MiditechKeyboard Garagekey Mini

Very good and compact keyboard ,love it!

Nice tactical feel, great with Garage Band. Simple and straightforward for anyone not particularly interested in bells and whistles. I thought the touch of the keyboard was balanced and well thought out.

So I went a little keyboard crazy and bought five different compact portable midi controllers, and guess which one is my favorite? For some reason, when I record myself playing in Garageband, the recordings I make with this keyboard sound the most realistic. I am not an expert or an advanced player, but I think the velocity sensitivity on this model best captures the subtleties of an actual piano compared to the other velocity sensitive models I tried. I measured the keyboard to be approximately 17.5" x 4.5" with the height a little less than 1.25" -- an absolutely compact unit that will be great for travel or throwing into a backpack to play at a coffee shop (with my earbuds, of course).The only thing that the manufacturer could improve upon would be to make the keys less stiff so that they would not require more pressure than usual to play. With that being the only negative, I am more than happy to work around it and am enjoying the keyboard.If you're new to MIDI keyboards, please note that the keyboard itself will not produce any sound unless it is plugged into a device that has a music app such as Garageband.

37 keys is just (barely) enough to do anything involving 2 hands, so this keyboard is preferable to the typical mini which has only 25. The keybed is good and firm, and as small and light as you can go without being too small. Keys are the same size as the MPK Mini II, but they are about 50% firmer--which is reasonable as any weaker than the MPK would feel flimsy. Akai, however, was clever enough to put the USB port on the side of the Mini, which is my only complaint about the Garagekey: having the port on the back interferes with the likely use-case of shoving this guy just in front of your computer keyboard.Assuming you don't need the pads and dials of an MPK Mini, start with this instead for practicality and affordability. Obviously this is not a replacement for a full sized midi keyboard. If you are going to do anything approaching normal hand and finger position, get one of those (e.g. the excellent MPK249 if you need pads, dials, sliders, etc).

I should give this 3 and half stars. It helped me for some of my projects, but the unit itself is not very exciting.

I have been looking for a basic MIDI keyboard. I only want inputs, I'm OK doing everything else in software, so I figured this would be perfect. No bells or whistles, no extra features I don't need, and rock-bottom prices.I was really excited taking it out of the box. It didn't feel cheap -- it was weighted nicely and had a good feel. It worked directly out of the box, no software required, with a basic USB-A to USB-C converter and my Macbook. But that was when my excitement ended.Unfortunately, mine wasn't really playable. The keys are extremely stiff and inconsistently weighted, so applying the same pressure across the notes of a basic chord meant I got wildly different velocities for each key (from 30 to 80). Getting to 100 velocity isn't even possible on every key and requires really pounding on the keys for which it is possible.I'd be OK pounding on it, since again I'm ok doing a lot in software, but it's not balanced for that: If you slam the front of the keys, the whole keyboard lifts up, causing it to move on the desk.Combined, these things mean it's not really playable. You might be able to use it to input basic chords one at a time, but you cannot string them together into a song using the keyboard alone.

The keyboard works as intended and it’s perfectly simple for my needs, but the D key on the upper octave doesn’t press and hold. The key will play when pressed, but the note will not continue if held (slightly frustrating but a minor issue)

I needed a keyboard to work on Garage Band so I could get these rough drafts of songs out of my head audible for production by more experienced producers. It plugged tight in with no issues at all and I was good to go. There are hundreds of instruments available on GB that I didn't have access to without this keyboard so that is great! I didn't experience issues with touch or velocity as other reviewers mentioned but since this is my first midi keyboard I don't know the difference. It is a great value and with experience you can make some quality music with it. I recommend it.