Novation A-Station

Simple and easy, nice to work with.

Vocoder, about the rest I don't know

I love the novation staff. I own several synths, but I realy dig the a-station, I can program it in no time and get exciting new sounds. I especially like the vocoder on this unit, it sounds better then my alesis micron. You can achieve almost any synthetic sound you can imagine, also it will take a little while for programming.

So far I had no issues with it. It seems to be a sturdy box. Yes I would use it on a gig without backup.

Don't know, never had any problems

If it were stolen, I would get it again. I've been playing for about 15 years. I own a korg wavestation, alesis micron, yamaha mm6, alesis s4, clavia nord electro, novation xio synth.

I love the ease of use, there's nothing that I realy hate about it.
It is a very creative tool for me and inspired me to a bunch of new songs.

Its Split. i could say that its easy because of the font panel. however i could also say its not because of the led menu. You will need a manual for as they put it "advanced" editing. which is really things that youll need regardless. However for its price range what is available in the font makes it about equal when you consider everything.

polophony is low.
effects are decent. once again when you consider the used price these go for there damn good.
no expansion.
my big gripe is no real software editing is available. theres one out there but 99 percent of the time it will not work for you.
the arp is beautiful. great.

well when i got it i was not impressed. it wasnt all that amazing off the bat. but once i read the manual and started making patches i was very impressed. this machine can do alot for its price range. kinda like a nord lead 1 with effects. people will gripe and say what they want but when you consider the price and the size (1u rack space) there isnt much that compares out there to this one. yeah sorry but knocking everything doesnt really make you a synth god. people will knock anything and everything on here. some things deserve it some dont. i feel like this one should have a much higher score. i have found that using two occilators instead of three makes your patch a bit warmer. three tends to become very digital sounding. the fm part is excellent for those who want a lil fm in there setup every once in a while. ive had synth that were real pieces of crap. i bought a sh 201 and returned it within 12 hours. that was crap. considering the closest synth to this is a waldorf micro q(600.000 or a nord lead 1 (600.00) and you can get almost 4 of these for that used. well i think it deserves a bit more props. like i said the editing sucks. however once you get it down like all other synths its a breeze. but dont be lazy and use presets. if your gonna do that why even own a synth?

seems very reliable like the other stations. i own bass,a, and drum.

if i lost it i would get another in a heartbeat. i think they got it down perfect. if it did more it would go for more used wouldnt it?

i also own a jv-1080 which i believe to be the most underrated synth of all time. i got it for 225. a big difference from the 1000+ they sold for new. i try to go for the less trendy gear when buying synths. that way i can get more for my buck. i dont pay more than 300 for a used synth. my bass station is the only one i broke that rule on. it was because analog bass synths arnt cheap anymore. and i perfer digital occilators anyway to voltage occilators. there too unstable for me. i bought this bacause for its price nothing else out there compares. this is a slimmed down supernova. the supernova goes for 600 + . think about that. just because a synth is expensive doesnt ever mean its better. perfect case in point the tb303.

my current list of gear is
mpc2000
roland r-8m
drum station
bass station
a station
roland m-vs1
jv-1080
roland mks 50
ensoniq dp/4
and i didnt pay over 300 for any of them. so dont always listen to the popular opinion. most of the time thats what drives pieces of crap like the korg poly 800 to go for more than a synth like this. dont get me wrong the poly has its good sides. but is it better than an a station? i dont think so.

Not to difficult, reading the manual helps of course. I already have the software version of the A and K, the V station, so I already had one foot on the ladder.
Presets sound great, but I love creating my own or building from the current patches.

Loads of hands on controls! Plenty of knobs. Good midi impletation. Wish it had a software editor though.
Its not multitimbral but thats no skin off my nose. I usually do single track recording anyway.
Very good in-house effects.

Beautiful! I love the liquid filters. This little box can either sound like smooth ice crystals or just plain dirty! Its just fab at producing TB303 sounds. One of the best.
I Have other synths in my arsenal, including an Access Virus TI keyboard, Korg Triton Extreme and a Yamaha MO6. The A station complements all these. As with the Virus, it has a sound of its own and a great one at that.

Yes, without a shadow of a doubt! Solid unit. But its Novation... I would'nt expect anthing less from them.

100% fantastic! I used to own a second hand Supernova II. One of the ends was badly cracked (previous owner) so I emailed Novation to see if they had a replacment.
The postman was knocking on my door the next day with a spare part in a box.
They never asked for money, just my address! Plus they gave me some spare knobs to boot!
Now thats what I called customer service!!!

If it was stolen, I'd hunt them down for sure!
As mentioned above, this complements my other hardware synths very well (and software).
I love almost everything about it apart from the menu's but the quality of build and sound makes up for it 100 fold.
I choose this synth because I already had a V Station (vsti version) and loved the sound of that and previously a Supernova II.
I would love to get TC Electronics Powercore firewire rack unit and if I do, I would also buy the V station on that to. But I would still use the A station, its just a great synth.

Very easy to use

Responds well to touch, This has some nice Analog sounds in it. It can do 303 sounds as well as nice Oberheim string sounds.

Rock Solid

Great synth, forget the price. It has effects and sound great. Only 8 voices, but a welcome addition.

The interface is tricky at first but you do get used to what those digits mean. Got it as soon as it came out.

Nice delay and distortion effects. Upgrading system is easy.

This is a nice sounding synth. Pads and bass are very warm and full sounding. Great for effects.

Like the idea of using flash memory for patch storage, don't need to worry about battery failure or replacement.

Just wish Novation would make patch making software like Korg did with their Microkorg. Did suggest it to Novation but they never replied.

This is a nice sounding synth. And at the current prices would get one again. Not really a replacement for your bass station range as the sound synthesis is different. If you can get around the cost cutting menus style its a bargain for quality sounds. Have used it quite a lot in my music and you can check it out at myspace website- mdx

OS2.1
Without time, patience and a thorough read of the manual it is impossible to unlock the features under the covers. The A-Station provides a limited two-character display. If there were a software editor available, it would probably be much easier to control this synth.
The manual is comprehensive and seems to be complete.

The A-Station is NOT multitimbral, but provides 8 note polyphony.
The A-Station has three powerful oscillators, a low-pass filter, two ADSR envelopes, two LFOs and a good effects section. There are seven effects in total: stereo delay, reverb, chorus/phaser, distortion, auto-pan, EQ and a 12-band vocoder.
1U rack format, MIDI IN/OUT/THRU.

Rich sounds, powerful synthesis. It works well for all electronic music styles (dance, hiphop, trance,...), but is NOT designed for playing natural sounds.

Seems to be solid.

An up-to-date website is available.

For this price, I probably would buy it again.

Lates OS.

Presets.... Let's talk about presets. Many years ago, I would buy a synth and immediately delete all the presets. I would labour night after night on sound design, until my eyes were red and my sequencer fed up from the same loop. Now, this was also in the days before computer editor/librarians, so this was no minor feat to "master the beast." I would assemble an arsenal of original and insane sounds. I have done this for everything from Minimoogs and Prophet-5s through to DX7s and samplers. Eventually, a some things occurred to me. Such as: most of these awesome sounds actually weren't terribly useful in a mix. Sounded great over the monitors at 3AM, but when the song started to come together, the stage started to get a bit crowded, so to speak. So these days, I generally will dial through a box's presets to find something slightly close to what I want, and not worry about tweaking until I get close to tracking. And you know what? There's plenty of useful sonic "departure points" that ship with this machine. And they do a good job of describing pretty much the range of what this box can do. Yes, you can always make hideous and waped sounds with it, and, no, most folks don't ship with that kind of thing. You know why? Because a hideous and warped sound is *only cool if you make it yourself.* Nobody will like someone else's hideous and warped patch (until, of course, it has been immortalized in a distributed recording). Nothing wrong with that. Just an observation.

Now, I do wish there was an editor available for this. Yes, it sure has knobs, and when it comes to the aforementioned tweaking stage, I love this box. But I also wouldn't mind getting an idea of the hows and whats of the patches, and there really isn't an easy way to do that (this is the unobvious benefit of the menu-driven interface--you can actually take a look at the values and routings and understand a bit about what does what). Experimenting with the modulation matrix is not much fun with just the LEDs, so I look at this machine as a "presets I can tweak a bit" box more than a sound design tool.

The manual is great. Would go well with an editor :-)

Polyphony, effects, MIDI, all par for the course. Arpeggiator is fun and surprisingly useful (can't explain it; some arps are just fun and therefoe inspiring).

I know the A Station can send all kinds of controller stuff out; I suppose for live tweaks going to the sequencer it could be quite cool; one rainy day I'll play with that. For now, I use it downstream of my MIDI controllers and sequencers, and use programmable knobs to send tweaks.

The A Station sounds clean, solid, and useable. If it suffers from any weakness, it is that it doesn't sound "alive." It covers all the bases, and produces very effective tones and noises, but it hasn't really surprised me yet. Now, this is a good thing, especially from a studio tweaking point of view. But when I hit a dead end, I often turn to my synths to scramble some sounds, and I haven't really created anything that was particularly unique or unexpected on the A Station. Yet. Maybe I haven't hooked into its engine yet. But there is something decidely "safe" sounding about it. I would sugest that if you are looking for aweful, squelchy burps and howls (al la MS-20), then keep looking. If you are looking for something that is going to sound analog in a musical way, this is really an excellent value, especially if you are not a hardcore programmer.

I have no reason to believe that this would not last on the road if well racked, but I limit my live rig to a few, steel-cased machines, with screws on the knobs, and trust nothing less. More than once I've had to defend myself at gigs with my keyboard, and can't see using this to threaten anyone :-)

Excellent. I've had some knobs fall off, and two days after an email, I had the full chain of their support network posting me replacements with spares, no charge. Thumbs up, folks!

I would replace it; it fills an important niche in my studio. However, I might be temped into something with a less cryptic display (or made entirely of steel) should I find myself shopping; the Roland JP-8080 intrigues me, and if Alesis ever ported its Ion to a rackmount, that also would get my attention. As it stands, I use this thing a lot, and often is the first box I fire up when sketching a song. I have even considered picking up a second one. I looked long and hard at the Korg MS2000 before picking up the A Station, and finally decided that the A Station would be more useful, if perhaps less sonically surprising.

I have been somewhat spoiled by my Nord Modular insofar as sound design goes, and I have a few "real" analogs kicking around (I use my Matrix 1000 all the time), and this machine holds it own (it actually makes the analogs sound kinda muffled). I run percussion loops out of Reason, and use an Korg ESX-1 as a drum machine. I also have a pile of older Yamaha synths (which I love but don't use much), and a couple of Kurzweils for accoustic bits. I have a pile of Akai samplers and Reaktor also. The whole mess is driven by my old Atari, and mixed through an eight-foot high rack of processing stuff (ten years of collecting vintage eq and so on). So the A Station actually is a "main" synth for me, at least as a regularly appearing instrument in my songs.

The only shortcoming that I can really point to is the lack of an available editor, and that's really not a reflection on the synthesizer itself. The sounds this thing makes will pump, swoop, boom, and blip to your heart's content. It may not scare you, but that's not for everyone, now is it?

It took me a few hours to really get into using this product because of the lack of screen.. Presets sound fab - although the purpose of this synth is not to use the factory presets, but to create your own sounds.

There seems to be everything packed into this box.. I'v had mine a few days now, and feel like I'vonly scratched the surface. Please note though that this module does not have any acoustic instrument patches.. and was never intended to be able to have any!

The Pads are so good.. with a good stereo setup or a nice pair of headphones they make you fly! It reacts well to playing, however this really depends on the quality of the midi controler. Plugged into my Roland PCA160 it sounded good, but going through my Clav - it was awesome.

Han't broke yet! I intend to gig with it without backup.

Never used customer support.

I'v been playing keys for 6-7 years now and a Roland RS-50. I'v found that the Novation / Roland setup complement eachother perfectly... Roland for it's pianos, organs, rhodes, and complete bank of instruments, and the novation for those KidA style electronic pads and effects. Definitly worth every penny.

OS1.1

Some of the Presets sound a but weak to my ears - but then I like big brash distorted fucked up noises - it's easy enough the edit them into great sounds. Havn't played much with creating sounds from scratch as I don't have the time. Would probably use the Software version as an editor If I did. It's a bit hard to keep track when each knob does loads of stuff. The manual's great though.

8 voice polyphony - for what I use it for - Techno leads - that's fine. Have so far only sequenced it from an MC-303 so not much experience of how if responds to complex midi commands - the manual suggests it does. Wicked effects.

See above - I've not had the change to evaluate the expressivness, but the sounds are nice - when I said they seemed tame before that by no means means they're not good. The effects are not going to beat a top range unit, but do the job.

HAs been a bit wierd once or twice - refusing to change to a certain sound. Also not quite sure how it choses which patch the boot up into...

HAve done one gig with it and it seemed fine. Doesn't seem to hiccup when you change patches - with the buttons at least.

Not tried. Their computer system was down when I was ordering through the Sound Control in Leeds, but the lovely shop assistant there said if I didn't mind the box being open I could have hers (she'd just brought the last one in stock) and she'd wait so I could have it for christmas.

Would definately get another if it got nicked - was just what I needed for the money I had. I though about getting the KStation - rack, but figured didn't quite have the cash - not too worried though - I don't really need four of them, not 'cos of any versitility issues, just 'cos I'd get drumsounds instead.

I didn't actually use it much for about 9 months 'cos I got out of live music - kicked myself when I started again for what I was missing out on.

I just bought this, and am using OS 1.1 patch editing is easy most of the time, although the manual (which is very clear and well put together) is a constant companion at the moment, especialy when using the Shift Function.

This unit is 8 voice poly, the effects are very versatile, although editing them is a bit tricky with all those 2 letter abreviations ! but I guess I will get used to it. Midi is quite comprehensive, transmits knob data as well. The arpegiator is very inspiring, although it can crash ocasionally when playing lots of chord changes and high notes.

There are some good sounds among the presets, but the editing potential is where this unit really shines, their is a lot of power lurking under those knobs and buttons, put in a few weeks with this and you will be well rewarded. On first use I was scared it was going to sound too digital, but it sounds fine to me, not obviously hard or cold, the sounds are well rounded with a nice "bloom" to them.
This machine will please most people I should imagine, from experimantal to dance and everything in between, as the old synth ads used to say, "the only limit is your imagination" :) I use this in a free improv band, so it is going to travel to the outer limits most of the time :)

Dont know, only had a it a few days, I live in England so if anything does go wrong I am quite local to Novation, which could be handy.

Not aplicable.

This is simply great for the price, I cant complain at all, I am thinking of buying another. The build qaulity s not bad at all, it is solid and heavy (wall wart is a bit of pain though) I think that Novation have got it right here, OK so their may be some bugs, but I have spent a lot more on synths from other manufactueres that have had serious software problems, we all expect more and more from makers these days, and they are struggling to keep up, you have to make the choice, do you pay inflated prices for old analogue gear or invest in new technology, after spending fortunes on repairing my ageing PRO 5 and Moog, I am definatly going to start moving over to modern instruments.

OS used 1.0

The A-station features a lot of knobs and the basic parameters is easy to edit. The effect section and some more advanced features require a bit deeper editing, with only a two digit display! It's a bit tricky, but you'll soon get a hand for it.

Enough voices, but it is just monotimbral, pitty... Ok effect section.

WAKE UP EVERYBODY! Most reviews here says that this thing sounds really good. Someone even gave it a 10... This was the first "real" analogue synth I bought, but I wasn't really satisfied and purchased an Access Virus rack classic instead. I bought the A-station brand new, but the virus second hand, and paid about the same for both (500 USD). If I rate the Virus a 10, the A-station will maybe get 3. It sounds okay and have some cool sounds, but why buy it when you can get so much more for the same money? I like some lead sounds and basses, but the pads are horrible.

Works fine.

Don't know.

As mentioned above, this isn't a monster synth. But, every sound has it's place. You can't make a good tune by just layering ten of the fatest sounds you can find, it would just be a mess. Sometimes, very often indeed, you need to use different kind of synths in your tunes to get a well balanced mix. For that reason every synth is usable somewhere. What synth you prefer also depends a lot on what music you wanna create. The fact that the synth is just monotimbral indicates that it's ment to be used as a complementary device to other equipment. Not as the "central hero" in your setup.
The A-station is pretty okay but you could get so much more...

Lots and lots of nobs on this, plus a 2 digit led. Nigh on impossible without the manual to get into the guts of it, difficult with it. Come's with 200 editable presets and another 200 spare for storing. Not the most friendly of interfaces and considering it was fisrt ever synth, pretty damn off putting.

Monotirmbral, which was dissapointing. But it has a load of effects a vocoder, arpegiater, 3 oscilators, midi sync and loads of other stuff.

This is where it really shines. The presets are great and nearly all usable, plus they can be edited. Using the onboard distortion on this fella gives you some really fat sounding leads and basses. The pads, strings and organs are lovely and you get get some truely impressive noises out of it.

Had a few problems early on. Haven't gigged with it yet, but will be doing so soon.

N/A

I bought this eighteen months ago as my first rack mounted synth, since then i've got a waldorf xt, a emu virtuoso 2000 (plus mophatt and techno roms) and a ER1. I've been making music for around 16 years of all mainstream styles (pop, rock, metal, funk) This is one of the synths i nearly always use on any track i'm making it so versetile. I recently got the v-sation plug in which now means i can use more than one in a track. This means i've been able to remove it from my rack to play live and make way for a new access rack. Considering these are now going for around half what i apid for it they represent excellent value for money.

Version 1.06
Presets sound good, amazing, even; sound editing is easy as it's all laid out with the knobs and switches.
It's when you want to edit effects, the vocoder, MIDI that it's such a pain to use --> the two character LED has cryptic messages and you have the have the manual handy.

8 voice polyphony, monotimbral. Good enough for an "analog" synth.
Effects are good, though not easy to edit. Arpeggiator is simple but surprisingly flexible. Vocoder is very good.

Solid sounds. the best sound sources I have owned were a Roland JD800 and a Korg Prophecy. This is at least as fat as those.
The basses are punchy, the leads, pads and brasses are very very good. The resonant filter (12 or 24 dB) sounds amazing.

The organs fail, but this is not an organ synth. The e pianos can work with some chorusing and distortion.

Don't know yet. Survived a trans-Pacific flight.

None yet

I've been playing for 15 years, and currently have an EMU MP7 (with sounds of the ZR), a Korg X5DR and T2 to go with the A-Station.
I've owned the following gear at one point or another : Roland JD800, MC303, Juno 106, PMA 5, DR5; Yamaha CS1x, CS2x; Korg X5, Prophecy, Electribes A and R among many others. The A station holds up well compared with those in terms of pure sound.

This is very enjoyable, a pleasure to use when you don't have to dig into the submenus. when you're playing, it's an absolute 10.

When you have to dig in and sync it to MIDI, and work through the sub menus, then it's a big pain.

But I'll be keeping this, and I'm even planning on getting a K-station.

Version 1.0. The presets are very good. With 200 preset sounds (you also have 200 user sounds) its ups and downs, but i was somewhat impressed.
It is easy to edit the patches, very easy. Most of the time u just turn the knobs and things change. To edit the effects you have to push a few buttons (menus and sub menus) but its not to difficult.

It is a easy synth to edit. Its a standard 3 osc. subtractiv synth engine, and I think (unlike some others) it would be a good synth for a novice. You have : LFO --> OSC --> MIX --> FILTER --> ENVELOPE (Amp and Filter). The basics ! You can go deeper to, but its easy to understand.

The manual is very good.

8 voice poly. Monotimbral. Good effectsection. Has a vocoder and an external input (great stuff).

3 Osc (with Ring mod, PWM and basic FM) - Sync osc 1&2 - Noise gen.
Mixer
2 LFO's
12 & 24 db filter. Self osc at 24 db.
2 env generators

Have to use a trafo and has no power off switch, but thats fine by me.

Not many realistic sounds, this is not a Roland JV-1080, its a virtual analog. A very good virtual analog.

Its can sound very "modern", dance, trance, ambient and fairly "retro", like Jupiter8's, Prophets and Junos.

I use a Yamaha SY-77 and a Roland JX-10 keyboard as controllers. The module responds to velocity and aftertouch. Its responsive and you can sound mellow and calm or lound and screaming.

It's small! Very small! 19" rack modul but only about 10cm deep. It looks cool :-) (i have the blue model).

When I first got it (I bought it second hand) it appeard to be broken. When I turned the knobs, nothing made sense. When i turned the "envelope-attack" button, the "filter cuttoff" changed, when I turned the "filter-cutoff" button, I adjusted the volume, and when i touched the "volume" button, the modul just powered down..

In short, I had a panic attack! :-).

I opened the modul (its almost empty in there !!) and tried to figure out if I could do anything. It looked OK... The only thing I could do was to turn a cable...(its like a computer harddrive IDE cable, u have to have the red stripe on pin1).... and presto everything worked. How the h*** that cable got turned I wonder..

Dont know. I tried to uppgrade the op.sys, but got an ERR (error) in the display.

Its very good! I have a Juno 106 and a Akai SG01v vitage module to do the same job, and I think I am gonna sell them now. The Juno for sure.

I paid only 200$ for it and its worth that for sure :-). If it got stolen I would by the Nova or Supernova if I had the cash, if not I would buy an A-station again.

I've been playing for about 15 years. I have a lot of gear and this beauty have become one of my favourites.

As I said earlier, I would rather have a multitimbral Nova or Supernova, but for the price I paid its unbeatable!

Get one if you can, or check out the K-station. Thats a A-station with a keyboard, a LCD display and some other goodies.

I think im using sofware version 1.06 but I'm not sure. This thing isnt the easiest rack synth to control, Novation have seen fit to only provide us with a pissy two digit display which is a damn nightmare to navigate through at first. But, on the plus side, you do get 25 knobs to play with. These control the important features. I never really worry about preset patches on synths as they tend to be fairly shite, but the A Station does have a few good presets, I'd say that the're above average. Editing the basic structure of a patch is dead simple as is saving patches, however, to edit FX settings, arp settings etc, you have to get used to using the numerical keypad and display. I've had the synth for a while now and rarely have to refer to the manual (Which is actually quite good in my opinion). It just takes a bit if getting used to.

I'll say straight away that this is a great sounding synth but there is a big 'BUT'! The first two major flaws are:
1) Another stupid external power supply. Why oh why can't manufacturers just put a proper one in their equipment? Most users will happily pay the extra money, I mean seriously, they go to all this trouble to make great sounding, professional gear and then give us a silly wall wart to power it with! Listen up Novation!
2) For some reason the A Station designers thought we would love the machine so much that we would spend every second of every day playing the damn thing because they have'nt given us a switch to turn the friggin' thing off! I know it will most likely make no difference to the health and well-being of my A Station, but the rest of my gear has power switches, In time the A Station mught feel left out...or...um something. Anyway, one other flaw is that there is an audible click when cycling through patches but I figure this will be fixed in a software update.

As for the features: Its a 3 Osc, single part 8 voice synth with delay, reverb, chorus, distortion, eq, arp, vocoder and i'm sure its got a whole bunch of other stuff hidden in that damn menu too. Full MIDI control and sync, headphone output, a bunch of knobs, buttons and switches, you know the drill, typical VA setup. Stereo output on jacks and a single jack input for a vocoder signal or to use the FX on external gear. All housed in a sturdy 1U rack case... with a fucking wall wart.grrrrrr.

This is where the A Station redeems itself, It sounds, to put it mildly, absofugginlutely sensational! The vocoder is the best of heard in this price range, great basses, leads, pads, strings. Its all great, ring mod and sync are really nice and its filters are fatterthanyomama. But what really suprised me about the A Station was its internal FX. Now, when I buy a synth its usually the last thing im interested in. Why? Coz the're generally pretty shit, thats why. But the A Station's FX are actually really good! For a start, you can add any amount of any effect to a patch simultaniously, and then they give you a fair amount of editabilty on top of that. Often I've gone to send it through outboard, then ended up just using the internal stuff. Nice one Novation. At one stage I was actually thinking about grabbing a couple more A Stations but with the V Station coming out, there is little point.

It crashed once and really scared the shit outta me. all i could get was garbled mess on the display and outta the outputs, you guessed it, it took about an hour of re-powering and knob twiddling to get it to work again, no probs since.

Never needed their support.

I believe I've mentioned this before in relation to other gear, but if it were lost or stolen, I would be ruined because the theives would steal everything else as well (My computer and processors are in the same rack!). Despite the problems with this box, at the end of the day I get a great sound out of it, and I got it for a good price. I wouldn't replace it if it were stolen, I would merely reposses it from the theif after Ive made him eat his own nose off his face. I use all sorts of gear, yamaha, roland, clavia, alesis, behringer etc (As well as lots of software), but no matter what im doing, the A Station and my Nord Lead 2 make it onto every track and every performance. If you can get past the design flaws and get used to the menu editing, you've got yourself a great synth at a great price.

OS version 1.06
This unit is my first "analog synth with knobs" ever.
I may then lack the typical "anaddict" jargon, but well, this has plenty of knobs to create whatever electronic sound you're after.
It is cheap but has a vocoder, so I could begin with some Kraftwerk-like singing.
I'd say I like it.
It could be easier to use, for example if the knobs would just readapt their positions to the currently loaded program.
Else, well, it's a matter of exploration, sometimes, you'll get an almost perfect sound which the 1-grade rotation of a knob will make useless, so beware...
The reason it has only 8/10 is also because of the lack of a front panel power button : the device is so short that it is difficult to dive my hand into the back of my rack in order to unplug/replug the synth in case I need to quicly reset it.

8-voice polyphonic, it is more than enough as a part of my studio : actually, its cheapness and its monotimbrality make it specifically aimed as being a complement to one's studio.
If you want 2 sounds, just buy a second one but for the price, market-segment, this is the device.
I am not into these table-boxes like the Electribes, the Yamaha xx200, etc. I lack room which is the reason why I am happy to have this as a rack.

It sounds incredible... except if you don't want it too : it has a very wide panel of possibilities, the only thing I could not create yet were typical perc sounds but the D-Station is coming for this... ;-)
I just love synths that sound "richly-dirty" because they have their own personality, this one has exactly this spirit.

No problem, it eventually crashed when I'd play with the arpeggio (not always) but now I never had such problem again.

?

I'd buy it again, of course, unless I could get a second hand Supernova instead, so, as then it is perfect but not ultimate because you can't drive a whole studio with this...
This is however for the very same reason (individuality thus uniqueness) that I give it a 10.

Software version 1.0.

Presets: Some are very, very good and warm. Others, not so good, as usual with any synth.

Editing is problematic without a sound editor. Even with all the knobs a sound editor would make this thing so much nicer to have and work with.

The manual is well written.

8 voice I believe. No keyboard so no action.

The built in effects sweeten things up nicely and help out overall with some sounds.

No expansion possibilities that I am aware of.

The usual MIDI stuff, hook it up to your controller and go.

No onboard sequencer but the arpeggiator is fun.

This is a virtual analogue module, and a good sounding one at that. I liked the warm smoothness of the decent analogue patches right away.

It would work well for many styles, techno or otherwise.

The onboard effects are nothing to complain about, I'll get to complaining here soon.

I noticed it has a glitch now and then as to playing dynamics. It does respond to velocity quite well. There is a good patch to demonstrate this as to how soft or hard you press the keys on your controller.

This is where the complaining begins. It is made in England I presume, or at least the company is from there, so I thought. IT quit working momentarily, the led went out and no sound, although the unit was not deenergized. The keypad is very cheapo feeling and you have to press just so to advance programs. It is annoying that units that have so much potential and sound so good cannot be built to mil-specs and provide quality housings and interfaces. So what if you pay another 200.00 bucks, get it right the first time and create something that lasts.

I could not depend on this for gigging. Home studio use is o.k. as long as you are nice to the unit.

Never dealt with them. Unless it goes down hard I probably won't deal with them either.

I would like to upgrade the OS and see if that increases it's reliability but from the reviews I'm not so sure. What a hassle anyway for something you've spent a chunk of change on as it is.

If it were lost or stolen I doubt I would replace it. So far as being worth what you pay, who knows. I think Novation has a decent reputation for there Pro Synths and it would be nice if they could hang on to that reputation for the lower end stuff.

I have been playing for a few years so far as synths go. I have a Yamaha SO3 and a Red Sound Darkstar XP which I love.

I really like the sounds of the A-Station and it does deliver in that area. It's compact and has knobs to tweak as well so with time it may be an asset. I hate the interface/keypad 2 led readout approach. It needs a sound editor bad.

I opted for the A-Station vice the Em-u Proteus 2000, I'm still thinking about getting the Em-U Proteus though. I wanted the anolugue sounds from the A-station so that's what sold me on it, and it has the "sounds".

I wish there was a sound editor for it.

It does the trick for sounds, I'm already using it for recording so I won't knock it for sounds.

Think hard before you get one of these, the quirkiness in operation is a big turn-off, no pun intended.

No power switch, small display.... does that really matter once you have the distored 303 riff from hell pulsing away? Only annoying thing so far is getting values accurate using the small knobs and 2 digit display.

Effects are excellent - all controlable via MIDI which is nice, eg, pump up the distortion in real time using a wheel on your master k'board - brilliant. Arpeggiator is good (not great), Vocoder is great plus you can route external audio into the unit to process the sounds - how cool?!

90% of the sounds are great - some of the basses are excellent, very rounded and punchy. Nice pads although you would have to tweak some of them to get that lush sounding Junoesque warmth. Some lead sounds are a bit gutless, but generally the sounds that are good are very good. I'm a sucker for a 303 and this unit doesn't disappoint. Responds too well sometimes to Aftertouch and the like but everything is tweakable so....

No probs yet.

Had a question for Novation about getting the Arpeggiator to send out the MIDI notes it is playing so you can record the pattern into you sequencer. Emailed back about 1 month later so not the quickest reply I've ever had. By the way, the answer was no, you can't not until the OS gets upgraded....

If I had my chance again, go for the K Station. I'm using the A station with a Korg X3 as the controller/sequencer, RolandAlpha Juno 1, Yamaha A3000 and some FX so the A station fits well into the rack, but for pick-up-and-play-ability I would grab the keyboard version. I love it - anything you don't like fiddle with until you do (apart from the small display natch). Theres nothing out there for the price, you really can't go wrong. A few minutes playing in the store convinced me - it's inspirational.

OS 1.0 Editing patches with the knobs is easy (as you might expect). The 2 digit LED and menus although somewhat arcane, really aren't that difficult to come to terms with. The manual is good - much better than most.

The sounds are good for electronica and there are even some good EPs and organs for more traditional rock and pop. The pizzicato strings patch is awesome! -Several good leads, pads, and basses too. I think that it would be difficult (or questionable!) for anyone to gripe very much about the A Station on a basis of sound quality.

No problems so far other than the well documented occasional popping sound when changing patches and the arpeggiator did freeze up once when I was playing in a high octave - OS 1.06 supposedly fixes the arpeggiator problem though.

I haven't dealt with Novation CS yet.

If it were lost or stolen I would definitely buy another one or I might be very tempted to buy the new Novation K Station 4 or K Station 5 especially if they are priced at or below $1000. Although I have a few ergonomic gripes about the A Station I love how it sounds and that's really the bottom line. I try to keep my set-up compact and the A Station along with a Roland JV 1010 and Yamaha DX 200 are the main components of my rig.

I am using OS 1.06.
Presets vary from thin to excellent. Lots of them are off-the-shelf dance music sounds, so if you're writing for the raver set, you can get started right away. Also represented are some nice pads, basses and leads, as well as a few organ and bell sounds.

I haven't done any editing. The multiple knobs make it easier, but the two digit LED is not particularly helpful. If you want to do major sound creation, get a computer-based editor.

The manual is decent, I haven't used it much.

8 voice polyphony, but monotimbral. This is the biggest disadvantage to the synth.

Built in FX are good. Delay, reverb, vocoder, distortion, etc.

Has no provision for memory slots or other such add-ons.

Its multiple knobs send MIDI data, so you can capture them while playing into a sequencer.

Sounds vary, most are good, a few are great, and a few are lame. As I said above, if you're making cliche dance music, this synth is perfect. If you are not, plan on spending a little more time fitting its sounds in or creating your own.

Notably absent are the types of morphing pads I like.

You can map controllers to its various LFOs, modulations, etc.

I have not gigged with this unit. I am wary of the wall-wart power supply, and will carry a backup when I use it a gigs. Its solidly built in a metal case. Put it in a secure rack, for sure.

There's a little noise sometimes when switching patches and on power-up.

This sucks: no on/off switch. That's right, you have to unplug the little stubby DC plug in back to turn it off. Suggest running the wall wart into a simple $2 USD switch and using that for power on/off instead.

I've not been happy with Novation. I emailed them complaining about lack of support, and received no reply. Their web site needs some fine tuning, and they need to better encourage 3rd party sound development. This is a good synth for the money, but would be much better if there were another 200 well-designed sounds for it.

To their credit, they recently ran a "submit a file" contest, and accepted my submission of a Cakewalk Instrument Definition file. (Though they didn't email me to acknowledge this.)

If this were lost of stolen, I would upgrade to something else with a real power supply and multi-timbral capabilities.

I've been playing off and on for 12 years, but recently started up again with piano lessons and gear.

I use a PC with Delta 66 soundcard, Sonar, Mackie 14 chn mixer, Yamaha S80 and the Novation A-Station. I write Art-Rock, i.e., The Police, Dismemberment Plan, Steely Dan, Rush, Dream Theater, etc.

I chose this synth after demoing a number of units at Guitar Center. I was less than impressed with all the new hyped equipment like the Korg Triton. Then I tried the A-Station and was impressed by the beefy sounds coming out of that tiny box.

I chose it for the sounds and the price. If I could get a similar synth with power supply and multitimbral capabilities for close to the price, I would.

I may seem rather hard on the unit, perhaps I will come to like it better once I've had it for a few months and can get some more sounds into it.

Unfortunately, its small display makes it horrible in use. There are up to fourteen (14!!!) menus under some of the buttons. Every time you want to get to the previous menu you have to click the same button fourteen times. With time this begins to be really irritating.

I don't think that you can get anything close to A station in terms of sound capabilities for such low price.

This synth has really great sound and futures for its price. I don't think that you can get anything close to A station in terms of sound capabilities for such low price.

One more thing when applying delay to the fatter chords it tends to distort sound and make horrible noises.

I have the 1.06 OS. I bought this unit on the grounds of other reviews id read and a CD demo off a magazine. i have to admit, the pre-sets are a bit cheezy but its not too hard to create your own sounds from scratch or by modifying existing ones. overall this is very easy to do and if you really screw up you can always reset it to ots original settings. a total of 400 patches can be saved. The manual is good even for a beginer such as myself

The full specs are brilliant and can be found on the the novation webpage. here are some of the minus points: one anoying thing about this unit is that it doesnt have an on/off switch. also, the LED display is also a bit crap becuase it can only shouw 2 figures at a time. it took me a while to find out how to display more than two to find out what operating system i had (it just displayed 1.0)
the midi output on the other hand is great for that extra expretion. on one track i did i tuned one of the filter knobs in real time and this was recorded by my sequencer (on my PC) which could then be modified etc..

once youve fiddled with the knobs (about 24 of them) you can create some fantastic and expressive sounds from bassy pads to hammond to just down right wierd. although the presets seemed to be geared towards the 'dance' scene, dont let this put you off. Ambient sweeping sounds can also be achived.

i sometimes get a clicking noise when i turn some of the knobs, the unit has also frozen on me a few times. i havent used it in a gig yet, just for recording so its not a major probel at the moment.

I had very good customer suport from Novation (UK) both on information before i boought the unit and on how to upgrade the operating system aferword . i do however live in the uk so im not sure what the suport is like internationaly.

only a month after i bougth this, novation released the K-Station which was only 100 ponds more. the K-Station seems to have fixed all the probelms i have mentioned with a better display and an on/off switch. it also has 2 wheel bars and 2 octave keyboard. If you can get an A-station for a good price, i would 100% recomend it although if i got a chance to swap it for a K-Station, then i definately would.

I'm using OS version 1.06. The factory programs sound great: fat basses and plenty of tech-pop sounds. Patch editing isn't bad if you are familiar with analog synths - an editor would help though. The manual is pretty straightforward.

The built-in effects are fairly comprehensive including overdrive for hot distortion lead solos. Arpegiator is handy I guess if you can midi sync it to drummer/sequencer during performance.

I'm using the A-Station for synth bass in dance music, it excels at that. Response to keyboard commands is smooth and remote control of front panel controls via midi is handy. The onboard effects sound good to my ear.

Well I guess we had to get to this part. My A-Station locked up a couple of times in the 6 weeks I've had it but power-on reset corrected that. Unfortunately the unit died altogether on last nights gig and no amount of resetting or reloading of sounds or operating system has helped.

Email is pending a response.

It takes a while to get your mind into the 2 x LED display , once you start to remeber what DU . DR , Ar etc.. stand for you will be fine and this is mostly for the effects and Arp section of the synth. Other than this there is a POT for all the standard dial's on this type of 3 osc synth and switches for all the rest. All of the pots send MIDI information so you can sequence your dial moves to your hearts content.

8 Voices of Polyphony , the effects on the whole are sweet (I am in love with the way the reverb sits so perfect in any mix) and they consist of Delay , Reverb , Distortion , Phaser , Vocoder (theres a few hundred bucks normally by itsself) and Chorus. MIDI upgradable Firmware (see notes in Reliability). The ARP is usefull has 6 diffrernt direction settings including Random (see Expresiveness / Sounds). All well worth the money

This is where this unit really shines and also has a slight flaw (atleast for me) . The A-Station can sound like most of the classics . Rolands, Obi's , Sequential due to its very versatile Filers. Its great , especially if your after the sounds without the hastle or issues that come with Vintage Synths. You can set cut-off's and Effects to the Wheels on your controller keyboard for a bit more handy real time control. GREAT! ;-) . I have found 2 issues with this unit though :(. 1) the Delay and other effects create LOTS of clicking noises when you use it with the ARP in Clock Sync to a sequencer this sounds horrible in the mix and makes the effects section useage limiting. 2) the Firmware upgrade to take the unit to OS 1.6 currently is in WINDOWS ONLY format (hu ? go figure) even though its just SYSEX information in a MIDI file it refuses to update the unit from my Macintosh (Cubase 4.x). This is really painfull because I know other Novation Synths in the past have had 'click' problems like I have discribed and this has been cleared up in OS upgrades. So maybe this problem is no longer happening in latest units (try in the shop first maybe ?)

I have had this unit freeze once in 2 weeks of almost constant useage . Not bad at all . you have to wonder what the unit would be like with the new OS ? I would use the A-Station Live without a backup. Only issue i would have would be that the unit has no ON-OFF switch so a quick reset if something went wrong is out of the question (unless you get your local synth Tech to make you a solution)

have not used the customer support yet. If the OS 1.6 upgrade that is Mac compatable is not relased soon I expect to be calling because the effects clicking in sync ARP mode is really starting to peeve me!.

If this unit was lost or stolen i would buy it again for sure. I am actually considering getting a second unit over the comming months. This unit fits in so well with the 'vintage' gear in my rig (sh 101 , MKS 50 , Juno 106, DX 7) the sound's are great and for the price you can afford 2 for the same price as 1 Virus. Lots of inspiration in this unit and easy as all hell to roll your own sounds :)

I wish there was some way to get a little more than mono timbral , but eh , you pay for a Poly synth don't expect multi-timbral. ohh by the way .. All spelling errors are (c) me :)

Once you get the hang of the menu system its really pretty easy, however, the manual is a bit harder to dycypher. Don't get me wrong, its not like the "Roland must be an engineer to understand this" manual. It spends more time explaining terms and pricipals of analouge than how to navigate the piece. In regards to over all controlability of sound generation, its great, lot's-o-knobs for a one space rack. The presets are spectacular, and it is overly easy to tweak them.

The one thing I have to say outright, it's monotimbral. That is the one thing that really pulls this piece down, otherwise the fx are wonderful, and they even provide a distortion compensator to keep your distorted patched form tearing your montiors to peices. The arpegiator is easy to use, but on the same token somewhat difficult to program due to the two digit LED. Overall, for it's price, it's wonderful in the feature department, blows everything else at that price range clear out of the water.

Even though Novation has gotten dumped into the "Dance music" genre, this synth proves that it can do whatever you want that requires an analouge sound. It can be agressive enough for industrial, and poppy enough for your more run-of-the-mill techno dance music. The bass sounds are really great, and are even placed at predicable places, every tenth sound. The sounds on this thing are why I bought it.

I really like it. I am currently using a Virus, and two Waldorfs, and this piece adds something none of them can, which I feel is really important. I love the sounds and controlability of the sounds, I don't have to menu dive, and it only takes one rack space. The biggest complaint, and really the only one, is the fact that it's monotimbral, which makes mixing down a bit more difficult, and if you want to use it on more than one track of a given song you have to mix down the audio of one before writng the next so you can hear what you are doing, thats a pain. Otherwise, top to bottom its a great piece and worth every penny.