PC and Music News

QuikQuak has updated all its plug-ins to fix VST-RTAS wrapper compatibility.

The updates include :

- Frozen interface fix for all six plug-ins (Mac & Win).
- Rayspace: Mono to stereo crash fix in Logic AU.
- Pitchwheel: Pointer reset on sequencer play.

WaveMachine Labs is proud to introduce its first official Drumagog sample library. Created by the same people who developed Drumagog, Percussion eXtras is a GOG-format collection of percussion instruments from around the world. Use them as stand-alone replacement sounds, or mix them with your existing drums for unique sonic combinations. From delicate triangles to the thunderous low-end of an 18" Djembe, Percussion eXtras offers new artistic flavors to the Drumagog user.

Produced by WaveMachine Labs and John Emrich, Percussion eXtras contains 44 individual GOG files, with 78 different positional groups. All together the library contains over 1600 individual percussion samples, each performed, recorded, and edited by John Emrich.

$59.95 retail price, available for both Mac and Windows in GOG-format only.

For more information and audio demos, visit here:

CME has announced that the Neosynth24 expansion board for their keyboards (UF and VX series) is now shipping. It provides high quality audio instruments and effects and adds great sonic possibilities to CME keyboards.

NeoSynth24 features a built in sound bank (64 MBytes/256 Mbits) that can be updated at your convenience. All instruments can thus be updated in order to create completely new sounds from the same keyboard. Various sound banks are available (General MIDI standard instruments set, Grand Piano style, Hip Hop style, Techno/House style, R&B style and much more …), these multiple sound banks are available on SD Cards that can be ordered separately. These SD Cards are then used to upgrade the on board instruments, once upgraded the SD Card can be removed from its slot. All available sound banks are high quality sampled instruments, from 16 to 24 bits resolution, up to 96 kHz sampling frequency. NeoSynth24 on board powerful DSP allows up to 124 voices of polyphony.

Features :

- MIDI / USB expander
- Up to 124 voices of polyphony
- Built-in FX engines
- Up to 64 MB sound bank
- Updatable sound banks from SD Card
- Various music styles available
- USB MIDI class compliant (no driver)
- 24 bits / 48 kHz audio paths
- Main stereo audio output (24bits D/A)
- Auxiliary stereo audio output (24bits D/A)
- Headphones output
- Analog stereo audio input (24bits A/D)
- S/PDIF stereo audio input/output
- Available for both UF & VX keyboards
- Large MIDI implementation

Blue Cat Audio has announced a massive update of all its commercial EQ plugins. The new versions are now available for Mac in VST and Audio Unit formats, and also bring multiple improvements to the existing Windows plug-ins. The Liny EQ series have been completely redesigned for this new release.

The Blue Cat Audio EQ plug-ins include the Liny EQ series (linear phase graphic equalizers), Parametr'EQ series (digital and analog parametric EQs) and the Triple EQ plug-ins (semi-parametric visual EQs). They all come in three flavors, offering a wide variety of capabilities. In particular, the Widening versions propose mid/side processing for frequency selective stereo narrowing or widening.

New for all plugins :

- Mac Audio Unit support.
- Mac VST Support.
- New Windows installer (you should uninstall any previous version before installing this new one).
- New documentation.

New for the Liny EQ series :

- New user interface design.
- The plug-in now offers two types of EQ curves.
- EQ range is now customizable.
- Undo/Redo support.
- Preset import/export in a host independent format.
- Window opacity control for plugin transparency.

The plug-ins are available in several bundles or separately, with a temporary special offer on bundles. Existing customers can update most plug-ins for free, except the Liny EQ series for which a special upgrade price is available.

Pricing :

- Blue Cat's Liny EQ Pack (3 Plug-ins) : €99.96 (instead of €119) or $133.56 (instead of $159)
- Blue Cat's Parametr'EQ Pack (3 Plug-ins) : €99.96 (instead of €119) or $133.56 (instead of $159)
- Blue Cat's Triple EQ Pack (2 Plug-ins) : €42.14 (instead of €49) or $59.34 (instead of $69)

The pre-release phase of the Detunized.com site has begun.

Detunized.com offers extensions for Ableton Live, Propellerhead Reason, FL Studio and their respective devices - Simpler, NN-XT, Directwave. Sample-based libraries will contain patches and sounds that cover an extensive variety of ready-to-use, but fully customizable presets, ranging from discreet timbres up to droones and soundscapes of detailed complexity. Releases will be purchasable via Paypal-Subscription or Paypal-Instant-Buy, based on a monthly release cadence.

Until the final starting date - 1st of April 2009 – the puplic is kindly invited to download freebie „dtn000 - Grandpa's Piano" and to subscribe to their newsletter.

Audio Damage is about to release bigseq2, a new version of its effect and gate sequencer.

BigSeq2 is a massive extension to the feature set of the BigSeq gate effect. With twelve sequencers controlling ten effects in six blocks, BigSeq2 is capable of everything from short staccato gate sequences to long, evolving filter sweeps and frequency shifts, and everything in between.

The six effect "Blocks" contain ten effects in total, and these Blocks can be re-arranged simply by dragging them, giving you full control over the routing of the effects. Each effect Block has a gate sequencer and a modulation sequencer. The gate sequencer turns that effect on and off (or in the case of the delay Block, activates the "send" control), while the modulation sequencer can affect any and all parameters in that block.

Features :

- Ten effects in six blocks, each with its own step sequencer, modulation sequencer, and time base.
- The gate and modulation sequencers for each effect block run on their own time-base, allowing different time signatures and step times for each effect.
- Each block has several parameters which can be altered via the modulation sequencer for that block.
- The effects blocks can be re-arranged in any order.
- Each sequencer has three independent modes of operation: forward, reverse, and random step. In addition, each of the twelve sequencers can be completely randomized at regular selectable intervals, for interesting modulation and gating possibilities.
- The included effects are VCA, pan, multi-mode filter, fuzz, sine warp, delay (with chorus and flanger modes), frequency shifter (also providing ring mod and phasing), sample rate reduction, bit depth, and our own "Error" effect.
- MIDI Learn on all published parameters for external hardware control. (VST only.)

bigseq2 will be available for both Mac and PC in VST and AU formats. Note that audio examples are available at :