[LAU] is there a controller like this?

[andy baxter]

Hello,

I have just bought a second hand keyboard, (edirol PCR-500) which has 
loads of knobs and sliders on it. The trouble is that all the knobs are 
pots, not rotary encoders; encoders would be much more useful I think 
because it would mean that if you press a button to switch to a new 
synth or effects patch, the correct defaults for it could be 
automatically loaded to each of the knobs when you switch. Without that, 
it seems like whenever you switch to a new instrument you would have to 
spend a while tweaking all the knobs to get the right basic sound.

What I would like is a device with a couple of rotary encoders on it 
(you only have two hands), maybe 16 buttons, and a character LCD screen.

The way it would work is (something-like):

- one of the buttons would be for loading new instruments. To switch to 
a new instrument, you would press the button and then turn either 
encoder. The LCD would show which instrument you were choosing from a 
list, and you would press the button again to make the switch.
- most of the buttons would be for accessing different midi controls. 
You could assign a midi control to an encoder by pressing the button for 
that control first, then pressing a button underneath the encoder you 
were assigning.
- having done this, that encoder would be bound to that midi control - 
turning it would send out midi messages for that control, and also 
update a display on the LCD saying what the level of that control is 
currently set at.
- loading a new instrument would automatically set the right default 
levels for each controller that that instrument used.

Does anyone know of anything like this that's already being made? If so 
I might get hold of one and see if I can hack it to work with linux; if 
not I'm thinking of having a go at making my own some time.

cheers,

andy baxter.