Hands on: IK Multimedia iRig Blueboard

When IK Multimedia's iRig Blueboard was released in October it immediately raised a fair degree of interest: here was a piece of hardware that could potentially usher the use of virtual guitar pedals closer into the live arena.

Priced at $99.99/€79.99 and available now, the Blueboard is aimed at guitarists who're interested in playing through iOS devices, using the iRig converter interface.

Essentially, it allows users to switch between simulated pedal effects in apps such as AmpliTube, by sending a signal via Bluetooth to the Blueboard app on your iOS device, which then connects with your virtual pedalboard.

Watch the video above to see how we got on trying it out for the first time. In it, we've tried out the Blueboard with the AmpliTube app, but the board works equally well with other IK Multimedia apps, such as SampleTank Free, iGrand Piano Free or the iRig Recorder, as well as any other Core-MIDI-compatible app like Apple's GarageBand.

Likewise, although we've used an iPad for the purposes of this demo, the Blueboard is just as simple to synch with a Macbook or iPhone.