Nektar Pacer MIDI DAW Footswitch Controller

Picked this up to control amplitube and reaper. Took a bit of figuring out, but you have to use VST and not VST3 for everything to communicate correctly.

This controller is very good. It feels like something you could keep for years in your studio. Great quality.
Pressing the pedals feels good and the LED display is very bright in low light situations.
That said, I’m returning it because:
– man that thing is heavy! I was planning on travelling with it to play concerts in Europe and the US, no way I’m gonna put this in my luggage.
– the top-left switch called “Preset” is not programmable. This results in a very odd 4+6 layout. I wish this “Preset” switch was the one at the bottom-right instead, that would make much more sense as it would result in a 5+5 layout, which is kind of the standard in foot controllers.
– The LED text above the switches (“Preset”, “Solo”, “Mute”, “Rec Arm”…) is not programmable either. I wish we could program these areas and display the text we want. As a result, if you’re not using this foot controller with a DAW or in a conventional way, all that real estate taken by the LED text is useless. This is a shame.
– it is not well integrated with Ableton Live. There are many useful videos on workarounds to make it work with Ableton, but these are annoying as most of them are MIDI mappings saved with Live Projects, instead of being global DAW controls

This is a very high quality piece of kit. I bought it to control various aspects of my DAW of choice, Reaper, and it does a very good job of that. More specifically, I’ve set it up to control the Super8 looper in Reaper so I can have a multi-channel looper with the ability to record, play-stop, overdub on dedicated footswitches. I also recently started using IKM’s Amplitube guitar amplifier modeling software and of course the many footswitches and ability to use expression pedals (I just have one) and footswitches (again, I just have one) to control the virtual guitar pedals, amps, and switch between patches is very satisfying. It’s easy to program the footswitch once you understand the process. The ability to select the LED color above each switch to help remind you what you’ve programmed it to do is a nice touch. It’s big, takes up a lot of floor space, and it’s heavy, but it looks killer and makes me want to play music. Nothing but praise for this thing.

Super buena calidad. Esta cosa se siente que va a resistir todo. La estoy usando con un Line 6 HX Stomp y funciona de maravilla. También lo puedo usar con mi DAW Reaper para controlar grabar, reproducir, seleccionar pista, etc… Por el precio por el que lo compré creo que fue una super ganga. Muy recomendado.

Initial impressions after one night of experimentation:

Physical:
It is very well built. Metal chassis, foot switches feel very solid and are quiet. Heavier than I expected which is a good thing. Nice rubber treads on the bottom to keep it from sliding. Profile of the pedals seems about right though I did accidently catch the rotary knob with my foot once or twice while operating. Spacing of the pedals is good. For my size 10 1/2 shoe — not a lot of extra room, but not too tight either. Responsiveness of switches is very good. It has the appearance of durability. Time will tell, of course.

Operational:
Out of the box it has a preset to do what I wanted: activate notes on a soft synth. It’s six notes on pedals 1-6 running from E to C. Worked immediately with my Arturia soft synth through Logic, no drivers or other nonsense necessary. I immediately set about programming a new preset the get closer to a full chromatic scale. You can’t, of course, with only ten pedals, but who really needs C# and Eb? Well, I do, but not that often. So the preset runs E, F, G, A, B, D on pedals 1-6 and F#, G#, Bb and C on pedals A-D. This will work on a lot of music I play.

I intend to set up another preset that will be aimed at minimize foot travel; probably E, A, B on pedals 1-3 and G, C, D on 4-6. That gives me the ability to do 1-4-5 blues/pop patterns in the two keys I use most.

The process of coding in the specific notes is a bit laborious — a computer app would be really handy — but once you get the hang of it it’s not too bad. I made a few mistakes but was able to correct them without starting over. After coding the pitches I coded the LEDs to get a different color for each pitch. Since it’s not layed out like a real keyboard the lights might help me find the right pedals until I develop the muscle memory. All told it took about 90 minutes to get the custom preset the way I wanted it. And then it simply worked. Love it when that happens!

At some point I’ll try it with triggering sequences and other stuff. The possibilities seem pretty limitless.

Conclusions:
I love it. This is what I’ve been wanting for a long time. I’ve owned various bass pedals which are really nice, but take up a lot of room. I nearly got the Keith MacMillen 12-step but the complaints about the small size and unreliability scared me off. I could wish the Pacer had 13 pedals instead of 10, but I don’t know that the extra size would have been worth it. There is the possibility of adding external footswitches that can be assigned to fill out the scale, but I’m not sure I’d like having loose mismatching targets to hit with my foot while performing. We’ll see.

It’s early days, but so far I am really thrilled with this thing. Good job, Nektar!