Roland A-49

The strongest agreement in the record, and the reason the A-49 still has advocates. Every hands-on source rates the action above its price class, and the praise is specific rather than vague: full-size keys with rounded front edges that make palm smears and glissandi easier, meaningful spring resistance despite being unweighted synth keys, quiet action, and no side-to-side play. Owners who arrived from M-Audio, Novation, Akai and Arturia boards consistently say this one plays better. The dissent is a single detailed observation rather than a camp — one owner felt velocity responded slightly differently on white and black keys. Note two things the spec sheet settles: there is no aftertouch, and the octave span is a touch narrower than a digital piano's, which matters if you move between the two.

“This key action (in my opinion) is miles better than the key action on any other midi controller in this price range that I’ve tried.”

Piano Tone

“the keys are some of the best I've experienced on a midi keyboard (and at this point I have owned MANY)”

Mapa · Amazon

“The weight, springiness, and shape of the keys was just right and felt completely 'pro' to me”

weld77 · Amazon

“The key bed feels much better than either of those, the quality is definitely way better- the build feels sturdy, the keys aren't also noisy as M Audio keystation 49”

Priyanshu · Amazon

Sources split, and not along a good-versus-bad line: they disagree about whether a nearly bare control surface is the product's argument or its shortfall. One camp bought the A-49 precisely because there is nothing on it — a clean keyboard, two knobs, and the Roland pitch/mod lever that several owners prefer to separate wheels. The other finds the hardware not merely sparse but too coarse to use: knobs described as unusually small and slippery, a lever whose resolution steps audibly under continuous modulation, and a D-BEAM that reviewers reach for once and then leave alone. The octave and transpose buttons with their LED ladder are a genuine bright spot both camps like. Also worth knowing: there is no display, no way to store multiple setups, and one community report of the D-BEAM throwing spurious MIDI into a DAW.

The weakest part of the package, and the one thing the A-49 is most complained about. It carries no DAW scripts, no auto-mapping and no editor: in any modern DAW it is a plain MIDI keyboard you map by hand. The one place Roland did build deep integration is its own hardware, where a dedicated SuperNATURAL button assigns every controller automatically for modules like the INTEGRA-7. The bigger issue is the first run. The unit ships expecting Roland's driver, and until it gets one — or is switched to generic class-compliant mode with an undocumented button combination held at power-up — it will not work with an iPad or a hardware synth, and will not even draw power. Multiple owners across a decade describe the same dead-keyboard-out-of-the-box moment. It is a one-time fix, and a minority reasonably point out that installing the driver takes five minutes, but nothing in the box tells you which of the two paths you need.

“The Roland A-49 out of the box, is configured only to function (which includes receiving power) if it is connected to a computer that has the Roland driver downloaded and installed”

Piano Tone

“the only negative he told me is that it's not plug and play and must install drivers”

nikos c · Thomann

“Looking at previous reviews, not sure why everyone had a challenge with Mac. Plug in, installed driver from Roland site - done!”

Kevin Coulter · Amazon

Unusually complete for a slim controller, and a real reason to choose it over cheaper rivals. There is a genuine 5-pin MIDI OUT, so it drives a hardware synth, stage piano or sound module without a USB host box, and — rarer still at this size — two separate pedal jacks, one for hold and one for a proper TRS expression pedal. That combination is what several owners say made the decision for them. The limits are just as clear: there is no MIDI IN, no CV or gate, no wireless, and the computer port is USB Type B rather than USB-C, which in 2026 means carrying a cable most people no longer own.

“The A-49 has both a sustain pedal port AND an expression pedal port; this is important for me to have both for organ and piano playing.”

Piano Tone

Does exactly what Roland designed it to do. At 2.5 kg and 84 mm tall it is one of the lightest full-size 49-key boards you can buy, slim enough to sit between a laptop and a monitor on a desk, and it runs on USB bus power with no wall wart. Owners reach for the same word unprompted — portable — and gigging players cite it as the reason they keep one in the bag as a second keyboard. One caveat carries over from the setup story: bus power only flows freely once the unit is in generic mode, so treat a battery pack or a synth's USB port as something to configure for rather than assume.

“The Roland A-49 is CRAZY portable; it only weighs 5 pounds”

Piano Tone

“Having grown tired of switching octaves on my old 25-key Novation ReMOTE SL and in need of a practical controller for live use, I ended up choosing this one after testing several other keyboards from makers such as Akai, Arturia, Korg and Novation.”

Thomann owner review, December 2014

Solid, and unusually uncontested — the one point even the harshest reviews concede. The chassis is plastic and nobody pretends otherwise, but sources agree it feels well made rather than cheap: no key wobble, quiet action, knobs and buttons that sit properly in the panel. The owner who gave the A-49 one star for everything else still called it a solid product in build terms, and an owner comparing it directly against an M-Audio Keystation singled out both the sturdier feel and the quieter keys. There are no recurring quality-control or failure reports in the corpus, which for a fourteen-year-old product with a long owner tail is itself a signal.

“there’s no side to side movement at all”

Piano Tone

“Apsolutely amazed by the quality of this keyboard. Using it in my home studio as a midi controller. Feel, sensitivity, build quality.. this keyboard has it all..”

Teo Mandzuka · Thomann

Thin, and inconsistently documented. What is in the box today is a single entry-level DAW licence — Roland's accessory list is the manual, a USB cable and an Ableton Live Lite serial card, and nothing else. The confusion is that the bundle has changed at least twice across the product's life, and retailer listings have not kept up: B&H still advertises the original Cakewalk SONAR LE package complete with a DVD-ROM, while an owner buying in 2018 describes receiving Ableton and AIR Ignite. One owner was shipped the wrong disc entirely. Nobody argues the software is a reason to buy the A-49; the practical advice is simply to check what a given seller will actually send before counting it as part of the price.

“The Roland A-49 currently comes with a subscription to Ableton Live Lite.”

Piano Tone

Genuinely contested, and the two camps are often pricing different products. The majority position is that the keybed alone justifies the money: owners who cross-shopped M-Audio, Nektar, Akai, Arturia and Novation say they paid the premium knowingly and would again. The minority position is blunter — at this price rivals hand you pads, faders, a display and working DAW integration, and the A-49 gives you two knobs. What makes the argument hard to settle is that the price itself is unstable. US dealers list it at $379.99, Thomann UK sells it for £152, and the owner who called it overpriced was paying about $180 in 2017. The retail star ratings track the same split: Amazon shows 72% five-star reviews alongside an 8% one-star tail with very little in the middle.