The big surprises here are the price and the depth of the Analog Lab sounds. The MiniLab itself is a two-octave mini-key controller with 16 endless encoders, eight pads (two banks for a total of 16 controls), plus pitchbend and modulation touchstrips in a super- compact form factor which is clearly designed for portability. Honestly, what had me excited about the MiniLab is that it comes bundled with Arturia's Analog Lab software package, which includes a curated collection of sounds from almost all of the best Arturia synths - a 'Greatest Hits' of essentials from Arturia's deep library. Not because I needed another USB control surface - frankly, I have a couple of decent MIDI keyboards which have served me well, and I wasn't really in the market for another. So I jumped at the chance to try out their new super-affordable MiniLab hybrid controller.

I'm a big fan of Arturia's soft synth collection they have some of the best sounding and well-modeled 'vintage' software synthesizers available.

Analog lab v price