The Obsidian NX W is classed as a lighting control surface rather than a stand-alone console. It’s a powerful wing that can either run on the ONYX platform via a PC, or act as a hardware extension within the wider Obsidian ONYX console range, offering a very similar physical layout to the rest of the range, including the NX2, NX4 and NX1-16. It also features next generation hardware that is shared with the soon to be released NX3.

The Obsidian NX W comes standard with a 16-universe ONYX license, which can be expanded all the way up to 128 universes. Even though it’s a small surface, the NX W is not just for small rigs. The surface can handle fairly large and complex systems when needed – it’s a very portable, easy to set up surface that’s capable of doing big things when required.

Does the ONYX range have a familiar look and feel to it even though you’ve never used it? That’s because it used to be the Martin M-Series.

For those unfamiliar with the brand, Obsidian Control Systems is a company that designs and manufactures lighting control solutions for stage, studio and install applications. Their product range is marketed and distributed via Elation Professional through their network of suppliers. Obsidian Control Systems acquired the M Series range of Martin controllers (including the M2GO) back in 2018, which included all lighting control software and hardware development.

Construction and Aesthetics

This pedigree explains why the Obsidian NX W looks a bit like the old Martin M2GO lighting console. If you liked that layout then you’ll find the NX W’s control surface very familiar, but with a much more modern feel to it.

The NX W has 10 RGB backlit motorised faders, RGB backlit keys, encoders and a keypad. It has a solid, professional look and feel – certainly a much higher quality than any iPad or MIDI controller – and at six kilograms, it’s light and portable while remaining robust enough to be moved around regularly. It draws only 30W of power too, so it’s also a frugal little beast.

The standard carry on luggage size for most airlines is 56 x 36 x 23cm. Given that the Obsidian NX-W is 54 x 31 x 8cm – one figures you could probably get both it and a laptop into a bag and carry it onto a plane, no dramas.

Applications and Features

Pair the NX W with a laptop loaded with ONYX software, and you could take this system almost anywhere. The NX W’s plug-and-play connectivity with a USB-C passthrough offers a level of practicality and convenience that operators appreciate. It may not sound like much on paper, but don’t underestimate the convenience of a lighting control system that you can set up in about a minute.

Once connected to your laptop, you have a powerful control surface for ONYX, especially when this is combined with multiple monitors or touchscreens. It’s also very easy to scale the system up or down depending on what you need to achieve.

The NX W has DMX/RDM ports in the back, as well as Gigabit Ethernet Output that acts as an external network card for X-NET and streaming DMX data. It can also be run alongside the rest of the ONYX hardware, such as nodes, splitters and fader wings to help you build a network that suits your needs.

To that end, the NX W fits neatly into the ONYX ecosystem; it’s not just a standalone controller, it’s strength by association.

As for its value as a physical hardware unit, any lighting operator will appreciate the console’s tactile surface featuring hard keys, encoder wheels and motorised faders. In an era where tactile surfaces have been largely replaced by touchscreen options (which do have their advantages) it’s still nice to work with lighting surfaces that feature tactile, high-quality controls.

Control and Programming

One of the main development priorities for the NX W was for it to be responsive and offer low-latency operation, which is critical when busking or running live shows. This is something that’s often overlooked in this corner of the market.

It has been designed largely to cater to all, and although you can certainly see that lighting consoles tend to be better suited to designers, programmers and lighting operators, the wider Obsidian range, and by extension the NX W, perfectly suits operators and buskers creating and recalling looks on the fly.