Arturia MicroFreak

Portray · February 1, 2019, 7:48am

First of all I must say that you guys at Arturia has really made something interesting and unique with the MicroFreak. 11 different types of oscillators in such a small package are really something special combined with the analog filter and mod matrix!

I just have 3 questions.
Why does it have so few preset slots?

Is it possible to delete the factory presets in order to store your own presets in all of the preset slots?

I noticed that it only has one master output. Will everything be in mono including the pad sounds?

Thanks in advance!

rcmusic · February 1, 2019, 8:15am

Thanx a lot for your answer, 256 seems ok (for me) as long as presets can be rewritten

Prints · February 1, 2019, 1:46pm

256 presets is A-ok. Let’s not forget this is the same company that only put enough memory for 8 patterns on the keystep, and that the new Korg Volcas still only have enough memory for 16 presets. Even the new Elektron M:S only has 96 patterns.

jeye_musik · February 1, 2019, 9:59pm

I am also thinking that 256 patches is mighty-fine… I can understand being miffed if it was 32 or under but if I’m being curiously pragmatic self I’m thinking that with 256 patches I can use the MF for 5 parts in a song and I’ll still be able to write 50ish songs. Or, even if I’m just demo’ing the patches and spending only 30 seconds per patch I’ll be there for a couple of hours. Unsure I’ve got that kind of stamina…

Skippit · February 1, 2019, 10:14pm

As long as you can overwrite factory presets then 256 is all good.

GDarcey · February 1, 2019, 10:21pm

Thanks. I have moved on from Arturia…I am not working with them, I just forgot to update my Linkedin dates.
I did start this project back in 2016 as a NanoBrute but we could not get the OSC price down so we switched to the digital osc concept in Jan 2017. I left at the end of November 2017 and Seb took over. I’m not sure when the Mutable code concept started.
Seb is really good and has great ideas. He was 100% the guy on Pigments, 95% the guy on Minibrute 2, Buchla V, etc. and he has had his hand in most products since he started. He was my right hand guy and I look forward to what he comes up with in the future for sure.

I am starting a new brand with Medeli and we will probably launch our first products in May.

Best,
Glen

Jukka · February 1, 2019, 10:33pm

Really looking forward to this. Must be interesting to start things clean sheet with them, and build a team there. Have fun with this all.

I will be looking for the news starting in May.

jeye_musik · February 1, 2019, 10:42pm

I really enjoyed your post. In a number of subtle ways it illustrates the effort and hard work associated with developing a product - which is so helpful when you have clowns diminishing that effort to somehow equate using some open-source code as meaning the product development is a doddle.

I look forward to hearing about your new endeavours in due course and hope you’ll be doing the tutorial vids for it. Your Synthesiser Patel reference remains a high tide line in synth tutorials!

plusn · February 1, 2019, 11:18pm

Check the facts. Its: 96x96=9216 Patterns…

Prints · February 1, 2019, 11:36pm

I was referring to the number of patterns accessible at one time. Saying the M:S has 9,216 patterns is pointless when 9,120 of those patterns are stuck in totally separate projects stored on the +drive imo.

jeye_musik · February 1, 2019, 11:54pm

When you say “stuck in totally separate projects” it makes it sound like an odysseus-ish quest to load a new project… sure, if the M:S was your only piece of gear and you were wanting a continuous stream of sound while you’re playing live it’s curtains here. But for any “studio” situation or playing live with one other piece of gear to cover the project load time doesn’t seem so tricky…

Prints · February 2, 2019, 12:03am

Ok, fine. It has 9,216 patterns.

GDarcey · February 2, 2019, 12:41am

Thank you.
Nice to see someone caught the Synthesizer Patel reference.

plusn · February 2, 2019, 12:58pm

It Sure doesnt.

finalform · February 2, 2019, 2:25pm

Never forget the Roland System-1 launched with eight patch memory slots.

olibol · February 2, 2019, 2:51pm

2 things I found not so good on the MF: (checked Plaits on a friends modular)

-Same four knobs to control the different modes but each mode has different functions of knobs on Plaits so that would be the same on MF! With plaits you can’t see what the knobs do unless you learn all functions and stick them in your head, same with MF? Or can you see the function of each orange knob on the screen when you turn them? It would have been way better to not have text under the orange knobs but 4 tiny screens that shows what the knobs function is! Anyway at that price can’t have it all!

-Don’t like the ADSR layout, it’s A D/R S and filter amount is the 4th knob, going to be very confusing in a dark place! And to work with release you probably need to press shift.

Skippit · February 2, 2019, 3:12pm

Maybe they’ll have some info on the display but with plaits and op-1 I actually liked the way that with the 4 knobs doing different thinsgs depending on the engine, it feels different to normal param tweaking and you don’t neccesarily tweak in the same way that you would other synths. Feels more organic, like forming something out of play-doh or something. I like the idea of MF having that same kind of feel when sound designing on it.

Glad that not ‘all’ synths are this way, but I like that some of them are…

olibol · February 2, 2019, 3:16pm

yes but then the sounddesign seems like more trial and error which can be good in certain ways to have more happy accidents etc, same with OP1 and Plaits. But anyway i’m not here to complain, just some things I saw when thinking about performance/jam options/etc

dtr · February 2, 2019, 3:29pm

A playful synth like this would be all about the happy accidents for me.

ronsun · February 19, 2019, 6:23pm