if you are a owner of one of Native instruments best midi controllers.... The Maschine Jam
you will know of the advantage of having 8 touchstirps...
one of the unique designs although subtle, sets it apart from touch TouchOSC controllers that would emulate the similar functional behaviour of touchstrips on lets say an ipad...
is the added design of the slighly indented trough, which lets you know without looking at your fingers are where they need to be to make contact with the strips!!
i also find if i map a EQ plugin to the touchstrips... running quickly over the strips to create a bell EQ is so effortless it is one of the small joys of owning such a unit!!
if ever Native instruments were to improve off the design of the Maschine Jam... i dont know what else they could add as the design of the Maschine jam is awesome in my view!!... perhaps having 8 extra banks.. both on the touchbanks and on the pad banks,, or perhaps having a extra click encoder on the opposite side... for the lefties out there
Its really the best designed Midi controller... granted it has no real velocity aspects in the buttons, but thats best overcome with midi keyboards... which are dime a dozen!!
edit: if velocity sensitive buttons were added to the mJAM... i think it would ruin the design... as you wouldnt be able to rest your palm or fingers on the controller without triggering something if it were velocity sensitive!! the pressure required to trigger the maschine jam pads are perfect!!
button double press actions... are recognised easily with the Jam.. which is something most people dont consider valueable... but if you use double clicks for triggering... reliable triggering is a must!!