Hi, this is my first post here and I don’t own an Hapax yet, but I am looking for some informations about it before pulling the trigger.
I currently use an Akai Force as my main midi sequencer and I must say it works fine but the lack of midi tools for creating interesting and unusual patterns is kinda frustrating. Also I find it pretty static as you can’t do much as a real time operations on written clips.
Hapax looks great in that area.
The good thing about the Force is that I can connect an usb hub and use loads of external gear, especially class compliant midi interfaces. I have loads of hardware and I only use those to create my music, so having all my stuff connected to the sequencer is crucial for a fast and effective workflow.
I use a Miditech 16x16 midi interface to connect most of my stuff and I am curious to know if anyone is using the same interface with the Hapax. It’s class compliant and works fine with my Force. I also use a 4x4 M audio, but looks like the Hapax doesn’t support (yet?) usb hubs, but that won’t be a problem as I could use a small thru box that I already own.
Any user experience to share with this combo?
Would be great to have some feedback about it.
Thanks a lot for your answers! Hope to join you soon folks! Cheers
Not exactly the same setup, but I’m using an iConnectivity mio connected to my Hapax, and the mio has a USB hub attached - it works great.
Interesting. I have the mio xl, but I’m not using it at the moment. Are you connecting the hapax to the mio via usb or midi din? This would be great to expand the number of ports I have because my multi-timbral synths are using them up quickly. Is this a good working solution? Thanks
Connecting via USB.
I got my Hapax a few days ago and it won’t be as flexible as the Force and the Force has a bug (I’m finding) where it doesn’t work as well as a midi router.
The force can see up to 32 usb midi devices. A mioXL or XM will present 16 devices or ports over the usb device port. I have all of my synths laid out over about 6 chains, all accessed from the Force through a single usb cable.
Unfortunately, the Hapax only has one port per usb connection so it cannot see all of the midi ports from the mioXL and my routing setup (which also worked exactly the same on PC due to rtp-midi) does not work on the Hapax.
I finally had the thought to route the Hapax through the Force and use it as a midi router for the moment.
The big problem I ran into is a note-off bug on midi inputs. Basically the force (and mpc) don’t see the channel for a note-off incoming and therefore sends it to all of the channels.
So what happens is that I’ll have a long pad playing, hit the same note on some other instrument and the note off will cut the pad.
I’m going to consolidate my midi routing but multi-timbral and mpe synths are a bit of a problem.
The hapax effectively have 6 output ports between 3xDIN,TRS,host,device so this is all doable but it will eat up ports on the mioXL without a bit of help.
Fortunately, if you are inclined to do a bit of soldering and write a bit of code, this is a very efficient way to add midi ports to the mio through usb: https://www.tindie.com/products/deftaudio/teensy-41-midi-breakout-board-8in-8out-usb-host/
This has midi host so I would be able to get all six ports from the hapax to the mio not eat up a ton of either din ports on the mio or usb device slots.
TL;DR You can’t use many multi-midi usb interfaces because they use multiple ports over usb, which the Hapax doesn’t support. Most likely you will need to use a combination of DIN and usb depending on how many midi channels you ultimately need.
And, yes the Hapax is worth it vs the Force. The note editing on Hapax pads is much easier than the touch screen on the force. Experimenting with chords is much easier and having the algo and effects together is very nice.
Oh, and the automation editing with interpolation is hugely useful compared to the force.
EDIT: Sorry for the long post but I just got through debugging the note-off issue.
@dstengle I sequence 5 tone generators from my Hapax through a MioXM.
I’m curious what stops you from directly addressing multiple ports on the MioXM. Did you set up routing between the “To Host” port (assuming that’s how you connected the Hapax) and the other ports?
They didn’t give a number, but it looks to me like the OP has (way) more than 16 Midi devices at which point you need more complex solutions.
I had at one time solved it like this: since the Hapax has more outs than ins and I don’t need a midi return from all my synths, I had for example connected mioPort3-Out to Synth1 and MioPort3-In to Hapax-OutC. Using appropriate filters and routing in Auracle this worked really well.
Yup, notably the OP has multi-timbral synths. 16 channels gets cramped before you even start.
It’s most unfortunate that Hapax doesn’t currently support the virtual USB cable numbering, that’d render soooo much cabling obsolete. Squarp has said this is on their roadmap though.
@polynil I see your point. I have 24 channels of tone generation and can’t address even 16 as I used 2 channels for system control.
More flexibility on this point in the Hapax would indeed be helpful.
Oh, is it? That’d be helpful, indeed. Might be the point where I’ll try MPE again.
I remembered seeing that post but it seems like it could be a while before they get to that with all of the other things they are trying to do.
I’ll probably come up with an alternate way to connect for now until they do get it done.
Edit: Or I can hope that Akai fixes their bug in the short term, but that seems unlikely.
Of course, that doesn’t tell us anything as to when it might actually happen if at all. If it was me, I’d want to get this kind of fundamental thing in early rather than late in the lifecycle of the device, but it’s not, and I really don’t envy them for having to priorize what must be an endless list of things, all looking equally critical 
I think it’s possible to connect multiple Hapax ports to a MioXM or MioXL and route intelligently so as to support more than 16 channels.
I haven’t had the time to try it, but I did buy an extra Mio (the DIN to USB adapter) so I could. Not sure when that will happen. Day job and all…
Well sure you can, but not over just one USB cable.
Right.
But my Hapax currently is only linked via a single USB, so an extra DIN connection is no big deal for the Hapax.
Thanks for experimenting with this. If we could simply plug the mioXL into the Hapax USB host and all of the ports appear in track selection, that would be amazing. Perhaps this could be done with a firmware update?
This is planned:
Just not clear where it might be in the roadmap given they are in catchup mode.
-Dave