User Guide

About this Guide

Launchpad MK2 communicates using MIDI over USB in both directions. This manual, describing

the MIDI communication format, is all the information you need to be able to write software that

is customised for Launchpad MK2.

This is not an exhaustive document. Certain extra System Exclusive messages are used for

authentication, and for remote firmware upgrade. These are beyond the scope of this document,

however, it is worth knowing that they exist in case you encounter them while you are playing

with Launchpad MK2.

Number Systems and MIDI conventions

There are three ways of expressing MIDI data in this manual. The first, where appropriate, is a

plain English description of the message. When we describe a musical note, middle C is deemed

to be ‘C3’ or note 60. MIDI channel 1 is considered to be the lowest-numbered MIDI channel and

channels range from 1 - 16.

MIDI messages are also expressed in plain data, with decimal and hexadecimal equivalents. The

hexadecimal number will always be followed by an ‘h’ and the decimal equivalent given in

brackets. For example a note on message on channel 1 is signified by the status byte 90h (144).

For Max Users

For the benefit of those who use Cycling 74’s Max software to process and manipulate MIDI data,

a series of tutorial patches are available. These demonstrate many of Launchpad MK2’s features

and capabilities within the Max environment.

A runtime version of Max is available from www.cycling74.com.