

The option of switching between five customisable workspace layouts mitigates the frustration of trying to fit everything on screen, and the ability to fully customise both keyboard shortcuts and mouse behaviour is another big plus. In fairness, though, most digital audio products have their foibles, and once you get the hang of Samplitude’s conventions, it’s admirably quick and easy to make edits and configure instruments. Some panels can be moved around and docked to the edge of the screen, but they don’t snap to intelligent places, so valuable space is wasted – and, maddeningly, the floating Mixer panel can’t be docked at all.

To do so, however, you’ll need to fight through Samplitude’s bewildering front-end: even the default “easy” workspace is dotted with cryptic controls in seemingly random fonts and styles, and occasional labels and tooltips in untranslated German don’t help.
