Kontrol X1 Mk2 - MIDI Settings for Loop Length LED Display

DJ Hardware
1

Device model : Mac Mini M4
Version of operating system : macOS 15.7.3
Version of djay : 5.6.1
Hardware/controllers used : Native Instruments Kontrol X1 Mk2
Hardware firmware version : 1.6

Hi there,

I have been building out a MIDI mapping for the X1, with reasonable results so far. I’ve been able to get nearly all functions working, but the one thing that is eluding me is the LED display for the Loop Length Encoder.

The Loop Length Rotary knobs work no problem at all, you can see the loop length updating in the software (and the XDJ-1000MK2 display which is great!) and you can press the knob to activate the loop. And the “Test” option displays the Midi Out Max value of 127 - which may or may not be a red herring, but at least the display does respond to the Test.

I just don’t know how to make the LED display show the same value for the loop length.

Google AI was saying I had to have multiple entries, one for each loop length value, but it wasn’t clear how to feed in the loop value in order to match to the MIDI Out value. It felt like a Wild Goose Chase.

I know Algoriddm doesn’t/can’t offer MIDI Mapping support, but I thought I would ask the question of the wider community in case anyone else had had any luck.

For clarity, the X1 is in MIDI Mode and I also have the NI Controller Editor running as well, which seems fine.

MIDI Mapping is a dark art, I’m just pleased I’ve gotten this far, if I could get the display working as well it would absolutely fantastic.

Thanks in advance for any help!

Midi Fighter Twister - Ultimate Neural Mix Crossfader Mapping
2

Hi @James_Gillies, this is not supported within the MIDI Learn tool of djay. It might be possible to program this through the XML file with a text editor, but honestly I can’t help you there.

4

Thanks @Slak_Jaw - I’ve made a post on DJ Tech Tools, to get the attention of someone who’s apparently had some luck getting the Tempo to display on the LEDs:

I might have made a baby step forward by adjusting the LED settings in the NI Controller Editor software to state “LED Display on Midi Out” rather than “LED Display on Midi In”.

This has had the effect (when enabling Midi Out for that CC) of changing the display from 1 to 127 based on turning the Loop Length rotary left or right (as-per the Min/Max Midi Out values).

This in of itself might be a Red Herring as it may not lead towards a proper solution, but as I’m learning it’s interesting to at least observe the change in behaviour.

As Google AI suggested, I’m not fully ruling out multiple/duplicate mapping entries if I need to have one per “indent” from 1/32 beat to 128 beats, it’s just a case of understanding how it’s supposed to work.

Why oh why did Native Instruments not publish full (low level) Midi Mapping documentation for their device, like Rane did for the MP 2015?!

If I get any further progress I’ll post it to this thread, someone else might find it of interest. Given I had essentially ignored my X1s due to them not being on the list of supported controllers I’m over the moon to even be where I am already!

That said, there’s very little documentation on the Internet other than already-built mappings posted, which are often encoded.

Cheers!

1 Like
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You’re welcome @James_Gillies. Thanks for sharing! Looking forward to hearing more results on this topic. Good luck!

8

Hi, I also own an X1 MK2, and I’d like to map it for DJ Pro as well. Would you mind sharing your mapping so I can see how it feels? :slight_smile: I’d be very grateful if you could send it to me via DM.
Thanks

9

Hi @Screma ,

Sure thing, if I can figure out how to export/save the MIDI Mapping I am using you are welcome to them!

The way I use them are pretty standard I would say, nothing too fancy, but a blend of the X1 “functions” as-per the knobs with a Djay Pro “twist” - and some Neural Mix bits in there too!

As-per the title of this topic, for now I have disabled the LED displays for the Loop Length as I don’t see a fix anytime soon. The loop length can still be adjusted and activated with the knob in the same way however, you would just need to look on Djay (or in my case the XDJ-1000 MK2 display when using them in USB HID mode) to verify the length that will be activated.

I hope this helps.

Cheers

James

10

OK, I was actually interested in activating the display, because then I mapped everything else to my needs, and removed the central rotary which unfortunately, does not expand the library when searching for songs, and above all, it does not move between playlists with shift + rotary, and therefore 3 separate functions must be mapped to do these 3 things, for the rest I found everything as I wanted. The only thing missing is being able to see the length of the loop/beatjump on the display, when rotating the annoying loop wheel.

11

Yes, I am in a similar position. As you say there’s no workable Shift layer yet in the Djay MIDI learner tool so it limits what you can map. In the end, for browsing my library tracks and folders I am using the relevant XDJ deck which has the Back button next to the Browse knob mapped out of the box for expanding folders. It’s workable enough.

1 Like
12

Hi, I’ve mapped the x1 for my needs, and I have to say I think I’ve found a great button combination, bringing it very close to the original Traktor layout.
Unfortunately, there are some major limitations (at least for me):

  1. On Traktor, turning the library wheel zooms in on the playlist by default, but on DJ Pro it doesn’t allow this. You have to map a single button to zoom in on the playlist and return it to its default position.
  2. To scroll through playlists, on Traktor, you press SHIFT + scroll the search wheel, a very quick solution to switch between the playlist view and the playlist view. Again, DJ Pro doesn’t allow me to map this function, or rather, it maps that button sequence, but it switches to the search source selection (collection-spotify-apple music-external playlists, and so on). I’ve tried and tried, but I can’t get it to just scroll through the playlists in my collection. So I had to remap the scroll wheel, which, by pressing it, switches me from searching within the playlist to searching outside the playlists, then pressing it again, it goes back into the playlist. It’s pretty cumbersome.
  3. Those damn loop/beatjump LEDs… It’s impossible that they can’t get the value shown on the screen and the loops. I just don’t know what to touch to tell them to take that value…

Can anyone fix it?

13

I may live to regret this but….

Big things coming… I hope. Fingers crossed.

14

Sneak peek… :smiling_face_with_sunglasses:

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3 Likes
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Nice work @James_Gillies!

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wow awesome!!! how did you do it???

1 Like
17

Hi there,

So I’ve just this minute finished putting together what is a working solution on two Kontrol X1s across all four decks in Djay Pro.

It’s a robust enough solution and I’m really happy with it, I will post a full video showing it working in the next couple of day, I’m away from home right now.

To create the solution I’ve had to step outside of Djay Pro a little bit, but not too far. As we know, Native Instruments use HID and a driver-based software connection to drive the displays.

Djay’s own MIDI capabilities aren’t looking at what VALUES are coming out of a given setting per-se, at least not with the MIDI learner tool provided.

This is not quite a MIDI mapping solution, but it works.

The solution has cost me €59 for a software license, after a successful trial to prove it works. If you want the solution, that’s what you’re looking at.

Happy to post the steps, it’s a little bit involved but I’ve done the whole thing from scratch in a few hours.

Once I post the video to show it working let me know if you’re still interested.

Cheers

James

2 Likes
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Thanks again for sharing this @James_Gillies

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I’m absolutely interested, even in buying this license in case. If you want, you can write to me on WhatsApp or Telegram for better support. I would be very grateful.

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Hi @Screma, I recommend you contact James via DM in this forum and not share your phone number or email publicly. You can DM community users by clicking on their avatar.

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2 Likes
21

Hi there Luca,

Here’s a quick video showing the LED displays working on the Traktor Kontrol X1 MK2s:

https://share.icloud.com/photos/008YW1ta9UuhzzAQO6uhOhFGQ

If the native NI functionality is 100% then I’d say this works at about 95% - all MIDI based, but not all within Djay Pro!

There’s a couple of minor caveats as you’d expect with any sort of workaround, but nothing to stop me using it, and there’s an easy “fix” to the caveat.

If you’re still keen to get the steps I’ll look to build out some procedure.

Cheers

James

2 Likes
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Hi, do you have any news on the explanation video?

23

Hi @Screma,

Yes in fact I’ve just grabbed 16 screenshots to cover the various steps for the initial set-up.

I just need to figure out how to Airdrop them all to my phone/computer so I can pull some notes together and provide the screenshots.

What I’ll do to make things easier as well is to supply exports of the MIDI mappings and configs I am using so you don’t have to create them all manually.

You might need to tweak slightly to suit your device names and so on, but it should be fairly straight-forward.

Tell me, do you have a single Kontrol X1? And have you got NI Controller Editor installed already? And finally, have you put your X1 in MIDI mode? I am guessing the answer to all of the above is “Yes” as you already have most of the functions mapped, right?

Cheers

James