Novation Peak- not impressed

[zerocrossing]

How do folks feel about this synth now? I'm in the middle of a toss up between the Peak, a DSI-Rev2 desktop

Listen to this
https://youtu.be/IK9_kUWUUzc?t=8m1s
and this
https://youtu.be/lNZ83epRGQE

For me the Novation PEAK sounds a *lot* better...

BTW, Novation can improve and add new tricks to the PEAK´s FPGAs.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Field-pro ... gate_array

I have to agree with you. To be honest, I haven't seen anything yet that really impresses me regarding the Rev 2, as much as I want to really like it (the modulation heavy patches don't grab me much, and the Rev 2 always sounds "dark"). Now, the Pro 2....that's a different story. Even though it's only 4 voice Paraphonic, it may very well be the only thing that gives the Peak a run for its money (at 700 dollars more than the peak but, with a keyboard). I keep hearing stories about the Peak having issues for some people which makes me question what kind of quality control is going on at Novation. The FGPA sounds like a real game changer though

After being disappointed by the Peak, I did end up with the Pro 2. I really like it, although there are limits to the paraphony due to the oscillators that make it less than the synth I thought I was buying. I thought that you’d be able to morph between superwaves so you’d be able to get that dual detuned oscillator sound while moving between the waveforms. You can’t. Still, the sound is a lot more interesting to me than the Peak.

As for the REV 2, it’s such a different animal that I don’t think it deserves to be in this conversation. I don’t have it, but I do have two Tetras, and I really like the sound. It’s not as warm and hi-fi sounding like the Pro 2/Prophet 6/OB-6 filter, but it’s got a great buzzy kind of quirk to the tone. I wouldn’t want it as my only analog poly, but as another tool at my disposal, it’s great. It makes it into a lot of my music. Actually the Tempest and Poly Evolver are more suited to this conversation. I’d love the Poly Evolver but I feel they’re too expensive for the voice count. I ended up with a Tempest instead and I really love it.

Lately the Korg Prologue has my attention. As far as the tone goes, they totally nailed it for me. It’s really want I look for in a hybrid. My issues are that it’s got a 61 key keyboard... that lacks aftertouch. So, it can’t replace my main controller and I’m plumb out of space. I’m also not quite sure why they went with such a cool digital oscillator section... and gave a whopping one LFO with a single destination to work with. It’s like they spent all their time on the oscillator and filter and then said, “we’re done. Throw one of our effect processors on it and let’s ship it.” I may end up with it anyway... but I’m not quite sure what I’d part with to scare up the funds. Definitely not the Pro 2.

[eXode]

I think this demo greatly demonstrate the Peak's capabilities in doing "classic" sounds. The type of sounds I was wondering about since I've heard so many other digital or harsh sounding patches. I think it sounds good, would definitely consider it over i.e. the REV2.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKssAN1cXKo

[EvilDragon]

OK it actually sounds pretty great in that video!

[transmetropolitan]

I'm slightly surprised that they haven't (so far as I can see) added more wavetables yet...

[Jax Pok]

I'm really impressed by some of the YouTube videos my Peak is arriving tomorow.

[Jax Pok]

Had my Peak a week I can't get off it superb sound great to create sounds with it does the Blade Runner CS-80 opening lead really well.

[Jax Pok]

Made this preset from init, added Exponential Audio R4 reverb, only Peak delay is used. I added some voice drift and diverge in Peak menu to get the oscillators more like VCOs. I think Soundcloud converts uploads to 128kbps Mp3
https://soundcloud.com/user-423995746/novation-peak-pad

[Sequent]

Thanks for sharing, Jax Pok! Even though it's been through Soundcloud, the gist of the sound still comes through. Very nice! This and that video, as well as your excitement have me interested in Peak once more.

[PatrickW]

Since the price of the Peak went down, I bought one two days ago.

My first impressions :
- The build quality feels great
- It's very intuitive and a bliss to create sounds
- The oscillators sound very clean
- It has a fantastic bottom end sound, but for creating snappy powerfull analog sounding bass sounds, it does not seem the right synth
- There is a lot of hidden power, since you have a virtual sync osc for each of the 3 oscillators, so you don't need to sacrifice an osc to get that sync sound
- You can create a sort of supersaw, which produces very wide and powerfull sounds if you do that with all 3 osc combined with unison
- The filter is more suitable for polyphonic sounds than for mono sounds. It's lacks some of the raw power of the Bass Station
- The free standalone library software works a treat
- The built in distortion and overdrive help to roughen up the sounds, but it is not always a pleasing sound
- The combination Peak + Analog Heat seems to be ideal : put some Heat saturation on the Peak and suddenly, the synth starts to sound a lot more organic and lively
- As far as I can see, you can't use the effect parameters as a destination in the mod matrix, but I see that they are in the midi table, so I guess you can modulate the effects from your DAW

Conclusion : without the Analog Heat, I would not advise the synth, except when you are looking for a clean sound.
But combined with some saturation box or plugin, it really is a programmers dream.

[EvilDragon]

I think Peak's built-in drive circuits are very good. It's all a matter of tweaking. While external saturation can possibly yield better results, you can't store that along with a preset...


Oh, and reverb on the Peak is beeeeee-aaaa-utiful.

- The filter is more suitable for polyphonic sounds than for mono sounds. It's lacks some of the raw power of the Bass Station

This is a standard occurence on great majority of polyphonic synths. Having a monosynth gainstaging and filter design in a polyphonic synth can quickly get quite overbearing and nigh impossible to mix. Example: Memorymoog. It's simply TOO fat (yes, that's possible).



I would say that without Analog Heat, Peak is still a great synth. It's not a necessity to have an external drive box. There are videos out there that confirm this notion.

[PatrickW]

I think Peak's built-in drive circuits are very good. It's all a matter of tweaking. While external saturation can possibly yield better results, you can't store that along with a preset...

Oh, and reverb on the Peak is beeeeee-aaaa-utiful.

I'm going to experiment somewhat more with the built in drive circuits, but there is a big chance that my Analog Heat has found its sparring partner for the next years

And the reverb on the Peak is indeed great !

[EDGEK8D]

This synth is rather polarizing. I see several people with tons of hardware who swear its their favorite modern poly they’ve ever owned. Other people seem totally unimpressed. I haven’t had the chance to try one, but on paper its what I’ve really wanted, a high quality digital poly with analog filters and analog distortion.

Those oscillators are really quite good with FM it seems. Most digital oscillators fall apart with audio rate stuff.

I already have a Blofeld too....and it’s the one thing that keeps me from getting a Peak. Blofeld’s filters do not suck, and there are two of them per voice which opens up a ton kf possibilities. While its a pain to program, it has a much better arp/seq as well. That said, the Blofeld’s VA sounds while decent, do not sound as good as Peaks. The Blofeld’s fx are nowhere near as good though. PLUS the Peak interface is far prefferable.

If Novation deceds to do a SuperPeak....ala Nova became Supernova....with 5 octave keybed, more voices, multitimbrality, and a better sequencer, I’m definitely not going to pass that up. Its clear that Novation was trying to keep the price down in the current market, which is fine, I get it. I think it’s priced fairly.

[EvilDragon]

Those oscillators are really quite good with FM it seems. Most digital oscillators fall apart with audio rate stuff.

Because Peak's oscillators are calculated at 20 MEGAhertz.

[SJ_Digriz]

I see several people ... who swear its their favorite modern poly they’ve ever owned. Other people seem totally unimpressed.

That pretty describes every item ever discussed on the internet.

[EDGEK8D]

I see several people ... who swear its their favorite modern poly they’ve ever owned. Other people seem totally unimpressed.

That pretty describes every item ever discussed on the internet.

No.....I’m talking people with thousands of youtube subscribers, patch designers, etc...