
The other key difference is the inclusion of “construction kits”, loops that can be used to build up full tracks with minimal effort. The new Battery kits are also color-coded, and there are special kits for Battery that include just kick drums or only percussion, which NI believes will save some producers time when they’re trying to find the perfect sound. NI’s Battery hasn’t received much attention since Maschine launched in 2009, but it’s a leaner piece of software with more focus on samples than Maschine, which has added both drum and bass synths over the years. “It’s not a one to one translation of the Maschine kits to Battery kits – in addition to those Maschine kits, we created extra Battery kits to fit the user experience.” “We had to go back and rebuild the Expansions from the ground up,” says Chris Lynn, Maschine marketing manager at NI. There’s new presets for NI’s Massive, Monark and Reaktor Prism synths accessible via the VST’s preset browser, and a lot more focus on samples and loops, particularly what NI calls “construction kits” – WAV files that can be easily imported into any DAW.Īs users of NI’s forum have pointed out, it’s always been possible to import Maschine Expansions’ one-shot samples for use in any sampler, so the big change is the new Battery kits, which NI has designed to be distinct from the existing Maschine kits.

First, all Maschine kits in the packs are now available as kits for NI’s Battery drum sampler, which is handy if you’re not a fan of Machine’s sequencer.

This week, NI turned Maschine Expansions into Expansions, placing the focus on them as tools for users of any DAW – not just Maschine.Įxpansions are the same genre-focused packs covering everything from dub techno to drum breaks as they were when called Maschine Expansions, with a few key differences. One of the most attractive reason for picking Native Instruments’ Maschine controller over a drum machine is the broad range of sounds it comes with – especially if you pay extra money for the platform’s Expansions, sound packs that cover one-shot samples, kits, synth presets, loops, pre-made patterns.


What the changes to Native Instruments’ Expansions sound packs mean for Maschine owners and users of third-party DAWs.
