Novation circuit

It's a standalone, digital instrument featuring a four-part drum machine, two six-note polyphonic synths and a deceptively deep sequencer. In the words of Novation, Circuit is "designed to inspire", with a heavy emphasis on immediacy, intuitiveness and experimentation. However, despite this being new territory for the British brand, there's a lot about Circuit that feels familiar.

For one thing, the device takes most of its design cues from the recent Launchpad Pro. Its chassis features the same combination of matt-black top, rounded corners and rubberised base, while its central sequencer grid is built from slightly smaller versions of the Launchpad's backlit, velocity-sensitive pads.

Build-wise, Circuit feels slightly more lightweight and plastic-y than the Launchpad Pro, but still gives the impression of being a well-built, quality piece of kit.

In terms of connections, Circuit features a stereo pair of 1/4-inch jack outs on its rear, along with a 3.5mm headphone out on the front panel. There's also a built-in speaker on the underside, which outputs at a decent volume but, predictably, lacks a little in low-end power.

"Novation was aiming for inspiration and immediacy and it has really achieved that with aplomb."

For true portability Circuit can be powered either by AA batteries inserted into its base or via a mains connection on the rear panel.

Finally, just like the Launchpad Pro, Circuit can send and receive MIDI both via USB and 3.5mm MIDI In/Out ports. Again, as with the Pro, Circuit ships with the required MIDI adaptors, USB cable, batteries and a power supply.

Play the hits

Circuit's links to previous Novation products run deeper than mere cosmetics though. The engine under the hood is based on the company's Nova line of synths, and much of the workflow borrows heavily from the Launchpad Pro.

In fact, in use Circuit feels like something of a 'greatest hits' from Novation.

That Nova sound engine is impressive too. It has a distinctly digital quality to it, but that shouldn't be taken as a criticism. Rather, where many of Circuit's direct rivals have set their sights on replicating the raspy, analogue quality of classic monosynths, Novation's groovebox excels at the sort of complex polyphonic sounds you just couldn't get from an analogue synth at this price point; all full of interesting textures and modulation.

There's a decent range of sounds onboard too. Each of the two synths can select one of 64 preset sounds, which range from bold leads and modern basses to rich pads and atmospheric textures.

The four drum parts, meanwhile, also share a bank of 64 sounds, which are divided into four groups along the lines of kicks, snares, cymbals and claps/percussion. As with the synth sounds, there's a nicely broad selection on offer, which goes beyond the usual x0x-mimicing staples you tend to find in budget grooveboxes (although there are a few of these included too).

Editing sounds is handled by a bank of eight continuous rotaries along the top of the unit. With either of the synths selected these become eight Macro controls, used to tweak and shape a relatively cryptic assortment of the chosen preset's parameters.

Novation states that, where possible, these Macro controls are broken down into pairs editing - from left to right - oscillators, envelope, filters and modulation. In reality though, the structure is fairly vague and there are numerous presets that don't fit the arrangement.

We've developed something of a love/hate relationship with these macro controls during our time with Circuit. Novation state that its lack of clear labelling is designed to encourage happy accidents, and there's certainly something to be said for this; there's plenty of fun to be had selecting presets at random and blind-tweaking the controls, which often throws up fantastic, unexpected sounds.

But, when searching for sounds with more of a specific idea of what we were after, we regularly found presets that almost fit the bill but didn't quite offer the necessary controls to, say, tweak the amp envelope or filter cutoff in the way we wanted.

Drum editing is a little more straightforward. The four drum parts are divided into pairs which share a sequencer page and bank of rotaries, with four Macro controls for each drum part.