Launchkey LED Mapping woes.

[brandonbpm]

I thought I would ask this here because Novation support has been no help. I bought the Novation Launchkey Mini keyboard recently, and I mostly bought it for use with Ableton production, but also to use the pads to trigger samples/remix decks in my DJ software, however the MIDI setup is driving me bonkers. The device operates in two modes (there are two input and two output ports) one in/out called Launchkey MIDI and the other called Launchkey InControl. The "InControl" functions are basically functions pre-mapped for triggering session clips in Ableton, complete with the LEDs lighting up with corresponding clip states. When InControl Mode is turned off, there is no extra LED feedback for the pads.

I was under the impression when I purchased the device, I would be able to map midi output to LEDs like any normal controller with LEDs but I have hit a bit of a snag. After hours of searching, the only lead I got was one of the first results from Novation forums where a user was trying to map LEDs to the Launchkey in Traktor:

"I talked with Novation Support and they said that there are no way to make LED feedback work in Traktor or anywhere else.
The problem is in InControl feature. While every other controls (keys, faders, etc.) work on one midi channel, pads use two of them: one for regular mapping and another for InControl's LED feedback. Software like Traktor "talks" with controller only via one midi channel. The only software that can use both channels is Ableton. Ableton has some kind of 'tricky mighty script' which other DAWs hasn't. So actually now it's others software delevopers' problem and not Novation's one. How tricky..."

I did a little research of my own by using the Midi Monitor app to track functions in Ableton while the device is in InControl mode, and I found out these outputs were being sent to the InControl Port in order to trigger LEDs. For example: A value of 60 sent to Ch 1 Note C6 lights up the first pad green. A value of 63 on the same channel and note turns same pad is yellow. 56 is blinking green, and 4 is sent to turn the LED off. I tried mapping one of these same output values in Traktor to test it out. Made sure the Output Port selected was Launchkey InControl (and not the regular Launchkey MIDI Port). For Add Out>Deck Common>Play/Pause. The Note I manually chose as Ch 1 C6 (if you choose learn and press the pad, it registers as Ch 10 E2, the value of the pad in normal mode, instead of InControl Mode), controller Range was default 0 to 1, Midi Range I put at 4 to 60, since I knew 60 was green and 4 was off (I'm assuming 0 is off as well, I also tried that) and it resulted in no LED at all while the track played.

I think the problem may be that there is no way that I see to turn on InControl mode in any program OTHER than Traktor, but I feel like there should definitely be some way to achieve LED feedback with this controller. At the end of the day, it IS all MIDI. I know I have said a lot and got pretty technical, but I have spent hours trying to figure this out and I was hoping maybe someone could help or show me something I'm overlooking.

[madiman1]

I dont have any experience with this controller, but maybe if you made two mappings it could work. One would be for the input, set to midi mode. And one for the output set to InControl.

[pashtron]

I thought I would ask this here because Novation support has been no help. I bought the Novation Launchkey Mini keyboard recently, and I mostly bought it for use with Ableton production, but also to use the pads to trigger samples/remix decks in my DJ software, however the MIDI setup is driving me bonkers. The device operates in two modes (there are two input and two output ports) one in/out called Launchkey MIDI and the other called Launchkey InControl. The "InControl" functions are basically functions pre-mapped for triggering session clips in Ableton, complete with the LEDs lighting up with corresponding clip states. When InControl Mode is turned off, there is no extra LED feedback for the pads.

I was under the impression when I purchased the device, I would be able to map midi output to LEDs like any normal controller with LEDs but I have hit a bit of a snag. After hours of searching, the only lead I got was one of the first results from Novation forums where a user was trying to map LEDs to the Launchkey in Traktor:

"I talked with Novation Support and they said that there are no way to make LED feedback work in Traktor or anywhere else.
The problem is in InControl feature. While every other controls (keys, faders, etc.) work on one midi channel, pads use two of them: one for regular mapping and another for InControl's LED feedback. Software like Traktor "talks" with controller only via one midi channel. The only software that can use both channels is Ableton. Ableton has some kind of 'tricky mighty script' which other DAWs hasn't. So actually now it's others software delevopers' problem and not Novation's one. How tricky..."

I did a little research of my own by using the Midi Monitor app to track functions in Ableton while the device is in InControl mode, and I found out these outputs were being sent to the InControl Port in order to trigger LEDs. For example: A value of 60 sent to Ch 1 Note C6 lights up the first pad green. A value of 63 on the same channel and note turns same pad is yellow. 56 is blinking green, and 4 is sent to turn the LED off. I tried mapping one of these same output values in Traktor to test it out. Made sure the Output Port selected was Launchkey InControl (and not the regular Launchkey MIDI Port). For Add Out>Deck Common>Play/Pause. The Note I manually chose as Ch 1 C6 (if you choose learn and press the pad, it registers as Ch 10 E2, the value of the pad in normal mode, instead of InControl Mode), controller Range was default 0 to 1, Midi Range I put at 4 to 60, since I knew 60 was green and 4 was off (I'm assuming 0 is off as well, I also tried that) and it resulted in no LED at all while the track played.

I think the problem may be that there is no way that I see to turn on InControl mode in any program OTHER than Traktor, but I feel like there should definitely be some way to achieve LED feedback with this controller. At the end of the day, it IS all MIDI. I know I have said a lot and got pretty technical, but I have spent hours trying to figure this out and I was hoping maybe someone could help or show me something I'm overlooking.

I was in a similar boat with the Launchkey 25 trying to get it to work with Renoise. I found the following weird trick worked to get me into inControl mode. All I did was output a particular MIDI note to the Launchkey inControl MIDI port. The note was C-1. That made the inControl buttons live and I was able to use the pads as two banks of a Launchpad controller (the MIDI mapping corresponds to the lower 2 rows).

So all you need to do is set up the Launchkey Incontrol MIDI as your output, and play the note C-1. That will enable the inControl buttons. It worked for me, anyway!