So I bought a Mikro to get into finger drumming using Addictive Drums after watching a lot of YouTube videos, and long story short I was not very impressed with the touch sensitivity on it - especially when playing fast and light.
I went down a rabbit hole of trying to resolve it with every setting imaginable to make sure it wasn’t a user error or something I was missing in the software.
I heard about hardware differences so I bought another Mikro and a full MK3 to test/compare.
I didn’t notice much difference in the Mikro’s, but the MK3 wins HANDS DOWN when it comes to touch sensitivity and fast playing. There’s something about the way it triggers which is very different compared to the Mikro, and it really picks up almost every hit. I know it’s a steep price tag, but if you are a perfectionist and really want the full realistic finger drumming experience, shell out for the MK3. It’s worth it. I played for 4 hours straight last night and couldn’t stop.
BTW I’m using it on 100% sensitivity with velocity at Soft3 and it’s perfect. Using Addictive Drums 2 inside of Maschine 2.
You might have gotten a “bad” unit when it comes to the Mikro, because what I found over time, with the newer Mikro’s and firmware updates and all that is that there is not a big difference. The biggest difference is that the Mikro “skips” the softest velocities and just outputs a louder note.
So where the Big Maschine would still output something like velocity 7 or something, the Mikro would just make that 15, skipping over the softest midi notes.
It does still trigger though, so the note will be played, just louder.
As far as bad units go, I have not yet heard about a big Maschine mk3 being a bad unit, where some mikro’s do have problems. I myself now have used 4 mikro devices and also compared to my 2 bigger maschine units and I would be fine with either of them.
The biggest problem with the expensive big maschine is that the pads get less sensitive when you hit them a lot. I play a lot and have to open and clean mine after 1 year and at some point get the sensor sheet replaced. You’ll never get it fully back to its initial sensitivitiy though.
I think that goes for all devices like the Maschine by the way. It’s just that I play my big maschine the most so it craps out the soonest. If I was playing a mikro it would be the same, my Yamaha FGDP 50 also does the same thing, it’s just that the big Maschine is the worst thing to replace because of its cost.
If it was a about the cost of playing a lot every day. I would probably buy Yamaha FGDP30’s and Maschine mikro’s because replacing those once in a while would be the equivalent of buying new string for my guitar regulary
I was told by the guys over at MPCStuff that you can actually use the full MK3/Plus sheets in the Mikro:
“We do have new replacement sensors that will work if yours are starting to fail - They have to be cut just a little bit with an exact-o knife or razor blade as they are made for the non Mikro version”
And yea, I guess I got 2 bad Mikro’s in a row! Oh well. Having plenty of fun with the MK3 so I’ll just grab a new sensor sheet if needed down the road.
I’ve been playing finger drums on a Maschine MK3 for the past few months and recently picked up a Mikro MK3 to see if I could downsize my setup. Like many others here, I quickly noticed a major issue with the Mikro’s pads—they consistently miss hits that are clearly above the lowest sensitivity threshold.
For example, when using the Moeller technique, the Mikro just drops hits entirely, whereas the full-size Maschine catches everything. These aren’t ghost notes—they’re legitimate hits that should be registering (and that the Maschine 3 registers). It feels like the pads just ignore some non-negligible fraction of them. If I play the hits differently, then the Mikro will register them just fine again.
I haven’t updated the firmware or registered the Mikro yet, so maybe that’s part of it—but honestly, I doubt it. It just seems flaky.
Just wanted to share my two cents, and see if anyone had any suggestions (CE sensitivity is all the way up and I’ve played with velo curves also).
One thing you can try is turn sensitivity down a bit actually. I found that the newer Mikros sometimes work better (maybe because they are overly sensitive and then it thinks that a pad is being pressed when your finger is actually lifted for example).
That said, you could very well have a bad unit. They exist, I know. In my experience testing a bunch of micros and a bunch of big Mk3’s, what you should have with a good unit is reliable triggering of soft hits but the softest midi velocity value on the mikro will be higher. It should trigger though.
Maybe it’s time for me to buy another mikro just to see where they’re at right now. If NI decides to cut costs or gets another factory to produce them they could very well become shittier.
