Positive Grid has already proven its aptitude for guitar amps with increasingly small entries in its Spark line. But for NAMM 2024 its going big with the Spark Live, a 150 watt portable PA system with four speakers and four channels of audio inputs. Rather than quiet solo practice, the Spark Live is meant for band practices or small gigs. 

The first channel is dedicated to guitar and has pretty much the full power of Positive Grid's modeling technology at its disposal. There are 33 amp models and 43 effect builtin that can be combined into eight different presets that are easily accessible from the main control panel. 

Channel two has a combo 1/4-inch / XLR input and has presets and effects customized for bass, vocals and acoustic guitar. There are preamp models as well as new effects unique to the Spark Live. Channel three and four are a stereo pair of direct ins. There are amp models or effects here, but you can run straight in from a synth, a amp simulator pedal or even just a backing track from a computer. 

There's also a sensor inside that allows it to dynamically change its EQ based on position. When vertical the Live has a more direct and punchier tone. But when laid on its side, it delivers a wider, softer stereo field. There's even a built in tilt stand so you can direct the sound where necessary. It can also adjust volume automatically based on incoming signals. There's even an option battery pack for $79 that can power the Spark Live for up to eight hours.

In addition to the Live, Positive Grid also announced the Spark Control X, a Bluetooth foot controller for its Spark line of amps. It can connect to the Spark Live all the way down to the minuscule Spark Go. It has six customizable foot switches, MIDI support, an expression pedal jack and a builtin rechargeable battery. Positive Grid even includes three clear overlays that you can write on with a dry erase marker so you know what each switch does. 

To round out it deluge of announcements for NAMM 2024, Positive Grid also unveiled the Spark Link wireless guitar system. Wireless guitar transmission systems are nothing new, but Positive Grid undercuts other players in the field with a price of $129. And it claims the Link has a range of 70 feet, 20 feet more than most. 

All of Positive Grid's new products are available for pre-order direct from the company. Spark Live will retail for $549, but there's a $50 off coupon available during the pre-order period. The Spark Control X and Spark Link can be preordered for $149 and $129, respectively.

It’s hard to believe that Artruria has anything left to add to Pigments at this point, but here we are. NAMM 2024 is just about ready to kick off, and Arturia is rolling out version five of its home-grown super synth. In the grand scheme of Pigments updates, this is a relatively minor one. But that’s not to say there aren’t new features worth getting excited about.

Perhaps the most important new feature is also the most invisible. Pigments finally supports multi-core processing, dramatically improving performance. It was never the biggest resource hog in the virtual synth space (the current champion in my experience is Moog’s Mariana), but it could be demanding depending on the patch. Now CPU usage in the standalone version sits at about 4 percent when idle on my M1 MacBook Pro. And I rarely see it climb above 20 percent.

Arturia

There are also changes to the stripped down Play view. It’s more consistent and a bit prettier now, with a new spectral visualizer. It doesn’t really change things in any practical way, and while I’ll admit that the main UI can seem a little busy to a newcomer, I never found it particularly difficult to navigate. Play view might be a welcome improvement for those who use Pigments in performance settings and rarely do deep sound design, but its not something I ever find myself switching over to.

If you’re not one for sound design and rely more on presets you’ll probably appreciate the 150 new ones that are included, not to mention the three new sound banks of 150 patches each, all of which are designed with MPE in mind. Pigments is one of a handful of high-profile soft synths out there with extensive MPE support, but its presets often don’t take full advantage. But now that MPE controllers are becoming more common, Arturia is making an effort to remedy that. Heck, maybe Arturia will announce an MPE controller of its own in the not too distant future.

Arturia

One of the more exciting upgrades is a new option in the utility engine (only on the second source) for audio input. That means you can process other instruments, or even your voice using Pigments’ effects. Chances are you already have access to a rich suite of effects in your DAW, but being able to seamlessly combine external audio with Pigments’ synth engines and process them through the same effects to help them meld together more seamlessly is a nice new source of timbres. I tested it out by running an Elektron Digitone through Pigments and was pretty happy with the results, but I definitely have a lot more exploring to do. If you’d rather stick to the built-in engines, there’s a selection of new samples and wavetables for you to explore as well.

The sequencer has also gotten some pretty significant upgrades. There’s a new dice icon for generating a random sequence which can be locked to a specific scale. And sequences can now be saved separately as their own presets, which you can lock to try the same sequence with multiple different sound presets. You can even feed the MIDI from the Pigments’ sequencer to other instruments. So if your DAW or synth of choice lacks generative features you can now just let Pigments do the work.

As usual, Pigments 5 is available as a free upgrade for current owners. If you haven’t taken the plunge yet, this is a pretty good time to do so. For a limited time you can get Pigments, plus the three new sound banks for $99. That’s quite a steal since Pigments is normally $199, and each of the sound banks (Beats Exploration, Expressive Explorations and Liquid Explorations) will be $30 at full price.

There are plenty of Engadget staffers who have been forced to suffer through karaoke nights with me. And they can attest to the fact that I have the singing voice of a chain smoking diner waitress and the vocal range of a mid'80s speech synthesizer. And yet, I just cant help myself. I have zero shame. There's nothing out there that will magically make me a good singer, but a healthy dose of effects and some pitch correction courtesy of a Boss VE-22 Vocal Performer, which is making its debut at NAMM 2024, might make listening to me croon bearable. 

The VE-22 is the latest in Boss' long line of vocal effect units and pedals. There's an XLR input on the back with a preamp and phantom power, in case you want to use it with a condenser mic. Two XLR outputs allow you to run audio out in stereo, dual mono or wet/dry. There's also an aux input for singing along to backing tracks. There's a reasonably large color screen for navigating the UI and a trio of pedals that seem like they'd be equally comfortable under you hand as your foot.

Effects range from basic things like EQ and compression to pitch correction and auto harmonization. The VE-22 can do subtle vocal enhancement, and add essential effects like reverb, or do crazy lo-fi and Autotune-like glitches. In total there are 39 effects, 50 factory presets, plus room for 99 user presets. If you need more control you can also connect an expression pedal for on the fly tweaking of parameters. And lastly, there's a 37 second looper with overdubbing for building up compositions and practicing harmonies. 

There's no MIDI support, but there is a USB-C port for recording and playing back audio from a computer or smartphone. While there is an AC adapter, it's unfortunately sold separately. It can also be powered by four AA batteries if you don't feel like springing for the adapter, just know you're only going to get between six and nine hours before they'll need to be replaced. The VE-22 Vocal Performer is available now for $350 and an optional carrying case with room for a mic and cable will cost $70.

Korg launched its Nu:Tekt line of DIY kits in 2019 with the NTS-1. It was basically just the programmable digital oscillator from the Prologue and Minilogue XD in a cheap dedicated box. Over the years it's gotten a few more members, including an oscilloscope and headphone amps. For NAMM 2024 the company is updating the originator with the NTS-1 mk2 and adding the NTS-3 Kaoss Pad to the mix.

The NTS-1 mk2 is the same size and shape as the original, and still comes as a solderless DIY kit. There's still a single monophonic digital oscillator as well, built on the LogueSDK. But that's about where the similarities end. Inside is a new, more powerful processor driving an updated version of the SDK which includes new oscillator types and effects, and the ability to use incoming audio as a modulation source. The ribbon keyboard has been swapped for an 18-key multitouch capacitive keyboard that looks far more playable. Korg has also added an eight-step sequencer, MIDI out and moved to USB-C for power. 

The NTS-1 mk2 looks like a solid upgrade to a surprisingly versatile mini synth, but it's the NTS-3 that brings something truly new to the table. It also comes as a solderless DIY kit that Korg says should take less than 20 minutes to assemble. And when you're done, you'll have honest-to-goodness Kaoss Pad with 35 built-in effects, an expressive X/Y pad for controlling them and a looper. And, of course, since it too is built on the LogueSDK you can load custom effects too. (Or design your own, if that's your bag.) You can use up to four effects simultaneously and a latch feature allows you to control them individually.

Unfortunately we don't have a ton more info about either device. There will be a librarian for managing custom oscillators and effects, though no date has been given for when it will be available. And similarly we don't the know the price of either device. All we know is that the NTS-1 mk2 is scheduled for release sometime in April, followed by the NTS-3 in June.