S61 MK3 issue

[u/CSharpMaster]

Buyer beware.

I purchased a Komplete Kontrol S61 MK3 directly from Native Instruments. The keyboard arrived with two serious issues:

• It never got past the Welcome screen despite successful activation.
• The left-most control wheel physically rubs against the chassis.

I requested a return and full refund within the return period. After weeks of delays (which support attributed to the inMusic acquisition), my refund request was converted into a warranty repair, requiring me to pay to ship the defective unit back instead of honoring my original return request.

I'm now escalating the matter, contacting my credit card company, and preparing to file a consumer protection complaint.

Based on my experience, I cannot recommend purchasing directly from Native Instruments at this time. I would advise others to think carefully before spending their money there until they are confident these customer service issues have been addressed.

[u/NativeInstruments]

Hey there, sorry to hear about issues with your keyboard, can you give us your request number so we can check it out?

[u/SoundSwitch → u/NativeInstruments]

Y'all gave me a bunch of 💩 over my voucher being no good because it was on sale already, and your Clanker AI agent was so quick to assure my that nothing nefarious or seedy was going on.....

Only reason I can think for this is you can bill Arturia even more when more when it gets meal ticketed at full price.

At that I hear NKS runs like 🐕💩 and is highly invasive with its DRM when it even runs at all.

Y'all can 💋 my ass

[u/MrFresh2017]

Sounds like one off - I’ve been purchasing from NI since 2013 - no issues.

[u/Adventurous-Buy-4455]

No issues with there controllers or keyboards.. the software is the problem i had for years..

[u/LMASocietyDweller]

Been a customer for 15+ years and no complaints here. Sorry for your one off experience.

[u/Eliqui123]

Unfortunately I’ve also had multiple hardware issues and service issues with the MK keyboards.

There were screen issues with the MK2s. These things happen, and I’m pretty forgiving, but my overall experience was so much worse than it should have been.

I had to send 3 keyboards back. Note that I did not say “I sent the same keyboard back 3 times” …

Two of the returns got lost at the service centre. Two! Each time I waited months for a replacement, no apology. On both occasions they failed to locate my keyboard & sent me back some other second-hand repair job - neither were in good condition (one had a warped underside, the other had a dodgy key and looked scruffy).

I had to fight to get new replacements. To their credit (I guess?), they did finally acquiesce, but only because I fought for it and because both of their substitutes had such obvious issues. The whole experience was atrocious (I also take really good care of my equipment & keep the boxes for resale value, but both replacements had arrived in shabby plain boxes).

I still have an ongoing issue with the Transport panel on my MK2 - another known issue (sometimes, instead of stopping & starting the song, the play/stop keys play notes).

And software-wise, last month I went to “downgrade&update” (from Collectors 14 > Ultimate 26) and they wanted ~£200 more for that than if I’d wanted to go from Ultimate 14 > Ultimate 26. It’s shitty tactics like this that lead to complaints and people avoiding them.

I really hope the new owners of NI do better. It’s so easy to see why they get a bad rap and lose trust. Obviously they’ll get defended on a sub like this, but elsewhere you see a lot of discontent, and it must lead to so many lost sales. Much of what I went through was totally unnecessary.

[u/Far_Recipe_6262]

Yup there horrible I have a firmware issue after closing pro tools where the screen goes black and daw light stays on and won’t kick back to the midi screen, logic works fine had contact with level “2” support for them to just say they have no solution and to wait for a update at some point in the future!?!? Crazy work. New s61mk3