Syntronik 2 Review

[Barton Ostby]

The various screens are accessed via a series of icons along the top of the Syntronik window, which provides easy access to the presets, arranged by style, synth type, character, etc. These icons also pull up the corresponding screens for creating splits, layers, creating four independent arpeggiators, the effects section, and settings. Of course they also provide access to now-ubiquitous in-app purchase for additional synths. Interestingly, while we were in the process of conducting this review, IK Multimedia released another 300 presets that were just a free download away.

The effects feature five slots with pull-down menus to load whatever effect you want. You can drag-and-drop to re-arrange the sequence of effects, a feature update that wasn't present in the first release, but was incorporated in a subsequent update (so if you're still running version 1.0, here's another reason to install the updates).

Speaking of slots, there are four instrument slots, labeled A-D at the top of the screen. You can load an instrument into one of these slots, and have four in total. The layer/split page was easy to use, showing four keyboards that we could select regions within to show the range of each synth in a multi-sound. We loved that four synths could each have up to five effects apiece!

Perhaps the most fun was being able to run four independent arpeggiators attached to four different synths. This is where, we think, Syntronik separates itself from the pack, as you can do some very cool, interesting things here. We layered an OB-xa, Arp 2600, and a Prophet-5 as a multi-sound, with independent arpeggiators. A little cacophony goes a long way!

We admit when we heard about Syntronik, we were curious but skeptical. Nothing against IK Multimedia, but with so many soft synth emulations of vintage gear available, what does Syntronik bring to the table? Well, it brings some solid sounds. Lots of them, actually.

iPad

There are just barely fewer presets on the iPad than the computer version, but the included presets are taken from the original collection. When we compared the same presets between iPad and computer, there was little difference to be heard. We hooked up our excellent Shure SRH940 headphones to both our computer interface and our iPad in order to make objective comparisons.

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