Superbooth 23: Arturia intros the MicroFreak firmware 5.0, turning its Freak synth into a granular sampler & new Stellar special edition.
Update: Arturia MicroFreak firmware 5.0 is available now.
The MicroFreak is one of the most fascinating hybrid synthesizers today. It’s already a classic. The freaky little hybrid synth is powered by various unique algorithms that can be refined with an analog Oberheim-style filter and played via an expressive touch keyboard.
Arturia has put a lot of love into the synth with constant free updates over the last few years. With these, the developer has massively increased the creative value of the synth. For Superbooth 23, the freak journey continues. Arturia probably shows the most significant and impressive update so far its MicroFreak. With firmware 5.0, they bring a 4-voice sampler engine with granular synthesis to the firmware and much more.
Arturia MicroFreak Firmware 5.0
Before questions arise, the MicroFreak you see in the picture is the new Stellar special edition that will also be presented at Superbooth 23. A very nice, playful, and funny design. Just like the new firmware 5.0.
Firmware 5.0 is again a free update for every existing MicroFreak user. And it will turn the MicroFreak on its head and create a massive plus for users. I didn’t believe it initially, but the developers added a sampler engine and granular synthesis with firmware 5.0. On top, you get internal sample memory for your own samples for up to 3 minutes.
It adds four new engines to the algorithm list. First, you get a more or less traditional 4-voice sampler with the ability to tweak the sample length, etc. Powerful is that you can modulate everything and route it through the Oberheim-style analog filter. So you get a sampler plus an analog filter.
Granular Engines
Next, you get three new granular engines you can explore with the built-in content or your custom samples. It offers a scan grains engine that goes in the direction of vintage time-stretching. Then, the cloud grains is more the classic granular engine with an addition chaos generator. Third and last is the hit grains engine which is made for percussive and clicky sounds. Very unique.
That’s not all. Firmware 5.0 also adds random per-key modulation for super wild sounds and an option to unlock snappy envelopes. Further, they expanded the patch memory to 512 presets slots. And you get 64 new prestes showing the features in action.
I made a video demo for these new fantastic engines.
The new Arturia MicroFreak 5.0 firmware will be available as a free update on May 30th, 2023. The new Stellar version will be available soon as a limited edition for 339€.
More information here: Arturia
Available here for pre-order
waw, nice update. Truely an experimental synth but useful in productions as well
The update is cool no doubt but Arturia did not add “sampling” as a feature, they added sample playback (aka they made it a “rompler”). For a device to be considered a “sampler” it needs to actually sample and Microfreak still does not do that.
it’s a sampler engine where you work with samples. A rompler is fixed environment, they are fixed in the ROM where you can’t change samples Here you can import your own sounds.
killer!
muss ich am wochenende gleich ausprobieren!
<3
kannst du noch nicht. Kommt erst am 30 Mai offiziell raus 🙂
It is a pity you can’t use the vocoder microphone to input samples. Or can you?
no, you can’t. Samples are imported via the MCC software
This feature could be fantastic but i doubt this is implanted…
Is this update coming to the Mini Freak as wsell?
don’t know sorry
ability to work with samples does not make it a “sampler”. the device cannot sample- it’s a sample editing/ playback device. (mc-101 can load samples but it’s not a sampler. but it can internally sample. digitakt is a true sampler) I’m surprised you don’t know this synthanatomy. and you doubled-down on your incorrect answer.
I said it in my video “more precisely sample playback engine”. I often refer to the software world where there are many plugin samplers that cannot sample themselves but are called samplers due of the nature of the engine: sample manipulation, sample playback etc. Yes, you are right sampler in the hardware world refers mostly to a “sampling” device