NAMM 2009: Beat Kangz Releases the Beat Thang

http://www.beatkangz.com/main/product

Here we are kicking off NAMM 2009 with a very interesting piece of hardware. This is in fact perhaps the most livePA oriented piece of hardware I have seen in a long time. To be 100% honest I am not sure of this product is real. The name is pretty dreadful, but if you can get past the name the hardware and the spec list look to actually be pretty impressive.

The Beat Thang is a 16 track sampler (and rompler?) that features six digital effects types, waveform editing and beat creation. Full spec list below.

• Sampling with onboard waveform editing
  
• Over 3000 Blazin' Brand new sounds designed by The Beat Kangz
  
• 16 Track MIDI sequencer 
  
• 500 production ready Platinum beats and loops created by The Beat Kangz
  
• Sleek design and styling with customizable “Paintz” and “Grillz”
  
• Convenient, light-weight portable design with internal rechargable battery
  
• USB In & Out 
  
• Pitch and Mod Wheels
  
• On Board FX including Reverb, Delay, Automated Filters and tons of Crazy "Freak FX" including "Chopped and Screwed"!!!!
  
• On Board "Mo Bang" Mastering with EQ and Limiting
  
• 256 MB Ram standard
  
• 2 High Speed SD Card Slots
  
• Export Beats to a Mac or PC 
  
• Very Easy to USE!!!
  
• More top Secret Features and Surprises that we dont want our sleezy, thieving corporate competitors to know.... but we'll tell ya soon!
  

I have to admit. The hardware itself looks pretty cool and the specs even cooler. I would like to know some more details about that sequencer and the sampling capabilities. But hopefully we have a nice new Groovebox on our hands here.


Update: Some more specs have been posted over at the Harmony Central Forums by what appears to be the company itself.

General Information

• 2 Headphone Jacks
  
• Carry audio output via USB. USB Connects to any Hard drive, USB keys can also be read and write to
  
• Read directly off of the SD cards. 2 Slots capbable of 16GB's each
  
• 256 MB Ram Stock! 
  
• 512 Flash for user content on board. Higher if its a custom order
  
• Stereo Mic Line input with Phantom Power
  
• Sampling, and Resampling of outputs
  
• Tempo sync Delay, Mastering, Reverb, Filters and tons of other weird FX
  
• Plans to open FX section to 3rd party developers . Can you say VST (Ed. Very interesting.....)
  
• Custom Paint. Any Color LED's, Custom Grillz
  
• Each pad can have 16 layers with independent pitch, cut off res, pan, velocity, vol and a single pad can be spread across a whole keyboard with Loop points so you can sample synths strings or anything and turn it into multi layered patches.
  
• PC Drum Kit builder with Drag and Drop capabilities
  

Sequencer Information

• 96 PPQ
  
• 1000 Sequences
  
• 500 Songs
  
• Individual Bar Length which can be changed in real time even while recording. (Ed. Excellent!!)
  
• Quantize and Swing can be changed in real-time.
• All your Songs, Sequences, Beats, Kits, Patches, Samples and settings that are on your SD cards are always there and show up just like the presets.
• 13 Pads with Velocity
  
• 8 Pad banks per track 
  
• 16 Tracks 
• Pad and Track mute and Solo 
• Mixer with level control FX send, Pan, Pitch Automation, Filter and EQ Automation per Track including (Low Pass, Band Pass, Hi pass, Low Shelf, High Shelf and Notch, Automated Q control to)
• Dynamic Kit and Patch creator which is easy and to use. Samples can all have categories (Kicks, Snares Hats etc) App for converting your own samples into the categories and the ability to create your own.
• 16 Layers per PAD with velocity, pan, pitch ,cut off, res and volume control
• Can create multilayerd patches that span a keyboard from one pad or multiple. Each bank can have a different patch (keys and bass or drums and synth )

Lets hope they aren't over promosing here and under delivering.