Ultranova?

[Mr_-G-]

Hi,
Has anybody played/tried the Novation Ultranova? Any comments on this synth? Many thanks.

[DJKeys]

Here is a user on Gearslutz who did a review:

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/electron ... anova.html

[Frantz]

British design, so its top
I remember putting my hands in a shop on a Blofeld, a Mininova, a Ultranova, a Virus Snow, a microKorg, one day. Bought none of them.
Was looking for pads, synth strings, leads and jamiroquai like sounds.
The Ultranova came first in my heart.
Blofeld second.
It's so hard (impossible) to make a decision when you don't own the synth for at least a few days.
It's a 300 £ budget (depends on the offer : used, demoed, brand new ...).

[Mr_-G-]

I remember putting my hands in a shop on a Blofeld, a Mininova, a Ultranova, a Virus Snow, a microKorg, one day. Bought none of them.

Ha ha!
I recently saw a demo somewhere in youtube and it did not sound bad at all.
It's a shame that it is a 3 oct keyboard. It does not have enough buttons but looking in their website, the architecture seemed quite good (3 osc, hidden osc sync, two filters, 4 lfos, quite a few EGs, effects). It all looked too good to be true for the price.
I borrowed a microKorg from a friend and did not like it that much. I had a hard time understanding the interface. Instead modular architecture is (to me) easy to visualise. Endless button combinations are just a pain in the neck.
Thanks for the comments!

[rb4u1]

Is there one that does Brass well ?

[raomcz]

I've used a Ultranova since last year. I bought in BHPhotoVideo NYC with a special price $499 (same price of Mininova on that time)!

I´ve used with Stage 2 HA 76 in two ways:

1 - As a Controller, using the synth keybed style to play solos/rifs (size of the keys is great).
2 - As a second board to make some Pads and Synth sounds layers.
3 - Touch function, give you some nice effects/transformations to the sound...

If you compare with VST Spectrasonics Omnishpere, Omnisphere is years ahead on Pad, Strings and overall sounds. The great advantage is that you could download new sounds from Novation (som new packs are there)...

Overall, it´s a great Synth for the price...

[Gustavo]

I used to own an Ultranova when it came out. I returned it shortly afterwards. I personally think that your money is better served with things like the Microkorg XL+, but it is mostly a matter of taste.

Also it all boils down to what you want it for. My current personal budget synth favorites at the moment are the Korg Volca synths. They are just crazy good sounding, just look at this:

They sound good, maybe even too good for the price! I own the volca bass (my favorite of the trio) and it has been more inspiring to me than the microkorg and mopho I own and specially the Ultranova I used to have.