Arturia Minifreak
- Faastwalker
- Posts: 2282
- Joined: 15 Jan 2015
- Location: NSW, Australia
This looks good. I love my Microfreak. This adds more voices, a large FX bank, keyboard (Mini keys as opposed to the Micro's touch keys), more routing / modualtion, more filter types, layering etc. And the price is pretty bloody good as well. Tempted to sell the Micro and move in the Mini
They've addressed two of the big criticisms of the MicroFreak by adding FX and a stereo output, but the price takes it to a place where there is lots and lots of competition. However, I think it will be a success.
I'll be sticking with the Micro, not least because the "weird" keyboard gives playing options that you just don't get anywhere else. You can play it like a theremin or slide guitar and you can modulate stuff by adding more fingers and/or pressure to a key that is already being played.
I'll be sticking with the Micro, not least because the "weird" keyboard gives playing options that you just don't get anywhere else. You can play it like a theremin or slide guitar and you can modulate stuff by adding more fingers and/or pressure to a key that is already being played.
- Faastwalker
- Posts: 2282
- Joined: 15 Jan 2015
- Location: NSW, Australia
I didn't mind the Micro not having any on board FX. It sounded really nice, I thought, when put through FX in Reason. Would have been nice to have stereo out though. I kind of liked the keypad on the Micro as well, although people seemed split on it. So not really surprised they've gone with a regular keyboard for the Mini. The Micro is a great little synth. The Noise Engineering and Vocoder voice modes added loads. I don't think the Mini has the Vocoder voice yet. Bit of a strange omission. But maybe they did this deliberately to separate it from the Micro? Apart from that I think the voices are the same, so not a great selling point if you already have one of those.DaveyG wrote: ↑20 Oct 2022They've addressed two of the big criticisms of the MicroFreak by adding FX and a stereo output, but the price takes it to a place where there is lots and lots of competition. However, I think it will be a success.
I'll be sticking with the Micro, not least because the "weird" keyboard gives playing options that you just don't get anywhere else. You can play it like a theremin or slide guitar and you can modulate stuff by adding more fingers and/or pressure to a key that is already being played.
Tempted by the Mini but will also probably stick with the Micro for now. It fits nicely on my desktop next to Minilab MKII. I'd have to oust the two of them to fit the Mini on my desktop. It's got some great features over the Micro but maybe not quite enough to sell it for me as a replacement. But if you're new to the Freak then the Mini is a serious bit of kit for sure. But I'll maybe see what happens in the future with it. If they add some more voice modes, that really take advantage of the extra capabilities of the Mini, then it will be much more enticing as a Micro replacement. I'll just have to get a bigger desktop!
I can give a quick review of this in a few days - my buddy who wrote the user guide is bringing one up to the Northwoods House of Sound (my studio) for the week after he is finished at AES tomorrow, so I will have my grubby little paws on it shortly!
Selig Audio, LLC
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- Posts: 3757
- Joined: 20 Oct 2017
- Location: Norway
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I'm on the fence about this one. Part of me wants it, part of me doesn't.
Will the VST be available for sale separately? Interesting choice, I guess following the footsteps of Korg with the Wavestate and Opsix VSTs alongside hardware.
Buying the hardware though, I would much prefer audio over USB for seamless integration and offloading processing. Looks like they didn't do that.
Buying the hardware though, I would much prefer audio over USB for seamless integration and offloading processing. Looks like they didn't do that.
I’ve always found that Europa’s Reason’s Microfreak on steroids ! Each time I come across a Micro and Minifreak vidéo, I fire up Europa and then I’m glad RS has done it !
Arturia have won me over, First, the V-collection, which is just mind-boggling in variety and authenticity of sound. Then Pigments, and the free upgrade to V4 now. A fantastic soft synth with a really easy to use interface and amazing sound, and now, MiniFreak! I just bought one, and am flabbergasted by what has been done with this brilliant and inexpensive gem. It's the first hardware synth I have purchased since getting into Reason V 1, over 20 years ago! The VST version is spot-on as far as sound quality, and the ability to reach over and tweak a physical knob without having to map or otherwise program assignment/functionality is liberating! I was hoping that Minifreak would be useful as a control surface for Pigments and other similar soft synths as well, but one thing getting in my way right now is the apparently unconventional MIDI driver Arturia have devised for it: The VST version IS the MIDI driver as well!... Unfortunately, that means dealing with it in Reason is less straightforward than I would have hoped for. Is anyone working on a Remote Definition for it? It doesn't get recognized by Reason as a supported Arturia surface yet... There also seems to be some limitations as to how many computers the virtual version can be installed on... I was hoping to be able to use my Microsoft Surface Pro 6 as a patch development tool for when I'm away from the hardware synth and my MAC Mini OS X Catalina running Reason 12.5... Any fellow Minifreakers / Reasoners out there?
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