I bet people will do some cool stuff with it, a bit of a shame there isn’t a little more you can do to a sample before it hits the mixer… seems like you will really want to bake in most everything you want about your sound before it enters the smpltrek. I don’t really get the vibe this is a sampler for people who love samplers, its more a musicians writing/sketching tool.
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Build quality aside it’s a good product at a fair price from a small manufacturer and I have no doubt it’s going to get better.
More competition is always good, it forces established companies to up their games instead of relying on brand recognition to sell people half assed grooveboxes.
It does exactly what a sampler sequencer should do, record samples, play them polyphonically, chop beats, timestretch and sequence these samples. It’s crazy how some more expensive samplers don’t even do all that…
Being able to sequence external gear is a bonus.
I also like how the initial crowdfunding campaign focused on practicality and functions instead of trying to be too smart with “slick design”, which made the device easy to produce. Too often crowdfunding campaigns focus on the wrong thing, which leads to delays because of course slick designs aren’t realistic from cost perspective.
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while it seems like this device packs in a lot of features i’m a bit shocked by the price: 559€
mainly because this device looks and “feels” so cheap. it doesn’t look like it will be a lot of fun to make music on this.
BUT to mention something positive: the reception and reviews for this one seems better then for the liven devices
I got mine via Kickstarter and it was way cheaper than 559EUR, I paid the same-ish amount like the Circuit Rhythm (I’ll have to check what customs tax is also), but it looks decent so far. Can’t return it :)). It’s missing quite a few things for me to make it work but I suspect we’ll get there.
Even if I’ll end up using it as a glorified guitar looper, it’s still a win for me.
I was expecting more sound design options like the Digitakt though.
I have the M8 tracker too because I’m into portable music making machines, and honestly that still remains my number one. It has great synth engines, the sampler is actually a bit more powerful than this, the sequencer is bananas for coming up with great random ideas…
So the Smpltrek has quite the competition
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Oof £500 seems steep compared to the alternatives, I thought it was going to be about £350, I think they won’t be a big seller in the UK/Europe.
The global tracks with 3 takes each looks very nicely implemented and the sequencing looks quite nice too, but the tiny screen, build quality and basic sample editing are a bit disappointing.
To me it looks like it could do with an app to supplement its function and use in the creation phase, for performance it looks quite hands on though.
I’ll be interested to hear how users get on with these though.
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I don’t think it will sell well anywhere. Too much competition and not enough new ideas. For me the size is the biggest pro. But the tiny volca knobs that you have to use a lot for sample and sequence editing won’t feel great i think. And a sample machine without unquantized recording isn’t what beatmakers need. But it seems like it could be useful for recording synths and other instruments. Looks just a bit too fiddly for me though.
Opens Kickstarter update email:
“I would like to inform you that the well-known YouTubers have reviewed SmplTrek.”
Ooh exciting, I think. Clicks first link to reveal
Loopop - extensive, authoritative
Clicks second link…
Bobeats - earnest, likes a woolly jumper
Who will be behind the third link reveal? Huang? Our Ricky perhaps?
The third link reveals…
Blezz! 
.
.
.
(Don’t get me wrong, I like his videos, the intro is pretty funny. Just not what I was expecting. Fair play to Sonicware)
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My lack of interest stems from the quality of Sonicware hardware. I’ve purchased and repurchased different versions of their hardware brand new, and in each case something doesn’t work right.
- Power issues
- Keys not working
- Encoders failing
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It does seem to suffer in comparison to the (cheaper?) SP-404 MK2.
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Wow, 559€ seems like a lot for this product.
My understanding was that this product was designed specifically to undercut some of the other samplers on price, compromising on design or some higher-end features. Last I checked, it was $299 to early backers on Kickstarter, $399 for pre-orders, and $429 retail. My guess was that, like a lot of things, there will be a “street price” and it will be closer to $399 than $429. But maybe my understanding has been outdated.
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i kickstarted it for 300… it was right at the limit for what id pay for this device, and i was fully aware it may not live up to my needs and i was banking on being able to sell it used at around the same price… so thats why i jumped on it
honestly i was looking for it to do all kinds of things, but mainly as a very portable MIDI sequencer hub …
i was hoping for much more sample mangling (by resampling) capabilities - for some reason i was expecting an insert fx on every track instead of 1 total for the whole project
also the fact it lacks an unquantized record is a bit of a weakness, but im pairing it with other devices that also lack this, so not a huge deal
im still waiting on delivery… i will try to post a video at some point
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Ive also got the M8, and Id also say its probably in the top 3 electronic music gear Ive ever owned over the past few decades… its a life changer for me - but i also started out on trackers, so that is definitely part of it. other than that the raw capabilities are outstanding…
one thing i had not expected is how useful it is as a master transport while sequencing on PC stuff like Live or Bitwig… skipping around using the song position and so forth
most highly recommended gear of all time for tracker fans
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Got mine yesterday (early backer).
Some thoughts:
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Solidly built and the form factor, once you get used to it, is actually amazing to use just holding it in your hands like a big Gameboy. It’s actually really fun to use.
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Sound quality is good though, as noted in reviews, the timestretching isn’t going to blow you away. It’s functional without too much artifacting.
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The velocity pads are actually really good to finger drum on. At first I thought they’d be feeble but they’re nicely responsive and you can edit the response curve.
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Speed. The speed you can get around and do stuff is really good. The only caveat being creating and editing drum kits (later).
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FX - a decent bag of useable FX (though with more caveats). With EQ on each track (an array of EQ/filter types) and compressor on the master bus you can actually refine your track sound really nicely. I was surprised how good it can actually sound in this respect.
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Trimming and chopping samples. A couple of UI bugs aside it’s really quick to use. There’s also sometimes you can’t zoom in quite far enough especially with problematic loops (instruments) but once you have the muscle memory it’s an absolute breeze.
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Sequencer: at first I thought the 16 ‘scenes’ thing was going to be a stumbling block (song length) and while it’s a little simplistic, the way you can configure each ‘scene’ in terms of phrase lengths and repeats actually works really well.
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Copying and pasting etc. On the whole this is again really fast and intuitive once you understand the UI design ethos. There’s no undo though so don’t get carried away
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Size. It’s unfathomably small considering what you can do with it. Super portable.
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Ins and Outs: on the size thing, it’s amazing that you get two 1/4 inputs, two 3.5mm sockets (internal and external sync clock), two 1/4 balanced outputs, a headphone socket, internal microphone, internal speaker and two MIDI DIN sockets. Unreal!
There’s more but they are my immediate feelings with about 3 hours using it.
I’ll do a separate post with cons.
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Cons:
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It’s small! Even after seeing the videos and stuff I was still shocked how small the screen is. However! It is on the whole fairly well thought out (the screen) and 90% of the functions are fairly clear.
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Sophistication. In terms of sample mangling and processing it is rather unsophisticated. I can’t remember which review said it (possibly Cuckoo) but it’s strength isn’t as a performance device (though arguably there are some features that do work well as a performance - one-shot samples and the ability to mix the master bus with an aux input or aux audio file) but is actually really usable as a portable song creation tool.
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There are no LFOs. The envelopes are virtually none existent. There’s no parameter automation (beyond note volume, pan etc.) to speak of. I know there’s plan to expand that side of it but out of the box, right now, don’t be expecting a mini Digitakt. It isn’t (in performance/modulation/mangling repects).
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Loading times and non-realtime usage. Loading a lot of sample data (long samples) is slow. Plus there are several areas where either an operation cannot be performed while the sequencer is playing or the process is not real-time: yes, timestretching, I’m looking at you. Now, to be fair, if you take a view that it’s less of a ‘performance’ machine then preparing samples is part of any modern music-making endeavour and, to be fair, the Smpltrek doesn’t make that as painful as you might imagine. Given it’s diminutive size (and subsequent diminutive processing ability) it’s a fair trade off but it can be a little jarring.
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Sequence editing. I will preface this by separating sequencing into ‘creation’ and 'editing. On the ‘creation’ side, it’s actually quite fun to enter notes into the sequences: either real-time or step method. However, and this could possibly be my biggest gripe with the Smpltrek right now - you cannot actually edit the notes in a sequence once you’ve created them. You can delete them, sure. But you can’t, say, move a note horizontally (time) or vertically (pitch). I’ve read every page of the manual and tried every logical button combo but there is no way to edit sequencer notes. I’d love someone to prove me wrong here.
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Sample editing limitations. In generally, zooming and moving around a sample to edit the start/end/loop points is nicely implemented. However I quickly stumbled across some odd limitations. There is a minimum loop length for example. It’s not explained anywhere but you can zoom in and get to a point where you can’t move the start/end/loop markers any closer. Seems odd. Also with a looped sample (for an Instrument) you can’t have a loop that starts at the start of the sample. There has to be a portion at the start that doesn’t loop. I mean I like that you do have the function to have an an ‘attack’ and loop portion but I’d like that to be my choice rather than being forced.
My laptop battery is running out so I’ll stop here for the time being. I might add more. I know the cons looks bigger than my Pros but I wanted to explain in a bit more detail about the cons as I think that’s more useful in assessing the device. Also bear in mind that this is still technically being developed so…you know…cut it some slack as it as a Song Mode right from day one
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i like how cuckoo is the only one with decent track
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Honestly, I’m glad I didn’t jump on this. It’s well over priced for what it is (they’re £488 in the U.K. street price) and it seems a bit crap.
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I was in first backer batch and think it was about £260
I cancelled though because I got an Octatrack few weeks later
Would have happily paid 260 but not 500
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…this little sonic fella is uberobviously cheap, small and universal…
a perfect substitute for all who can’t afford teenage engineerings op1…
or don’t wanna mess up mash up with 404’s…
at this pricetag, it’s pretty fake snobbish to complain about any of it’s downsides…really.
at least if u don’t have to purchase it in british pounds…almost 500 pounds for this ???
well, then, it’s indeed nothing but another overpriced piece of handy plasticwaste…
oops…just realized it’s more than 500 bux in euros, too…
so, oook…i’m too old anyways, for another little toy with a super tiny display…
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