ES Digital Electronic Wind Instrument (Saxophone and Clarinet)

Long time and pro wind controller player and owned many going back to the Lyricon. Currently down to 3 different ones. The ES2 has midi and audio out via usb and a sample player on-board. You can learn to program your own fingerings not just modify stock fingerings like some of the others. Both, I think, are first. Not easy building your own samples as this is the first time I have tried. Very pleased with the results. Many post on the Patchman site, Facebook Midi Guitar 2 and Wind Controller sites. This is no toy like the marketing would lead you to believe.

I don't want to run them down. I was hoping for this to be a real winner, buying one in December 2019. We've exchanged emails with responses sometimes immediately, other times over a week without a response.The latest firmware is ok, but has a bug in the breath pressure code. Trying the menu to increase "breath" actually does the opposite.The previous beta firmware (vindor-firmware-20191023.zdf) works correctly but will nearly mute the onboard synth if overblown. The instrument will have to be switched off and back on to correct: great if using it for a performance, right? And easily correctable... just limit the reading from the pressure to some max amount of limit what you may ask of the synth before rolling the limit over or wheatever is happening in the firmware.There are also "hot keys" that will change the Key, octave and sound of the instrument - I think it's a terrible implementation of this feature. Brushing any key and pressing this button on the left hand will immediately change the setup. It could be changed to a double tap or tap-long press for a safeguard.The battery used internally is a16340 cell rated 1100 mah or 1300 mah (fake rating) Chinese cell that only comes 700-800 mah from legit battery manufacturers. I know because mine died... in under a year, wouldn't hold a charge to last 10 minutes.I replaced it with a 3 year old flashlight 16340 (700 mah) that last for hours.It's heart is a ARM Cortex-M4 Kinetis K20 - which gives me hope that if they released the firmware, we could make something SOLID out of what they started.More fun - there is plenty of room in the case (seen when I opened to replace the junk battery) to add wifi or Bluetooth BLE (esp32 module)... and the "keys" we touch are common 1/4" carriage bolts! Order some brass or gold ones for style!PS: the best/reliable recipe I have so far is Oct 2019 beta firmware, SD card with sampled sounds, pick the clarinet and set breath at +40. ...or fire the EWI USB back up, that works too :/

This is a relatively accessible Midi Wind Instrument. It includes a small speaker and a simple synth, so that you can play it live, much as one would a real clarinet, sax, or recorder. The small speaker limits dynamics if that's all you use.This pairs well with any number of computer programs and/or synth modules for iPhone, and iPad, including Garage Band. There are two apps that the Vindor uses, and the settings one is invaluable. While you can read out setting information from the small screen on the back, it is much easier to change things using the app.I found that using headphones is a very good and private way to use it. However, you need to pay attention to the size of the headphone male plug because a ridge in the instrument's mold prevents you from using some premium quality headphones that have fat connectors. Most earbuds and something like a Koss PortaPro fit fine, but my reference RS1e Grados don't plug in fully.The mini SD card can take some sample sounds in a specific format, and extend the internal sounds of the Vindor. The instrument comes with 8 pre-programmed voices, and you can overlay these with 8 more using a mini SD. You do not need high capacity SD cards.The real value comes when using a synth module and something for output. It can use guitar amps, but could equally go out from the headphone jack to other electronics. When using a synth module, depending on your application, you may want to turn off the internal synth so that it operates as a MIDI controller only.Note - I am not a real musician, I just fool around with stuff. I learned Sax when I was a kid, but found that it was not as easy as I remembered relearning the fingering. This is because the Vindor has mere touch buttons, and not actual moving parts like valves and actuators on a real instrument. Thus, when I had a real sax in my hands, I could see that the left pinky pressed something that actuated valves at the very end of the horn. There is no such visual with the Vindor. I'm sure this is nothing to someone who is already a competent player, but it might make harder learning, or be harder for people coming back to the instrument.There are alternate fingerings and alternate fingering charts, including simplified fingering, Clarinet, and Recorder. These may help. I'm still deciding.The user should spend some time on the Vindor website, looking carefully for documentation. It would be nice if they had a site map with links to all documentation pages. Sometimes a feature, with documentation, is only available by clicking a link on their pages that happen to mention the feature. Fortunately, the company responds well and quickly to email inquiries.Note that this instrument uses a real clarinet mouthpiece with a synthetic reed. You do not need to vibrate the reed, which should make reed life good. It responds well to breath control.