual screens is that it’s not possible to neither name scenes or to set scenes as disabled in the Axe Fx 2, and therefore in the MFC. I’m most likely going to buy myself a MMGT 16 for this reason. I’ve spent a good few hours with the LiquidFoot+ and MMGT editors to get a feel for both products and from working with the editors the MMGT seems to be the far better product and one of the reasons that I like in the editor is the ability to have a individual base layout per preset (falling back to a global layout if you haven’t defined anything). This would enable these two things - name the scenes in the preset and have different number of active scenes per preset.
 
pauliusmm said:
There is a way to name scenes with liquid foot + controllers. Using IA labels feature.
Click to expand...

See, I believe you. I believe Jeff when he says so. But there's a saying in Usability Design: if the user can't find or use the feature, it isn't really there.

It is very easy to design a system and try to please everyone by making it infinitely flexible. The problem then becomes that you end up designing for the tail of the bell curve that demands the most customizability, but leave out the big middle of the curve of users who just wanted something simple to use. It is much harder to meet both those demands, but it is possible.

I used to work for a VERY large company that at the time was making a piece of software for C++ programmers to optimize their code for the (then new) Pentium pipes. So this was an application that was designed by one of the intended members of the user group. I looked it over, and it was really, really bad. No awareness of task flows or directions for what to do if you saw something. But the developer didn't believe me. The company did, though, and let me do usability testing with the developer watching. He worked with me to put together a set of common tasks that a user should be able to do. The developer was behind a one-way mirror, and the test participants and I were on the other. We eventually had to have the developer leave, because you could hear him screaming behind the one-way mirror. "Idiots! Don't you see it??" Made for some awkward moments.

Lots of people think that design is just common sense and aesthetics, but it isn't. And for something this complicated, it is surprisingly hard. But I'm more convinced than ever that digital is the future, and whoever designs a really usable controller for a reasonable price is going to have a big marketing win on their hands.
 
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