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.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/arturia-pigments-5-adds-generative-sequencing-and-external-audio-processing-201014331.html?src=rss
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.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/boss-ve-22-vocal-performer-is-the-latest-high-powered-effects-pedal-for-singers-100024692.html?src=rss
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.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/korg-nutekt-diy-line-gets-a-new-mini-synth-and-a-kaoss-pad-133559507.html?src=rss
NAMM 2024 is right around the corner, but Korg isn't waiting for the festivities to officially begin. It's announced about a dozen new products over the last few days. Among them are updates to two of the company's virtual analog synths, the roughly 10-year-old KingKorg and the 22-year-old MicroKorg.
The KingKorg Neo is built on the same 37-key form factor as the rest of Korg's recent digital synths, like the Opsix, Modwave and Wavestate. But the core here is the company's XMT (eXpanded Modelling Technology) virtual analog sound engine. It's not the most convincing analog emulation in the world, but it does have some character.
It's a multi-timbral synth, with each patch having the ability to layer or split to different sounds, with three oscillators at its disposal. There are 138 different options to choose from on the oscillator front, ranging from basic wave shapes, to PCM samples. And there are 18 different filter emulations to choose from as well, including the classic MS-20. There's also two LFOs, two envelopes, and a whole host of effects from your typical delays and reverbs, to amp simulators and sound mangling decimator.
Perhaps most exciting though, is the 16-band vocoder and included gooseneck mic. But, the KingKorg Neo isn't the only new synth from the storied manufacturer with a vocoder. It's also updating its iconic MicroKorg with the MicroKorg 2.
The original MicroKorg was launched in 2002 and went on to become one of the best selling synths of all time. In fact, in May of 2023 Korg was still pumping out iterations of the original, celebrating its multiple decades of success with a Crystal special edition.
The new version has a very similar form factor, including its small size, gooseneck mic, the ability to be powered by batteries and a large dial for navigating patches that are still sorted by genre. But under the hood is a new sound engine, and there's a 2.8-inch color display on the front which should simplify sound design. There's also a built-in loop recorder which should make it a much more powerful instrument for solo performers.
The KingKorg Neo is expected to start shipping in February for $1,000. We'll have to wait a bit longer for the MicroKorg 2 however, which should be hitting the market in June, though there's no word on pricing. Hopefully it'll fall somewhere in the $500 range like the original. Part of what made the MicroKorg so successful was that it was perfectly accessible to even the lowliest of synth hobbyists.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/korgs-microkorg-2-and-kingkorg-neo-are-overdue-updates-to-its-virtual-analog-synthesizers-110005853.html?src=rss
NAMM 2024 is right around the corner, but Korg isn't waiting for the festivities to officially begin. It's announced about a dozen new products over the last few days. Among them are updates to two of the company's virtual analog synths, the roughly 10-year-old KingKorg and the 22-year-old MicroKorg.
The KingKorg Neo is built on the same 37-key form factor as the rest of Korg's recent digital synths, like the Opsix, Modwave and Wavestate. But the core here is the company's XMT (eXpanded Modelling Technology) virtual analog sound engine. It's not the most convincing analog emulation in the world, but it does have some character.
It's a multi-timbral synth, with each patch having the ability to layer or split to different sounds, with three oscillators at its disposal. There are 138 different options to choose from on the oscillator front, ranging from basic wave shapes, to PCM samples. And there are 18 different filter emulations to choose from as well, including the classic MS-20. There's also two LFOs, two envelopes, and a whole host of effects from your typical delays and reverbs, to amp simulators and sound mangling decimator.
Perhaps most exciting though, is the 16-band vocoder and included gooseneck mic. But, the KingKorg Neo isn't the only new synth from the storied manufacturer with a vocoder. It's also updating its iconic MicroKorg with the MicroKorg 2.
The original MicroKorg was launched in 2002 and went on to become one of the best selling synths of all time. In fact, in May of 2023 Korg was still pumping out iterations of the original, celebrating its multiple decades of success with a Crystal special edition.
The new version has a very similar form factor, including its small size, gooseneck mic, the ability to be powered by batteries and a large dial for navigating patches that are still sorted by genre. But under the hood is a new sound engine, and there's a 2.8-inch color display on the front which should simplify sound design. There's also a built-in loop recorder which should make it a much more powerful instrument for solo performers.
The KingKorg Neo is expected to start shipping in February for $1,000. We'll have to wait a bit longer for the MicroKorg 2 however, which should be hitting the market in June, though there's no word on pricing. Hopefully it'll fall somewhere in the $500 range like the original. Part of what made the MicroKorg so successful was that it was perfectly accessible to even the lowliest of synth hobbyists.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/korgs-microkorg-2-and-kingkorg-neo-are-overdue-updates-to-its-virtual-analog-synthesizers-110005853.html?src=rss
I have had two consistent complaints about most Roland gear: a lack of hands-on controls and an unnecessary amount of diving through incomprehensible menus. But, earlier this year the company shipped the Aira Compact S-1 Tweak Synth. Its menu sent me into a rage spiral, but it did offer a fair number of hands-on controls. Then, not long after, Roland debuted the SH-4D which not only had plenty of knobs, buttons and faders, but a streamlined menu and a screen that didn’t predate home computers. My biggest issue was the form factor; I just really wanted it to be a dedicated synthesizer with a keyboard, but it was more of a pseudo groovebox.
So, when Roland announced the Gaia 2 — a long overdue update to its 13-year-old virtual analog synth — I was cautiously optimistic. The S-1 and SH-4D were signs the company was heading in the right direction interface-wise, and they both sounded great. At first glance the Gaia 2 seemed to be everything I’ve been looking for in a Roland synth: plenty of hands-on controls, a decent screen, a simplified menu and a full-size 37-key keybed. And yet, at the risk of seeming impossible to please, I walked away from the Gaia 2 a little unsatisfied.
All sounds, except for the drums, come straight from the Gaia 2. The only additional processing being some EQ and compression.
Hardware
The most immediately underwhelming thing is the build. Now, to be clear, the Gaia 2 doesn’t feel cheap, but I expected slightly more from a $900 synth. The top panel is metal, but the rest is plastic. The keyboard is excellent, but lacks aftertouch. The knobs are mostly fine, but there are a few encoders that feel loose and have a good amount of wiggle. The detents on some are weak too, making it easy to miss your mark. Plus the pitch and mod wheels are bizarrely small. All of these things would be easily forgiven on a $600 synthesizer, but at this price I felt a little let down.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
The Korg Minilogue XD, for instance, only costs $650 and generally feels more rugged, even if the keybed isn’t as good. And Elektron’s Digitakt and Digitone lack a keyboard but feel damn-near indestructible at $949 (and for only $50 more).
The controls are extensive, though. Roland hasn’t solved all of its menu-diving problems, but the Gaia 2 gets pretty close. There are more knobs and buttons than I care to count. Everything is organized logically and, while there are some shift functions, many of the controls are single purpose, leaving you free to tweak almost anything with one hand while you play. This is getting harder and harder to come by as customers expect more powerful synth engines with more modulation options, while also wanting instruments to be compact.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
The Gaia 2 isn’t exactly small. At roughly 26 inches wide and 13 inches deep, it does command a decent amount of desk space, but it’s hardly onerous. And it makes the most of its front panel, cramming it full of controls and a decent sized screen.
It’s inevitable that your eyes will be drawn to the “Motional” touchpad directly below that. It’s one of the highlights of the synth, with my one complaint being its placement. It’s dead center, which makes sense if you’re using it to navigate the menus with a cursor. But, it’s much faster to just use the knobs. The touchpad just doesn’t feel natural for navigating the interface, and it would be much less cumbersome for performance on the left side — there’s certainly room for it alongside the toy-sized pitch and mod wheels.
The Motional Pad is great, the terrible name aside. It seems like a bit of a gimmick at first — a large X/Y touchpad, not unlike the Korg Kaoss Pad, dedicated to modulation. But once you get past the initial strangeness (and Roland’s factory patches that lean hard into its gimmicky side), it’s hard not to see the value. It’s used to control the waveshaping and phase modulation of oscillator one, but you can also assign almost any parameter you want to the X and Y axis and change them by simply dragging your finger around.
What’s more, you can record that motion, essentially giving you a third, complex LFO. It records not just the shape of your finger movements, but the timing too. So you could draw small circles slowly working your way from the bottom left to the top right, to open up the filter and increase the resonance before quickly zigzagging your way back to the start. Many of the factory presets treat this animated modulation sequence as a novelty, sketching out small people, leaves and, of course, the Roland logo.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
Sound engine
This clearly isn’t a deal breaker, but it does speak to a broader issue I have with the Gaia 2: many of the presets feel like tech demos and I don’t find them particularly usable. Now, I can already hear people getting up in arms. “Well, a real musician would be designing all their own patches from scratch anyway!” you might be saying. I’m here to tell you to go kick rocks. There’s no shame in playing presets, especially if you’re making music as a hobby. Additionally, the factory presets should be a showcase of what a synth is capable of, not just technically, but musically. And judging by that, the Gaia 2 is firmly stuck in the early aughts.
This is ultimately what left me feeling cold about the Gaia 2: It sounds dated. The original Gaia was a strictly virtual analog affair. Its successor kept the same three oscillator structure, but swapped in a wavetable engine for one of them (the other two remain virtual analog). There are plenty of great, modern-sounding synthesizers out there that use wavetables, but Gaia 2 specializes in a particular brand of Roland cheese. It’s perfect for scoring a turn of the century cyber thriller, and while some people will love it, others won’t.
The two virtual analog oscillators sound clinical and lack oomph in the lower registers. The filter is extremely versatile with three different slope options (-12dB/Oct, -18dB/Oct or -24dB/Oct) for each of its three modes (lowpass, bandpass and highpass) and a drive option. It can sound a touch thin, but it’s serviceable.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
I wish I could say I was more enamored with the sound engine, because otherwise this is probably the most enjoyable modern Roland synth I’ve used. The Gaia 2 strikes a near-perfect balance between complexity and approachability. The three oscillators, multimode filter, dual LFOs, Motional Pad and rich effects section offer quite a bit of depth, but are incredibly easy to dial in. Everything is labeled clearly and all of the most essential parameters have direct hands-on controls. Even most things that require shift functions or some menu diving are all pretty intuitive. It’s legitimately fun to program. The Gaia 2 would make an excellent instrument to learn synthesis on if it wasn’t so expensive.
Applying the LFO to any parameter is as simple as holding a button and turning the knob of whatever you want to modulate. And there’s even a step mode where you can design a 16-step custom wave. The Motional Pad and excellent sequencer are a cinch to use. And having faders instead of knobs for the two envelopes (amp and filter) is a nice touch. There’s no modulation matrix and you can’t reroute the envelopes, but I didn’t mind much. I rarely ran into a situation where I really wanted to do something when designing a patch, but couldn’t. It’s a straightforward synth with enough depth to keep even experienced players twiddling knobs for hours.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
Model Expansions
Once you grow bored of the main Gaia engine, you can load Model Expansions to add emulations of classic Roland synths like the Jupiter-8 or Juno-106. It even comes with an SH-101 emulation pre-installed. Honestly, that sounds better than the default virtual analog engine.
Of course, the model expansions aren’t cheap at $149. And loading them on the Gaia is, let’s say, aggravating. You have two options: You can buy an optional $100 wireless USB adapter and send them from your phone. Or, you can copy files to a USB key and then load them manually from there. (You know, just like it’s 2001.) This is one of the few places where Roland remains stubbornly archaic. Even though the Gaia 2 has a USB-C port capable of transmitting both audio and MIDI (and power), it can’t connect to the Roland Cloud manager app to load Model Expansions.
Effects
The bright spot in the sound engine, though, is definitely the effects. There are seven reverb and delay options, three types of excellent sounding chorus, and 53 other effects including compressors, bit crushers, lo-fi and scatter. The new shimmer reverb algorithm, in particular, is gorgeous. There’s almost as much room for sound design in the FX section alone as there is in the rest of the synth. This is also your best bet for adding some character to the often cold-sounding main oscillators.
Wrap-up
Ultimately, what makes the Gaia disappointing is that it gets so much right, but can’t quite stick the landing. It’s extremely fun to program patches on, but I just didn’t click with the results. It expertly blends approachability with depth, but it’s too expensive to recommend to a beginner. And it finally delivers the hands-on controls people have been begging for, but the quality of the encoders, pots and buttons leave something to be desired. I wanted to like the Gaia 2, and I’m sure there’s plenty of people out there who will, but it’s just not for me.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/roland-gaia-2-review-roland-finally-delivers-the-hands-on-synthesizer-weve-been-begging-for-150058035.html?src=rss
I have had two consistent complaints about most Roland gear: a lack of hands-on controls and an unnecessary amount of diving through incomprehensible menus. But, earlier this year the company shipped the Aira Compact S-1 Tweak Synth. Its menu sent me into a rage spiral, but it did offer a fair number of hands-on controls. Then, not long after, Roland debuted the SH-4D which not only had plenty of knobs, buttons and faders, but a streamlined menu and a screen that didn’t predate home computers. My biggest issue was the form factor; I just really wanted it to be a dedicated synthesizer with a keyboard, but it was more of a pseudo groovebox.
So, when Roland announced the Gaia 2 — a long overdue update to its 13-year-old virtual analog synth — I was cautiously optimistic. The S-1 and SH-4D were signs the company was heading in the right direction interface-wise, and they both sounded great. At first glance the Gaia 2 seemed to be everything I’ve been looking for in a Roland synth: plenty of hands-on controls, a decent screen, a simplified menu and a full-size 37-key keybed. And yet, at the risk of seeming impossible to please, I walked away from the Gaia 2 a little unsatisfied.
All sounds, except for the drums, come straight from the Gaia 2. The only additional processing being some EQ and compression.
Hardware
The most immediately underwhelming thing is the build. Now, to be clear, the Gaia 2 doesn’t feel cheap, but I expected slightly more from a $900 synth. The top panel is metal, but the rest is plastic. The keyboard is excellent, but lacks aftertouch. The knobs are mostly fine, but there are a few encoders that feel loose and have a good amount of wiggle. The detents on some are weak too, making it easy to miss your mark. Plus the pitch and mod wheels are bizarrely small. All of these things would be easily forgiven on a $600 synthesizer, but at this price I felt a little let down.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
The Korg Minilogue XD, for instance, only costs $650 and generally feels more rugged, even if the keybed isn’t as good. And Elektron’s Digitakt and Digitone lack a keyboard but feel damn-near indestructible at $949 (and for only $50 more).
The controls are extensive, though. Roland hasn’t solved all of its menu-diving problems, but the Gaia 2 gets pretty close. There are more knobs and buttons than I care to count. Everything is organized logically and, while there are some shift functions, many of the controls are single purpose, leaving you free to tweak almost anything with one hand while you play. This is getting harder and harder to come by as customers expect more powerful synth engines with more modulation options, while also wanting instruments to be compact.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
The Gaia 2 isn’t exactly small. At roughly 26 inches wide and 13 inches deep, it does command a decent amount of desk space, but it’s hardly onerous. And it makes the most of its front panel, cramming it full of controls and a decent sized screen.
It’s inevitable that your eyes will be drawn to the “Motional” touchpad directly below that. It’s one of the highlights of the synth, with my one complaint being its placement. It’s dead center, which makes sense if you’re using it to navigate the menus with a cursor. But, it’s much faster to just use the knobs. The touchpad just doesn’t feel natural for navigating the interface, and it would be much less cumbersome for performance on the left side — there’s certainly room for it alongside the toy-sized pitch and mod wheels.
The Motional Pad is great, the terrible name aside. It seems like a bit of a gimmick at first — a large X/Y touchpad, not unlike the Korg Kaoss Pad, dedicated to modulation. But once you get past the initial strangeness (and Roland’s factory patches that lean hard into its gimmicky side), it’s hard not to see the value. It’s used to control the waveshaping and phase modulation of oscillator one, but you can also assign almost any parameter you want to the X and Y axis and change them by simply dragging your finger around.
What’s more, you can record that motion, essentially giving you a third, complex LFO. It records not just the shape of your finger movements, but the timing too. So you could draw small circles slowly working your way from the bottom left to the top right, to open up the filter and increase the resonance before quickly zigzagging your way back to the start. Many of the factory presets treat this animated modulation sequence as a novelty, sketching out small people, leaves and, of course, the Roland logo.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
Sound engine
This clearly isn’t a deal breaker, but it does speak to a broader issue I have with the Gaia 2: many of the presets feel like tech demos and I don’t find them particularly usable. Now, I can already hear people getting up in arms. “Well, a real musician would be designing all their own patches from scratch anyway!” you might be saying. I’m here to tell you to go kick rocks. There’s no shame in playing presets, especially if you’re making music as a hobby. Additionally, the factory presets should be a showcase of what a synth is capable of, not just technically, but musically. And judging by that, the Gaia 2 is firmly stuck in the early aughts.
This is ultimately what left me feeling cold about the Gaia 2: It sounds dated. The original Gaia was a strictly virtual analog affair. Its successor kept the same three oscillator structure, but swapped in a wavetable engine for one of them (the other two remain virtual analog). There are plenty of great, modern-sounding synthesizers out there that use wavetables, but Gaia 2 specializes in a particular brand of Roland cheese. It’s perfect for scoring a turn of the century cyber thriller, and while some people will love it, others won’t.
The two virtual analog oscillators sound clinical and lack oomph in the lower registers. The filter is extremely versatile with three different slope options (-12dB/Oct, -18dB/Oct or -24dB/Oct) for each of its three modes (lowpass, bandpass and highpass) and a drive option. It can sound a touch thin, but it’s serviceable.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
I wish I could say I was more enamored with the sound engine, because otherwise this is probably the most enjoyable modern Roland synth I’ve used. The Gaia 2 strikes a near-perfect balance between complexity and approachability. The three oscillators, multimode filter, dual LFOs, Motional Pad and rich effects section offer quite a bit of depth, but are incredibly easy to dial in. Everything is labeled clearly and all of the most essential parameters have direct hands-on controls. Even most things that require shift functions or some menu diving are all pretty intuitive. It’s legitimately fun to program. The Gaia 2 would make an excellent instrument to learn synthesis on if it wasn’t so expensive.
Applying the LFO to any parameter is as simple as holding a button and turning the knob of whatever you want to modulate. And there’s even a step mode where you can design a 16-step custom wave. The Motional Pad and excellent sequencer are a cinch to use. And having faders instead of knobs for the two envelopes (amp and filter) is a nice touch. There’s no modulation matrix and you can’t reroute the envelopes, but I didn’t mind much. I rarely ran into a situation where I really wanted to do something when designing a patch, but couldn’t. It’s a straightforward synth with enough depth to keep even experienced players twiddling knobs for hours.
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
Model Expansions
Once you grow bored of the main Gaia engine, you can load Model Expansions to add emulations of classic Roland synths like the Jupiter-8 or Juno-106. It even comes with an SH-101 emulation pre-installed. Honestly, that sounds better than the default virtual analog engine.
Of course, the model expansions aren’t cheap at $149. And loading them on the Gaia is, let’s say, aggravating. You have two options: You can buy an optional $100 wireless USB adapter and send them from your phone. Or, you can copy files to a USB key and then load them manually from there. (You know, just like it’s 2001.) This is one of the few places where Roland remains stubbornly archaic. Even though the Gaia 2 has a USB-C port capable of transmitting both audio and MIDI (and power), it can’t connect to the Roland Cloud manager app to load Model Expansions.
Effects
The bright spot in the sound engine, though, is definitely the effects. There are seven reverb and delay options, three types of excellent sounding chorus, and 53 other effects including compressors, bit crushers, lo-fi and scatter. The new shimmer reverb algorithm, in particular, is gorgeous. There’s almost as much room for sound design in the FX section alone as there is in the rest of the synth. This is also your best bet for adding some character to the often cold-sounding main oscillators.
Wrap-up
Ultimately, what makes the Gaia disappointing is that it gets so much right, but can’t quite stick the landing. It’s extremely fun to program patches on, but I just didn’t click with the results. It expertly blends approachability with depth, but it’s too expensive to recommend to a beginner. And it finally delivers the hands-on controls people have been begging for, but the quality of the encoders, pots and buttons leave something to be desired. I wanted to like the Gaia 2, and I’m sure there’s plenty of people out there who will, but it’s just not for me.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/roland-gaia-2-review-roland-finally-delivers-the-hands-on-synthesizer-weve-been-begging-for-150058035.html?src=rss
Yes, you probably already have a virtual assistant in your pocket on your phone. Heck, if you're reading Engadget, I'm willing to bet you've got at least one smart speaker floating around your home as well that you can ask to complete basic tasks. But a new startup called Rabbit seems to think these are less than ideal implementations of AI (if you can really call Siri and Alexa that). The company, which is exhibiting at CES 2024 in Las Vegas this week, envisions a world where you trade apps for conversation and, rather than a distracting device shoving icons in your face, you interact with what amounts to a walkie-talkie for an AI. We had a chance to see the Rabbit RI AI device for ourselves at the show.
The Rabbit R1 is the first device to be launched by Rabbit and it's an objectively adorable little square in an endearingly bright shade of orange. Even if you're not sold on the necessity of a dedicated gadget for a virtual assistant, it's hard to deny the aesthetic appeal, which comes courtesy of the design gurus at Teenage Engineering. It features a small 2.88-inch touchscreen, an analog scroll wheel, two mics, a speaker and a "360 degree rotational eye," which is just a fancy name for a camera you can spin to face toward you or through the back of the handset.
The primary way you interact with the Rabbit AI, though, is by pressing and holding the "Push-to-Talk" button. This tells Rabbit OS to start listening. A heavily stylized and disembodied rabbit head bobs slowly as you ask your question or give it a task, and then it quickly gets to work. Want to book an Uber? Need a recipe to use up the leftovers in your fridge? Wondering who sampled The Isley Brothers "That Lady"? (The answer is Beastie Boys, Basement Jaxx and Kendrick Lamar, FTR.) The Rabbit R1 AI seems pretty capable of handling those tasks, at least in the controlled video demo.
Rabbit OS is able to tackle those tasks using what it calls the Large Action Model (LAM). This is what founder and CEO Jesse Lyu pitches as the company's major innovation. It's designed to take actions on interfaces rather than through APIs or apps. In short, it can be trained to carry out almost any task that can be accomplished through a user interface. It's sort of like a fancy version of a macro.
As a way of demonstrating its capabilities, Lyu teaches the Rabbit AI how to generate an image using Midjourney via Discord. Once Lyu walks and performs the process, with Rabbit OS recording his actions, it can repeat the task when asked.
The rotating camera faces up into the body by default, acting as a sort of privacy shutter. Only turning its sensor towards its target when summoned. It can do the usual tricks like identify people or thing in the real world (within reason, at least). But the way it interacts with the AI is sure to pique people's interest. In the demo Lyu points the R1 at a full refrigerator and asks it to suggest a recipe that's "low in calories" based on its contents.
Rabbit
Of course, there are still a lot of unanswered questions about the Rabbit R1. How is the battery life? The company claims it's "all day," but what does that really mean? And will the average user be able to train it easily. At least we know a few things, though. We know it costs $199 and is available for preorder now, with an expected ship date sometime in March or April.
We're reporting live from CES 2024 in Las Vegas from January 6-12. Keep up with all the latest news from the show here.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/rabbit-r1-is-an-adorable-ai-powered-assistant-co-designed-by-teenage-engineering-001051537.html?src=rss
Exobrew is latest in a long line of companies to try and make homebrew beer as compact and beginner friendly as possible. Everyone from startups like Picobrew and Brewie, to major corporations like LG and Whirlpool have taken a stab at an all-in-one brewing systems with varying amounts of success (or lack there of). On its surface, the Exobrew doesn't seem to stray too far from those who have come before it, other than the eye-catching keg in a lovely shade of orange. The company is demoing the device at CES 2024 in Las Vegas this week, and I had a chance to get a preview at CES Unveiled on Sunday evening.
That keg is the heart of the system; it handles heating, cooling, fermentation and serving. During the actual brewing process it pumps hot water out the top and circulates it over the grains for the mash. When the time comes for the boil, water is redirected to avoid over extraction. Above the grain hopper is a rotating dispenser for hop additions that drops them (in adorable little muslin bags) straight into the keg.
Terrence O'Brien
The temperature controlled keg then cools things off for your yeast addition and you pop on the the fermentation lid. The whole process takes about four hours start to finish and requires basically no human intervention. The Exobrew is controlled entirely through an app and it downloads recipes from the cloud. Since its targeting inexperienced home brewers, there's a lot of focus on kits that come with all the ingredients pre-parsed, crushed and ready to go. But you can design your own recipes, or use recipes from other users. Unfortunately that privilege will be locked behind a $9 a month (or $90 a year) subscription.
The fact that everything from the mash, to the boil, to fermentation, to serving happens from a single vessel, with no need for refrigeration definitely sets the Exobrew apart from a lot of other systems (it's even self cleaning). But it also comes with its own set of challenges. However, it has features to avoid some of the more common beermaking pitfalls that produce off flavors: a clever system for keeping dimethyl sulfide from dripping back into your brew; a filter in the top of the keg helps clear out some sediment; and the interior of the keg is conical, with a small valve at the bottom to remove the trub (another form of sediment.)
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
It's clear that a lot of thought went into the design of the Exobrew. But it still has some tough hills to climb. For one, it's relatively large. While it will technically fit on a counter, it's not something anyone will want to leave out in the kitchen all the time, no matter how pretty that orange keg is. It also doesn't come cheap. $879 is hefty investment for a beginner, especially when you could probably make your first batch of homebrew with a $10 bucket from the hardware store and what you already have in your kitchen. And, while the Exobrew definitely makes things convenient — you can literally start it and walk away for four hours — it might suck some of the fun out of it for experienced brewers.
But, if you just want to enjoy the freshest beer you possibly can, have little interest in getting your hands dirty and have some money to burn, pre-orders for the Exobrew are open now. The company is asking for a down payment of $165, with the rest due when manufacturing commences. Production units are expected to ship sometime in the first quarter of the year.
We're reporting live from CES 2024 in Las Vegas from January 6-12. Keep up with all the latest news from the show here.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/exobrew-is-the-latest-machine-trying-to-make-homebrewing-beer-beginner-friendly-174055765.html?src=rss
Arturia V Collection X is one of the biggest updates to the virtual synth library in quite some time. Six new instruments have been added (though, most have been available separately before) and two have been rebuilt from the ground up. That brings the grand total number of instruments in V Collection to 38, and over the last few years at least six of those have been completely revamped with dramatic improvements.
MiniFreak V, Acid V, Augmented Brass and Augmented Grand Piano were all available previously as standalone instruments, but now they are joining the V Collection proper. Two completely new instruments are also entering the fold. Augmented Woodwinds and CP-70 V. Augmented Woodwinds is, as you might have guessed, a take on Arturia’s Augmented series, except here the synths are paired with woodwind samples. CP-70 V is an emulation of Yamaha’s electric piano from the late ‘70s and early ‘80s used most notably by The Grateful Dead and Genesis.
Augmented Woodwinds, Brass and Grand Piano
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
I’ll admit to being somewhat skeptical of Augmented Woodwinds at first. I think Augmented Strings and Grand Piano are excellent, but have found little use for Brass and Voices so far, and woodwinds often feel like some of the most difficult acoustic instruments to get right in a sample library. Yet, Arturia pulls it off, largely by leaning into the synth side of things pretty strongly. You’re never going to convince anyone that the sounds coming out of it are from a flesh-and-blood woodwind ensemble, but the soft cinematic pads and leads you can coax out of it are compelling, especially when paired with an MPE controller like the Push or Seaboard Rise 2. (With the exception of a few presets that seem to come undone when faced with MPE input, at least.)
Like the rest of the Augmented series, Woodwinds, Brass and Grand Piano feel built especially with scoring in mind. That’s not to say you can’t find a use for them in a pop song or jazz arrangement, but these are all about atmosphere and texture, and there’s a healthy dose of sounds that would only be appropriate in the tensest moments of a cosmic horror film.
They all have a suite of advanced controls where you can build almost any sound you want from its four layer engine (two samples and two synths). You can even completely disable the sample layers and go woodwind-less, though, you might as well use one of the other plugins at that point.
CP-70 V
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
The other completely new instrument, CP-70 V, is a lot more straightforward. It’s an electric piano. A very specific one that hasn’t enjoyed the same level of reverence as the Rhodes or Wurlitzer, but isn’t without its merits. The CP-70 used strings like a real piano, instead of the metal reeds and tines found in Rhodes in Wurlitzers. It also used piezo pickups instead of magnetic ones, resulting in a sound that is significantly closer to an actual acoustic piano. That was definitely a huge selling point for touring acts in the ‘70s and ‘80s that wanted the sound of a grand piano, but didn’t want to lug one on the road.
The result though, is less characterful than those other electric pianos. It’s brighter and there’s less room for shaping the sound without adding effects. Arturia seems to do an admirable job of capturing the spirit of the CP-70, but it comes close enough to sounding like a real piano, I’d be far more likely to reach for the regular ol' Piano V plugin in most cases.
MiniFreak V
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
Acid V and MiniFreak V both launched earlier this year. And frankly, nothing has changed with Acid V in the roughly four months since I wrote about it, so I won’t say much beyond, it’s an excellent TB-303 emulator. It does what you expect it to and not much else, but with about one-tenth of the headaches of the real thing.
MiniFreak V, on the other hand, got a major update yesterday with a new wavetable engine, new super unison effect and some improvements to the LFO. The 32 wavetables are pretty solid and modern sounding. And perhaps, best of all, they seem to be able to handle bass better than some of the other oscillators — an area the Freak line has always felt a little weak in. There are 64 new presets designed to show off the strength of the wavetable engine and there’s some real winners in there. Yes, there are plenty of weirdo sound effects and dubstep bass wubs, but there are also some lovely chilly pads and delicate keys.
Additionally, Arturia is finally adding preset packs for the MiniFreak and MiniFreak V to its store. There are two paid soundpacks, but also three free ones and, well, I can’t recommend that you download Deserted Lands from Oscillator Sink enough. It’s basically just one gorgeous broken patch after another. This was sort of a running theme, though. With MiniFreak 2.0, Augmented Woodwinds and the rebuilt Mini V4, Arturia really improved the quality of its presets. Whether they were designed in house or by an artist they worked with, most felt designed to show off what the plugins were capable of musically, as opposed to technically. That wasn’t necessarily the case with the MiniFreak, the MicroFreak or even Pigments.
Mini V4
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
This was the single biggest shock of the lot, honestly. Mini V was also a decent enough Minimoog Model D emulation, but the world is filled with those. It was never the reason to seek out V Collection specifically, but it was good enough that you didn’t need to go find an alternative. Mini V4, however, is incredible. The difference is subtle, but definitely noticeable if you load up the default template in both Mini V3 and V4 and play them side by side. For one, the V4 is a touch louder, but it’s also fuller. Part of that, I think, is there’s more inherent instability in the new oscillator model. As you start playing at the lower reaches of the keyboard you can hear it more clearly.
You can also play lower notes. Where V3 simply doesn’t work below A-1, V4 will let you get all the way down to C-2, though, there’s very little musical reason for you to go down that far.
The differences become more apparent when you start messing with the filter. More bass is retained as you start turning up the resonance in the new version, and it remains usable even with it pinned. The frequency cutoff is also smoother with a bit more of a guttural growl as you start isolating those lower frequencies.
While the Minimoog obviously excels at bass, and Arturia makes sure to showcase that, there are also a lot of presets that push the sound in different directions. The benefit of a plugin over the actual vintage synth is that you can have eight notes of polyphony here. That gives this virtual Model D the freedom to play unstable pads and electric-piano style keys.
The addition of a “vintage” knob is also quite welcome here. While I love things being ever-so-slightly out of tune and for there to be a gentle whisper of white noise in the background, others might want a more buttoned up sound.
It’s also worth pointing out that Arturia didn’t go too overboard with the features here. There’s no modulation matrix or sequencer or motion recording. There’s a handful of useful effects, an arpeggiator and MPE controls, and not much else beyond what you’d find on the original.
Wurli V3
Terrence O'Brien / Engadget
Similar to the Mini V, Arturia took its Wurlitzer plugin and decided to start over agin. The results are excellent, if a touch less dramatic than with the Moog emulation. The general tone is brighter and it sings a bit more in the lower registers. There also seems to be a wider stereo field than before as well. The cumulative effect is something a bit more inviting.
The new mic and amp simulations help it feel more alive and like you're actually in a room with a Wurli instead of just playing one through your computer. And the age parameter adds instability to the sound, allowing you to get that "just found this keyboard in my uncle's basement where it's been sitting untouched for 30 years" sound. Not to mention it absolutely nails the sound of Supertramp's "The Logical Song."
The Wurli isn’t a plugin I reach for terribly often, but I appreciated the improved tone that should help it cut through a mix a bit better. It’s also far more versatile than the CP-70 V, though even with the improvements I’m far more likely to reach for a Rhodes.
Arturia V Collection X is available now and existing Arturia customers will get a discount, depending on what software they already own. If you're new, the full price of $599 might be a bit tough to swallow, but it still represents one of the better deals in soft syths.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/arturia-v-collection-x-is-its-biggest-upgrade-in-years-160015345.html?src=rss