the only problem I see is that no one else has been able to get the voltage conversion to work without dropping the Amps below a workable number to my knowledge… then ripcord comes along and claims that they have but refuse to sell it in a marketplace like amazon. I guess its not really a big cost but I think maybe just biting the cost and grabbing https://www.amazon.com/Portable-RAVPower-20100mAh-Universal-Smartphones/dp/B01LYONAT8/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1497990546&sr=8-6&keywords=ravpower+laptop+power+bank as it would be sure to power it for extended periods of time in a nice size and shape. This was a recent discovery for me as an option https://www.amazon.com/APC-Back-UPS-Protector-Charging-BE600M1/dp/B01FWAZEIU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1497990746&sr=8-2&keywords=battery+surge+protector it claims it can power 10A at 12v for 3 hours not sure if the batteries in it are really meant to sit unplugged but that would be the equivalent of 30hours of digitakt at 1A 12v I think in reality I bet it would be way less but even if it was 10hours that would be a steal but you would be unable to take a battery like that on flights.
Supposedly you’re allowed up to a max 5A (25W) on a USB 2.0 charging port, so in theory it shouldn’t be a problem. Though I have no idea how efficient DC-DC convertors are these days or which they are using.
My problem was the method to sell them.
Just wondering if anyone has successfully run the Digitakt off battery? I have an MPC Live on preorder but may cancel and order a digitakt if I can confirm it can run off a battery pack so long as it isn’t too bulky or expensive.
I have both, the battery in mpc is a winner.
I have a car jumper battery it can run off of but it is obviously not really portable in a backpack type way, more so drive to a farmers market and set up type way. I plan on grabbing https://www.amazon.com/Portable-RAVPower-20100mAh-Universal-Smartphones/dp/B01LYONAT8 this one which if my math is right at 5v x 20100mAh you get 100wh. Digitakt uses 12v 1a which would supposedly work out to about 100hours on a charge. No way I would expect anything close to that though but I do feel safer still being able to use the elektron power supply with it rather than trusting a third party dc adapter hooked up to a cheaply made battery. If something went wrong you would likely only need to replace the power supply rather than a new digitakt. So the 2 prongs I think is a must for me. And if it even lasted 10hours I would be ok with that. The price is ok… I think it should be closer to 100$ or that at least is how much more expensive I would have expected the digitakt to be if it had a nice built in battery.
All this said I wouldn’t really think the digitakt would be much of a replacement for the new MPC… very different machines meant to be used in very different ways. Digitakt is more a live performance, control all, expression, glitch effects, 8mono 8midi box. The MPC is much more just a DAW, focused on writing a song start to finish rather than writing parts and then preforming them together. Giving you as much freedom as you might want part wise.
I wouldn’t be surprised if digitakt was actually smaller and lighter than the mpc even with a big external battery. MPC live is more than twice the size of the digitakt. MPC is also consuming around 5 times the power that the digitakt does meaning that a battery will stretch further on a digitakt even though its not built in.
i saw this earlier on facebook , looked interesting.
I am not sure if I’ve asked this in here.
My watts to Amps/Volts skills are straight garbage, figure one of you might know.
Ok, Im not a fan of the ekektron PSU, and while I wait for my ripcord to arrive, I have a zolt charger with just one cable to connect (that has powered up my digitakt before).
I cant for the life of me find much info on the zolt charger watts etc due to their site being shutdown, but I did find this.
“Zolt Portable Laptop Charger Plus KitGeneral Features: Color: Violet 70-watts of total power Charges Apple MacBook/MacBook Pro 13-inch/MacBook Air devices and up to 2 mobile devices at the same time Three (3) USB ports: Top USB port for Macbook/MacBook Pro charging; middle and bottom USB ports for charging a Tablet, Smartphone and other mobile devices such as cameras, portable speakers, wireless headphones and more Folding 2-prong AC power plug Rotates 90° to free up adjacent outlets Built-in over-voltage, short-circuit and over-temperature protection Ultra light, compact and portableTechnical Specifications: AC Input: 120-240VAC, 50/60Hz, 1.5A Charger: Up to 70-watts continuous power USB port output with automatic voltage priority USB port for laptop: 19.5V, 3.3A, 18.0V, 3.6A Tablet: 5V, 0.5-2.6A Smartphone: 5V, 0.5-2.6A Dimensions: 1.3 x 1.3 x 3.6-inches (H x W x D, approximate) Weight: 3.5 oz.”
I know the top port outputs at 70w. but since I dont know jack about this stuff, I am wondering about the whole AC/DC conversion etc. and if this is a suitable wall wart that wont kill my device over time.
As long as the ripchord cable is converting the power correctly it should be fine… what don’t you like about the elektron PSU? But yea I can’t speak to the actual quality of either of the zolt or ripchord, generally if you plug the wrong cable into a device you will get some nice smoke effects billowing out of it but I think on some analog gear it can effect the clock speed and stuff along those lines if your voltage is slightly off. Japanese hair driers will run hotter in the states because of voltage differences or your rice cooker will over cook rice, likewise if you take a blow drier from the states to japan it wont get as hot. The safest thing is always going to be use the thing that elektron supplied but I would think your set up would work fine.
I’d prefer to just use the ripcord over the Zolt since they’re not defunct like Zolt and also specialize in music gear. The PSU is slightly annoying for someone who’s really into carrying next to nothing when it comes to gear and that is bulk that can be narrowed down when compared to other wall power units etc. But if it’s gonna be that vs losing my device due to wrong voltage I’m gonna side with the elektron PSU
As for the Zolt. I’m wondering if the info I’ve provided is enough to tell if it’s safe voltage etc. I did run my Digitakt with it for a good 2 hours with no issues once before
Did you have a cable that was stepping up or down to 12v? If not I would not use it… I don’t know if I feel comfortable enough to give advice beyond that as I would hate if my advice had you end up with a broken machine. Personally I plan to use the PSU they gave me and when I use a battery use one with a 2 prong plug as it just seems like the safest option. Although If the voltage is right and the cable is right then I don’t know why it wouldn’t work.The output of the elektron PSU is 12v 24a so we know that is a safe number but from my understanding as long as it is getting 1a it should work and their isn’t really such thing as too many amps just wrong voltage.
Someone in the Elektron Digitakt Facebook group posted that this pack is working well, with great battery life.
I can’t find the original post because FB isn’t great at finding old posts in groups, but I believe he was at 87% battery life remaining after 3 or 4 hours of use
this
and that
The powerbank lasts for hours… It has a small vent that makes a low noise… nothing to worry if the music is playing…
Excuse my ignorance on the subject, but what specs would one be looking for when purchasing a power bank to power the Digitakt?
sounds believable… digitakt has a really small power draw I did the math a few days ago and it came out to around 100 hours on a batter with less mAh that that one. You would shouldn’t expect perfect efficiency but I think around 80% efficiency is considered a good number.
Don’t know 
As I can return stuff that I buy via amazon I looked for the option to plug in the Octatrack / Digitakt power supply and that’s it…
As this powerbank lasts for hours it does not seem to be the main point if if has 18.000 or 30.000 mhA…
How are you connecting the Digitakt to the power bank…?
with the power supply of the digitakt.
It has a euro plug and that can be plugged into the powerbank…
Hey everyone. I ended up with this & it works great…
I went through quite a bit of back and forth buying & returning different adaptors, 5v > 12v cords & power banks. In the end I went with this one because it has 12v DC out. The 5v > 12v boost cables seemed to work in some cases but not all (some didn’t output over 1A & a few others plug didn’t want to fit). Additionally the first 2 usb power banks I tried (both were 2A output) just didn’t want to work. They would be working fine, then I’d plug in the Digi & they’d turn off. I’m not sure if some of these USB only power banks have some sort of protection power off built into them or something.
So… my thought is something that outputs 12v and is built to power 12v is the best bet. I was getting nowhere until I went that route. Seems like all the posts so far giving examples of working power banks are in the same boat.
Hope this helps guys.
I bought this piece:
https://www.proshop.se/Powerbank/Sandberg-20000-Powerbank-Svart-20000-mAh/2485876
On 12v i get random power offs after a while of using Digitakt. There is 16v output on battery but i wont dare to go there.
