# Two Korg nanKONTROL and Digital Performer 10



## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

I’m trying to understand how to set up two Korg nanoKONTROL under Mojave/Catalina to drive my DAW, MotU Digital Performer 10.
From the relevant user’s manual, I see that nanoKONTROL must be powered up via USB, keeping pressed both Marker Set and FF buttons. This is DAW mode, but nothing is written about starting the unit in CC mode. Searching on the net, I found that pressing both Control Set and Cycle buttons corresponds to starting the unit in CC mode.
Assuming to a video (in Spanish) I found off YouTube, it seems that starting nanoKONTROL in DAW mode allows to drive 8 track at the time in Digital Performer.
On the other hand, if nanoKONTROL is powered up in CC mode, it’s not clear if a group (I.e. knob, slider and three buttons Solo, Mute and Rec) can be set on a specific MIDI channel or not. Also with the editor it seems that a group can’t have its MIDI channel.
To sum up, there a lot of things on user’s manual that are not explained or given for granted.
I’d really appreciate if someone could shed some light on this conundrum.


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## jbuhler (May 16, 2021)

In general you can have the nanokontrols in DAW mode or midi mode. In DAW mode it will control the mixer and navigation. In midi mode you can control CCs, send notes, etc. and it will apply to the track that is active. You can set it to broadcast on different midi channels like other midi devices but it’s not going to automatically shift the way it does in DAW mode. There is a way to retain some navigation capability in CC mode, but I don’t recall how to do it off hand. If that’s what you are seeking to do I’ll see if I can find instructions.


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

Thanks for your reply. first of all. I performerd a search in the fourum but I did not find exactly the information i need. Unfortunately Italian technical support is simply lame and, although I'm pretty confident with all MIDI related things, if user's manual is lacking of fundamental information I can't go ahead.
At present, I'm doing some experiments under Windows 10, with Digital Performer 9 and a single nanoKONTROL, even though my real DAW runs under OSX - _but hardware and software are the same_. The sole difference between Core MIDI and MIDI under Windows is that on the former I can rename MIDI devices, thus I can detect which is doing what. Under Windows I see just nanoKONTROL2 and nanoKONTROL2 2 and this doesn't help this much.


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## jbuhler (May 16, 2021)

So there’s this: https://vi-control.net/community/th...o-detailed-install-guide.106245/#post-4772891

and this: https://vi-control.net/community/th...in-logic-through-kontakt.102585/#post-4711453

Both are aimed at the peculiarities of using nanokontrols with Logic but a lot of the issues are the same when trying to combine the midi side with navigation. I’m not quite sure what your issues are with using two nanokontrols. 

In general I don’t think you can control mixing functions of the DAW when the nanokontrol is in CC mode. I’ve seen videos where someone managed to have a couple of sliders in CC mode while the others controlled the mixer but I’ve never been able to get it to do that. You can set CC mode to have some control over navigation.


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

Well, after some endeavors and swears, I succeeded obtaining little results but I'm not completely satisfied because I'm just at the very beginning.
First of all, with two nanoKONTROLs I am able to control up to 16 audio tracks at the same time, included pans, Solos, Mutes and Record... the downside is that - until now - touching Track < and > makes a mess and I'm not able to control single traks anymore.
I understand that two different nanoKONTROL might go into opposition, because they send very simiilar commands that can overlap. It's up to me understanding how to avoid this annoying issue.

Then, another very complicated chapter is using nanoKONTROLs as CC controllers, i.e. managing MIDI volumes of tracks. I saw that with the editor I can assign different MIDI channels to the sliders, thus with great patience I should reach my goal.


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

jbuhler said:


> So there’s this: https://vi-control.net/community/th...o-detailed-install-guide.106245/#post-4772891


Thanks a lot. I'll have it a look. For sure.
It's also about Loigic Pro, but I'll go for the content about nanoKONTROL itself.


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## jbuhler (May 16, 2021)

I added to that post as I accidentally hit “post” while I was compiling the information. 

If you set one nanokontrol in DAW mode and the other in CC you should be able to use one for navigation and work with groups of faders, while the other handles the CCs.


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

jbuhler said:


> I added to that post as I accidentally hit “post” while I was compiling the information.
> 
> If you set one nanokontrol in DAW mode and the other in CC you should be able to use one for navigation and work with groups of faders, while the other handles the CCs.


In the meantime my experiments went ahead. I succeeded using two nanoKONTROLs at the same time with Digital Performer 9.5.
it seems that everything goes as expected except for a very strange behaviour I can't explain. In a nutshell, if I start with a project made up of 32 tracks and use Track > to move to the next 16 tracks, Digital Performer "cuts" the 16 tracks that are not at sight. In other words the mixing section is made up of just 16 tracks when, moving from a group of 16 tracks to the next group, I can control the relevand volumes, pans etc.
As far as I can see, there's a master nanoKONTROL that reacts also to transport controls and a slave nanoKONTROL that sends just controls to the tracks.


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## jbuhler (May 16, 2021)

Interesting. Does it default to one or the other as the main controller or is it random on start up as to which gets initialized as the main controller?


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

jbuhler said:


> Interesting. Does it default to one or the other as the main controller or is it random on start up as to which gets initialized as the main controller?


Well, assuming I hate Windows but I must bear with it, at least until I will move to OSX, I realised that the last nanoKONTROL hooked to the USB port or HUB becomes the main controller between two. In fact the second nanoKONTROL has the STOP button lit. Both control volumes, pans etc. but only the second one controls DAW transport.
Perhaps also in DP’s settimgs under Surface Control you can decide what device is primary and what is secundary.


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

Little steps...
At present I saw that a hierarchical order can be obtained under Control Surface Setup inside MotU Performer. The nanoKONTROL with STOP button lit is the master. Now I can control only volumes, pan, mutes, solos and record of audio tracks.
Even though I powered both nanoKONTROLs in CC mode (Set Marker + Cycle) it seems that they have absolutely no control over MIDI tracks nevertheless I set the slider previously assigned via its editor to MIDI channel 1. By the way, another annoying thing is that Korg Editor claims the MIDI port, thus I can't have running Digital Performer 9.5 and Korg nano Editor at the same time...


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## jaketanner (May 16, 2021)

jbuhler said:


> I’ve seen videos where someone managed to have a couple of sliders in CC mode while the others controlled the mixer but I’ve never been able to get it to do that


The old version you could have..not V2.


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## jim2b (May 16, 2021)

You might try posting your question on Motunation.com.
There are a lot of helpful digital performer experts there.


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## wavesequence (May 16, 2021)

jim2b said:


> You might try posting your question on Motunation.com.
> There are a lot of helpful digital performer experts there.


In the meantime I posted on DP‘sFacebook group… crossing fingers. I had a look into that forum but threads about nanoKONTROL are quite scarce.


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## jim2b (May 17, 2021)

wavesequence said:


> In the meantime I posted on DP‘sFacebook group… crossing fingers. I had a look into that forum but threads about nanoKONTROL are quite scarce.


Good luck. Sometimes it takes a few days for a response.


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## wavesequence (May 17, 2021)

jim2b said:


> Good luck. Sometimes it takes a few days for a response.


They replied... and gave me a good hint. That's the reason of a tech support!
They suggested me to "unlock" nanoKONTROL from the Control Surface Setup... and it makes sense, because if nanoKONTROL is used in CC mode, it can't work either DAW mode.


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