It does look neat, but if I'm going to dink with hardware I need something that says "I will sound as good as the best VSTs in your plugin toolbox, yet take up no CPU". The audio demos on this puppy did not grab my interest, then there was this:

"MiniBrute comes with no electronic presets. You build yourself every sound you hear. Believe us, this is fun, this is creative and this helps make better music (and honestly, this is not harder than browsing sub-menus). Now of course you can still play sounds made by other programmers. And you can store your sounds. How is that ? Arturia delivers preset sheets that fit on the surface of the MiniBrute. Following instructions set on the preset sheets, you get a preset sound in a minute. And if you want to store your sound, just take one of the blank sheets and write your marks. "

Cute. But only two octaves, lol?

The Moog Minitaur looks and sounds great.

I'd love for Access to release a oscillator waveform designer for Virus, then I'd sell a kidney. Cherry on the top would be if it sported the whiteout scheme. :)

Does look cute, lack of preset recall is an instant killer for me for what I would mainly want it for (additional live synth on stage).

Minitaur is mighty tempting!

As far as Access updates/bugs, guess we will see what happens, if anything. That said the only problem I get with mine is the occasional clock slip out of time.

Of course the Minibrute is just cute, nothing more ;) That's the reason I chose my description carefully!

I think this is a concept similar of the Roland Gaia, with no presets or LCD screen and every single parameter with a dedicated knob/controller... But this one has got 100% analog path, super portable, nice keybed action (but I prefer 37 keys) and it seems built like a tank (just like the Virus). All of those points make the Arturia Minibrute to look more desirable in comparison with the Roland Gaia. And it's on a similar price range. Maybe this is a great beginner 100% analog synth to learn programming...

But I still think it looks quite cute :rolleyes:

The Minitaur is for sure destined for my music room. The MiniBrute is still a big maybe, but I do like this analog revival we've got going on this year.

^ Waldorf Pulse 2


^ Korg SV-1 (Stage Vintage) Piano


^ Korg Monotron Duo (two-osc analog synth with MS-20 filter) and Monotron Delay (one-osc analog synth with MS-32 filter and space echo)


^ Moog Minitaur


^ Arturia Minibrute


^ Nord Virtual Dum

Would be nice if Access branched out from the same Virus line all the time. I don't think they innovate (in sonic terms) as much as they could.


^ Nord Piano 2


^ Nord C2D, dual-manual organ with drawbars


^ ho ho, Casio XW-P1 and XW-G1.


VA, PCM, noise, drawbar organ, also with waves from CZ.


^ Jomox Moonwind analogue filter with seq

so... I was right :( nothing new from our beloved manufacturer this winter indeed... :/ the preceding inactivity on FB before NAMM somehow already suggested me that or maybe I'm a Jedi, not to mention the more and more suspicious unsuccessful Google searches throughout the show...

I refuse to buy another casio haha

I am also hyped on a lot of the iPad development

I'll have one soon

A company that stops innovating is pretty much doomed. I've worked in countless technology organizations that exhibit the same outwardly visibile symptoms Access is displaying today, and I could write a book on what leads to the decline of a tech industry leader. I of course have no insight on what is really going on with Access right now or if they are really on the decline, but I do know that I've always been fascinated at how synth manufacturers never seem to be able to uphold their mojo.

For example, why is it that today we cannot buy something like a JP-8000 on steroids? Instead, Roland comes out with some piece of crap synth and slaps the Jupiter name on it, almost mocking one of the greatest synths every created. I would be impressed with Roland if they still made the original JP-8000 for example. Yet, nobody ever does that. As soon as they have a great product, you can rest assured it will find a place in a museum somewhere but that not only will that product not evolve into better offspring of same, that they won't even be able to sustain same!

In technology and engineering in general, I have watched so many companies take a product about 90% of the way to perfection, then abandon the last ten percent because the last 10 percent is the hardest to pull off. Or in some cases, upper management says "well, we've got the product we want now, we just have to sell it harder" so they start laying off the engineers that know how the product works and start filling their seats with more salesmen. Problem is, that last 10 percent of bug fixes was never worked out, and the collateral damage from such catasrophic management decisions is too great, the aftershock lingers, the product goes in the museum of technology history of great things that might have been.

I hate to seem down on the Virus but I was really looking forward to what they might announce. I know there is that .0001% they can make a liar out of me and introduce something outside the NAMM window, maybe later this year, but I get the feeling there was a bunch of folks that got tired of standing on a sinking ship and have moved on. Maybe they perceived the soft synth movement to be unstoppable, so what is the point of working on Total Integration and Virus Control and getting them actually working?

+1
Not only going after the money and releasing a 'master of nothing jack of all trades' palette of unfinished products is disgusting and disappointing, but abandoning them as well... mainly support-wise.

The situation now with Access is not that serious at all, I'm just simply disappointed because I've been waiting for months for something big from them in vain :)