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The same workflow from that desktop app is carried over to the standalone groovebox, so you should be able to seamlessly bounce back and forth between the two depending on your mood. (Though, it can still operate as a controller for the Maschine software when plugged in.) The + has a quad-core processor and 4GB of RAM inside which allows it to run a selection of Native Instruments plugins even when it’s not connected to a computer. But under the hood is a completely different beast. There’s the same set of 16 large pads on the front, eight encoders for tweaking parameters, two reasonably large color screens and a host of navigation and transport controls. Physically the Maschine+ is basically indistinguishable from the Maschine MkIII. And then stuck it inside the chassis of it’s well regarded Maschine controllers. So it did the obvious thing: It built a computer. This poses a challenge for companies like Native Instruments that have built an empire around making music on a computer. But there’s a growing desire to put actual hardware in front of people and all the better if that hardware works just the same even when your computer is shut down.
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It’s not that DAWs and VSTs don’t have their place. Basically everyone in the music world right now is trying to break away from the PC.
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