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Stuff.tv
5 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Stuff.tv
Best electronic instruments in 2025, including MIDI keyboards, drum pads and samplers
Electronic instruments have come a long way since New Order sequenced Blue Monday using binary code. Now it's all quantised beats, USB-C, and expensive noise-cancelling headphones. And if you're in the market for modern melodies, these are the machines you need. From MIDI keyboards to beat pads, below you'll find an orchestra of tools for making electronic music. Whether you're tinkering with your first track or ready to lay down another lo-fi banger, the kit listed here will help you sample, sequence and synthesise your way to a smash hit. Or at least something worth sharing on SoundCloud. Don't know your MIDI DIN from your MIDI in? We've also broken down some electronic lingo to help you out. Give it a read, and you'll know your controllers better than Jean-Michel Jarre knows his laser harp. Why you can trust Stuff: Our team of experts rigorously test each product and provide honest, unbiased reviews to help you make informed decisions. For more details, read how we test and rate products. The best electronic instruments you can buy today: The rhythm rig 1. Native Instruments Maschine Mikro Amadeus never needed drum pads. Then again, Wolfgang didn't do trip-hop beats. If your unfinished symphony is more Massive Attack than Mozart, try this groovebox. Colour-coded pads help you compose percussion parts with targeted taps, while a Smart Strip lets you mix up your kicks with Perform FX. Plus, the Maschine software has more instruments than an orchestra. The groovy grid 2. Novation Launchpad X You need light and sound for a desktop disco. Luckily, this rainbow grid does both. Like a dancefloor for your fingers, the 64-pad plinth lets you paint your tunes with RGB pixels. Designed for Ableton Live, it also functions as a fully mappable MIDI controller. Tap out patterns on the velocity-sensitive squares, and the capture mode will ensure you never miss a beat. The stealthy stepper 3. Arturia BeatStep Sometimes the biggest beats start with something small. Don't let its stature fool you: this compact controller can do it all. Use its pressure-sensitive pads for finger drumming or switch to sequencer mode to create 16-step patterns. Matching pitch knobs give you granular command of every note, while iPad connectivity means your rhythm isn't tied to a desk. The sound snatcher 4. Teenage Engineering EP 133 K.O. II The music man might be able to play the piano, but can he record a dog's bark and sequence it into a drum and bass banger? Probably not, but this distinctive sampler can. Styled like a Lego answering machine and just as fun to play with, battery power and a built-in mic mean it's made for going walkabout. Punch-in effects let you mangle samples on the fly, too. The standalone studio 5. Yamaha SEQTRAK You could build a studio in your shed. Or for a portable production setup, try this Yamaha hybrid. Part sampler, part sequencer, part synth – plus a sound effects section: the SEQTRAK is a self-contained station for crafting electronic jams. Lightweight but heavy on features, it includes a library of 2000 presets. There's even an integrated speaker for impromptu gigs. The rugged recorder 6. Roland SP-404MKII It might look like a hardcore calculator, but this button box is actually built for crunching notes, not numbers. Tough enough for any beat battle, its hands-on interface and signature sounds have made the SP a cult hit with DIY musicians. An OLED display makes it easier to layer loops, stack effects and slice samples in real time, which is a lot more fun than solving equations. The mini maestro 7. Akai Professional MPK Mini MK3 The Swiss Army doesn't need a MIDI controller. If it did, this would be the one. A fun-sized performer you can play several ways, it's a versatile utensil for tinkering with tunes. The 25 mini keys keep your fingers busy, along with eight pads, a pitch stick and a built-in arpeggiator. Assignable knobs complete the ensemble. The only thing missing is a bottle opener. The tactile tinkler 8. Roli Seaboard M When is a mini keyboard not a keyboard? When it's a haptic slab of sonic expression. Swapping regular keys for a responsive playing surface, the smallest Seaboard lets you glide, slide and press your way to organic sounds that a pitch wheel could only dream of – from swelling synths to string vibrato. Need more range? Magnetic connectors let you attach additional boards for extra octaves. Buy Now The portable performer 9. Korg nanoKEY Fold Even composers need a summer break. Pack this travel-sized MIDI keyboard for tunes wherever your next tour takes you. Lightweight at just 126g, the flat-pack piano folds in half without sacrificing features. 25 silent membrane keys mean you can rehearse without disturbing fellow passengers, while a pair of touch sliders let you perfect your melodies, whether you're taking them to Malibu or Ibiza. How to choose the best electronic instrument Looking to buy the best electronic instrument but don't know where to start? Here are some things to consider: Pads: Want to finger drum like Fred Again? Pick a tool with percussive pads. Some are velocity-sensitive for responsive beats, while others have RGB backlighting for better visual feedback when you're deep in the groove. Want to finger drum like Fred Again? Pick a tool with percussive pads. Some are velocity-sensitive for responsive beats, while others have RGB backlighting for better visual feedback when you're deep in the groove. Keys: MIDI keys come in different renditions, from plasticky plonkers to pressure-sensitive sets. If you play piano, you'll want ivories with proper travel. If you just need to trigger chords, a lighter touch will do. MIDI keys come in different renditions, from plasticky plonkers to pressure-sensitive sets. If you play piano, you'll want ivories with proper travel. If you just need to trigger chords, a lighter touch will do. Connectivity: USB-C, MIDI DIN, CV/GATE: connectivity can make or break your setup. Check what language your gear speaks before shelling out. Some instruments double as audio interfaces, with input ports for mics and other sources. USB-C, MIDI DIN, CV/GATE: connectivity can make or break your setup. Check what language your gear speaks before shelling out. Some instruments double as audio interfaces, with input ports for mics and other sources. Software: Not all tools are plug-and-play. Some need a digital audio workstation (DAW) to function. If you prefer jamming to programming, pick one with built-in brains so you can noodle without a laptop. Now check out Stuff's guide to the best creative control panels.
Stuff.tv
a day ago
- Stuff.tv
I wish I could buy the second generation of my favourite foldable phone
One of my favourite foldable smartphones is the Xiaomi Mix Flip. Not only is it an excellent handset with a barely visible crease, but it also offers excellent value for money. So Xiaomi's launch of the Mix Flip 2 in China caught my attention. Even if I do have to just sit here, politely applauding from afar. With the Mix Flip 2, Xiaomi has gone and upgraded pretty much everything. It's packing Qualcomm's flagship Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, which probably means this foldable runs smoother than you could ever need. The battery's a beefy 5165mAh – which is a big deal when most flip-style phones are still trying to pretend 4000mAh is enough. It also clocks in at under 200g and just 7.57mm when unfolded. What's even more annoying (in a good way) is the new 3.5 inch outer display. It supports over 500 apps now – not just the predictable ones either like your calendar or the clock. You can apparently book flights, order from Amazon, and even fiddle with photos without opening the phone. Since it's 2025, there are also some AI-powered pet lock screens that react when you poke them. Not exactly a must-have feature, but perhaps useful if you've ever wanted your phone to act like a Tamagotchi. The camera set-up looks pretty impressive as well – and not just for a foldable. It features a Light Fusion 800 sensor paired with Leica optics. Xiaomi's partnership with Leica has produced some surprisingly strong mobile shooters lately, so I wouldn't be shocked if the Mix Flip 2 punches above its weight in the photography department. It's available in White, Purple, Green, and a properly flashy Checkered Gold. You can spec this foldable all the way up to 16GB RAM and a ridiculous 1TB of storage. Pricing starts at 5999 RMB (approx $825/£650), with three configurations: 12GB+256GB, 12GB+512GB, and 16GB+1TB. All of them are currently exclusive to China. Xiaomi says there are no updates regarding global availability. Still, considering the first-gen Flip did eventually go global, I'm holding out hope that the sequel won't stay locked in China forever.
Stuff.tv
a day ago
- Sport
- Stuff.tv
How to watch sports from anywhere with a VPN
One of the best reasons to start using a VPN is to hide your geographical location. You might want to do this for a variety of reasons, and being able to watch sports events you're locked out of thanks to the country you're trying to watch from is often top among them. Whether it's Premier League football, baseball, Indian cricket, top-level tennis from venues across Europe, or that weird thing the Americans call 'football', more and more sports are available for us to watch. Broadcasters, however, are in the habit of region-locking their sports streaming, perhaps because they don't have the rights to show particular games outside certain areas. A VPN can help you to get around this, by masking your location and making it appear as if you're watching from within a portion of the globe that's able to view the sport you want. Sponsored: protect Your Privacy. Unlock the World ExpressVPN gives you the freedom to browse the internet safely, securely, and without limits. With ultra-fast servers in 94 countries, your data stays private and your connection stays lightning-fast—whether you're at home or on the go. ✅ Top-tier encryption to keep your data safe ✅ No activity logs—your privacy is our priority ✅ Bypass geo-restrictions and access content worldwide ✅ 24/7 customer support ready when you need it ✅ Easy-to-use apps for all your devices Experience the internet the way it's meant to be—open, private, and secure. Join millions of users who trust ExpressVPN to keep them safe online. Hiding your location with a VPN is easy – you just have to get one installed, subscribe to it if necessary, and switch it on. Your location is tied to your IP address, and this is what broadcasters use to determine where you're trying to watch from. If your IP address is associated with a country or region that's not on their list of allowed locations, then you'll be blocked from watching. A VPN works by sitting between you and the content you're trying to access. A sports streamer doesn't see your IP address, but instead the one provided by the VPN server you're connected to, which may be in a completely different country and isn't associated with you in any way. Your connection is also encrypted, so there's much less chance of any information that could identify you, or your country of origin, leaking out. Where are you? So the important thing with watching region-locked streamed sports isn't just to hide your actual location, but to make it look as if you're accessing the stream from somewhere the broadcaster approves of. This means selecting a VPN server carefully, so you can be sure of appearing to be in the right part of the world. Luckily, many VPNs allow you to do just this. While free services will choose a server for you, which won't necessarily be in the right place, if you subscribe to a VPN service you'll find you have much greater control over which country you appear to be connecting from. Despite this, there may be an element of trial and error in getting your sports streaming to work with a VPN. Sports streamers and broadcasters are well aware that people use VPNs to watch their content from outside the specified geographic area, and will do their best to block any IP addresses that are associated with VPN and which could be used to circumvent the restrictions. This means trying multiple servers and even VPN providers until you find a combination that works. Once you've got a system that's configured to access sports streaming from across the world, you can relax and enjoy some of the best entertainment out there. The only problem will be deciding what to watch. Join millions of users who trust ExpressVPN to keep them safe online.
Stuff.tv
a day ago
- Stuff.tv
Why HDMI 2.2 is equal parts overkill and the future of TV and gaming
Version 2.2 of the HDMI Specification is here, because we weren't blazing ahead into eyeball-dazzling televisual overkill enough already. The new spec ramps up maximum bandwidth from 48Gbps to 96Gbps, and supports resolutions up to a whopping 16K resolution at 60Hz. That's 15,360x8640px. You could tile 16 4K images – or 64 1080p images – within the same space, if you were very bored and didn't have anything better to do. But come on: do we really need 16K? According to our team here at Stuff, no. And also, yes. 16K? Pfft. Just buy 16 4K TVs and a big tube of glue instead. Or something. Why I don't need 16K in my life Craig Grannell, regular Stuff contributor and irregular grumpy old person Maybe it's my age. OK, definitely my age. But as new specs whoosh past my face, there comes a point where I think: enough. Like with 16K. I come from a pre-HD world. Games with pixels so chunky you could cut yourself on them. Video so fuzzy that, when watching it today, you'd swear your internet was broken. So I'm not anti-upgrade. The leap from SD to HD was huge. 4K? Not so much, unless your TV covers an entire wall. So most upgrades have felt like diminishing returns, alongside diminishing bank accounts while trying to keep up. Or maybe it's my diminishing eyesight. But do eyes even support 16K? I'm reminded of audiophiles raving about remastered albums with audio ranges you'd need to be part bat, part elephant to appreciate. Can you really see 16K? 'Aha!' say some folks. 'It's not about size – it's about sharpness!' TVs and monitors as crisp as a phone's display, for pin-sharp footage when your nose is pressed up against the glass. Or a future of face-mounted gadgets for people who consider the vaguest hint of a visible pixel a crime against technology, humanity and reality. Fine. Maybe this is my own (wrongly attributed) Bill Gates quote. But rather than saying 640k is enough for everyone, I'm arguing for 4K. Or definitely 8K. Because it's not like we're drowning in 4K content, let alone 8K. 'But the future', you might cry, as your closing move. Sure. Good luck flinging 16K footage around without melting broadband and blowing up budgets. Still, if I'm wrong, feel free to dig up this column a decade from now while watching Captain Spider-Panther and the Miracle of Merch (Because We're Not Even pretending Now) in glorious 16K. Why I'm 16K all the way Tom Morgan-Freelander, Stuff deputy editor and irritatingly optimistic youngling If my glasses prescription is any indication, you really don't need 20/20 vision to spot the difference between HD and 4K – so imagine how much detail will be on show once Netflix starts streaming Is it Cake in glorious 16K. You'll almost be able to taste the frosting! OK, it'll take a lot more than a new HDMI spec before that happens. We need cameras with big enough sensors to film the content in the first place. The file sizes will be astronomical. And no commercially available screen has that many pixels. Sony would allegedly sell you one as early as 2019, if you had a cool $5 million – and space for a display 17 meters wide. The tech has come a long way since then, but 8K is still where most TV brands draw the line. HDMI 2.1 took two years to arrive, so the upgrade isn't going to appear overnight. Still, we've got to start somewhere, right? Black Magic, Red, Sony and Canon are almost certainly hard at work on the camera hardware; people far smarter than I are figuring out the algorithms to keep those file sizes in check; and ever-faster broadband speeds are laying the groundwork for 16K video at more than a frame per second. Having all those extra pixels to push in games might make the likes of Nvidia sweat a bit, but if that stops them obsessing over AI for even a moment then I'm all for it. It's not just resolution that has me excited about HDMI 2.2, either. Doubling the bandwidth means higher refresh rate gaming, so in theory the PlayStation 6 could spit out 4K images at 240Hz – or double what the PS5 can handle today. HDMI 2.1 goodies such as variable refresh rate (VRR) and auto low latency mode (ALLM) aren't going anywhere, and backwards compatibility is a given, so we're not having to give anything up in exchange. As noted philosopher Frasier Crane once said: 'if less is more, just imagine how much more more would be.'
Stuff.tv
a day ago
- Business
- Stuff.tv
The Zenith Chronomaster Original gets a stunning blue upgrade
Zenith has taken one of its most iconic watches and given it a stunning new twist. The Chronomaster Original – the spiritual descendant of the 1969 A386 and one of the first watches to house the legendary El Primero calibre – is now available with a stunning midnight blue dial. It's the first time Zenith has paired the Chronomaster Original with a full blue dial, and it's a beauty. The brand's signature tricolour subdials (grey, dark grey, and light blue) are still present and correct, but now they sit on a rich blue background that adds a classic edge to this classically styled chronograph. The silver 1/10th of a second track circling the dial provides a crisp contrast, improving legibility while adding to the drama. The 38mm stainless steel case stays true to the 1969 blueprint. It's round and bezel-less, with pump-style pushers, faceted lugs, and a mix of polished and brushed finishes. It's compact, wearable and distinctly vintage in feel, though the performance under the hood is anything but… Powering the watch is the El Primero 3600, Zenith's updated high-frequency chronograph movement. It beats at 5Hz and tracks time down to 1/10th of a second via a central seconds hand that whips around the dial once every ten seconds. It's precise, fast, and visible through a sapphire case back that also reveals a column wheel and open-worked rotor. Buyers get a choice of a classic three-link steel bracelet or a blue calfskin strap with matching stitching – both fitted with folding clasps. Whether you go for steel or leather, this blue-dial Chronomaster feels like a fresh yet faithful tribute to a genuine horological icon. It's available now from Zenith boutiques and the brand's online store, priced at $10,300 / £9300. Liked this? Biver hides a serious watchmaking flex in its latest release
