Korg turned up to Superbooth in a rather coquettish mood this year, teasing attendees with a new synth displayed proudly at the centre of its booth, albeit covered with a blue tarp to mask its identity.
This mystery forthcoming instrument wasn’t the company’s only surprise though, as the Korg also used the show to quietly soft-launch a new addition to its DIY Nu:Tekt range, the NTS-4 – which is now getting a proper release.
The NTS-4 is a six-channel analogue performance mixer. It ships in DIY kit form, like other products in Korg’s Nu:Tekt range, but building the device requires no soldering or electronics experience and according to Korg the build should only take a matter of minutes.
Its six channels are fed via four stereo and two mono minijack inputs. These latter two are equipped with attenuator switches that can flip the inputs between line and Eurorack level operation. There are also stereo send and return minijacks on the mixer’s top panel that can be used to integrate external effects.
The NTS-4 also has internal effects of its own though, in the form of both Send FX and master Total FX. The former can select between delay, ping pong delay, two types of hall reverb, two slap reverbs and chorus. The Total FX has low- and high-pass filters, along with isolator, flanger, phaser, decimator, drive, distortion, compressor and limiter modes.
Each of the six mixer channels is equipped with mute and cue buttons – the latter routed to the top panel headphone output – along with a send level control. The two mono channels also have pan position controls.
The NTS-4 has a pair of unbalanced ¼-inch main outputs on its rear panel. It can also act as an audio interface to stream to Mac, PC or mobile devices via its USB-C port, which is also used for power. The top panel also features a minijack MIDI output that can be used to route MIDI from a DAW or USB device to external hardware.
The NTS-4 isn’t Korg’s first attempt at a desktop mixer. Back in 2018 the brand released the Volca Mix, a mixer companion for its popular collection of compact synths and drum machiners. We were fairly underwhelmed by the Volca Mix, however, due to its fiddly controls and lack of MIDI or USB connectivity.
The NTS-4 looks like it fixes many of the Mix’s failings though, and as a result it has the potential to be a far more competent hub for a Volca setup – or any collection of mini synths you might have to hand.
The NTS-4 is available now priced at $249/€219/£189. Head to the Korg website for more information.
