PC and Music News

AudioThing has released Spheres, a new collection of 64 patches for Native Instruments Massive including pads, leads, basses, soundscapes, synth tuned percussions/mallets, sequences and more.
These patches weren't designed for a specific genre, instead they were crafted trying to follow a leitmotiv: round shapes, bouncing sounds and circular sequences.

Specifications
- 64 Patches.
- Multiformat: KSD and NMSV.
- Size: 1 MB installed.
- Macro Controls assigned to main parameters.

Full version of Native Instruments Massive 1.2.1 or 1.3.0 is required.

Sphere is available for $8.

Produced by Nick Phoenix, Quantum Leap Solo Violin is a virtuoso solo violin recorded at Remote Control Productions, a film score facility in Santa Monica, California run by veteran film composer Hans Zimmer and home to the scores of many of today‚s top films.

Quantum Leap Solo Violin includes 5 passes of true legatos sampled intervals, Legato soft, legato forte, expressive legato, portamento and fast legato/ trill/ run.
$99.00 USD

CurveEQ implements spectrum matching technology that allows you to transfer spectrum's shape of one recording to another. In other words, this allows you to "copy" frequency balance of existing time-proven mixes so that other mixes that are still in the works may have a chance to sound better.

CurveEQ features:
- 3 EQ curves per channel group
- Linear- and minimum-phase filtering
- Spectrum matching
- Freeform EQ curve drawing mode
- Real-time FFT spectrum analyzer
- Stereo and multi-channel processing
- Internal channel routing
- Channel grouping
- Mid/side processing
- 64-bit floating point processing
- Preset manager
- Undo/redo history
- A/B comparisons
- Contextual hint messages
- All sample rates support
- 53 ms compensated processing latency.

KV331 Audio has updated SynthMaster to version 2.5.4.133 on both Windows and MacOSX platforms.

In this latest update, SynthMaster becomes a native 64 bits VST/AU plugin on MacOSX. Other changes in this update are as follows:

New Features:

- Added online presets uploaded by registered users.
- Added a new (red) skin, created by Irion DaRonin.
- Added new global setting to enable/disable hiding older presets.
- Added new global setting to enable/disable bipolar easy parameters.
- For effect version of SynthMaster, oscillator type is set to "audio in" by default now.

Fixes:
- SynthMaster might crash when oscillator type is changed from basic/additive to wavescanning.
- When renaming a preset, SynthMaster shows the file dialog box at the wrong location, which might cause a crash.
- When mod matrix filter is set, and prev/next buttons of the matrix are pressed, SynthMaster might crash.
- 64 bit version of SynthMaster does not load correctly.
- SynthMaster does not send changed parameter values to VST host.
- SynthMaster crashes when SynthMasterFolders.txt file needs to be written.

Teenage Engineering announces an update for their mini keayboard/sampler OP-1.

Some features in OP-1 OS 12470:
- Added Finger sequencer.
- Added DrumBox drum synth.
- Added Drum key copy.
- Added ChopLifter.
- Added MIDI Timing Clock.
- Added MIDI LFO.
- Tape did not stop at end of tape. Fixed.
- Drum voices could be interrupted. Fixed.
- Pressing Help would trigger an assert when the battery was low. Fixed.
- Tap Tempo is improved.

Native Instruments today launched a time-limited special offer on TRAKTOR KONTROL S2, reducing the price of the compact 2-deck controller to $449 / 399 EUR throughout February and March 2012. This represents a saving of $220 / 200 EUR against the suggested retail price.

TRAKTOR KONTROL S2 is a versatile integrated DJ performance system that was designed to set a new professional standard in the 2-deck category. A compact version of the market-leading KONTROL S4 hardware, the S2 provides a '2+1' setup with sample decks as well as comprehensive mixing features and effects, all based on the included full-featured TRAKTOR PRO 2 software.