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Get To The New Stuff Already...
There
wasn’t a huge amount of new gear this year
at AES but plenty of updates
and improvements to talk about.
Here’s a brief
synopsis offered for your perusal.
Frontier Audio Designs
 The
gizmo that seemed to create the biggest stir at
the
2004 AES convention was also
one of the tiniest new products.
Frontier Audio makes some
highly reputable audio interfaces,
like the Tango, but more recently
has been working in conjunction
with Tascam on control surfaces/interfaces
like the FW-1884. I heard
all about their new wireless
control surface on the first
day of the convention and it
was top on my list to check
out the next morning. The TranzPORT
is a unique little device that
looks more like the latest PDA
than a control surface, but
spend two minutes with it and
you will be hooked, The Tranzporter
is the Game Boy Advance for
us recording geeks and I would
expect everyone who has a DAW
will want one. Basically this
is a jog shuttle wheel,
some buttons/transport controls,
and an LCD display that
sits in the palm of your hand
and controls simple
DAW functions wirelessly
through RF. This means you
don’t even have
to be in the same room as
your DAW to push the Record
button, which is great if
you track in a different
room. You can also easily
set up loop points, insert
markers, control volume and
pan, as well as virtually
anything else you want to
link to. At $199 this
could be the control surface
for the masses. Look for
the Tranzporter to hit the
street in early 2005.
Tascam
 Frontier Audio had a busy
year. On top of the Tranzporter
mentioned above, they also collaborated
with Tascam on a new FireWire
control surface (FW-1082),
and a new FireWire interface
(FW-1804).The
control surface is a scaled
down version of the FW-1884
FireWire interface with 10
Ins and 4 Outs at 96kHz/24
bit.
 The FW-1082 is
priced at $799 and
you can pre-order one now.
The FW-1804 FireWire
interface is basically a
rackmount version of the FW-1884,
sells for $599,
and is also available for pre-order.
Tascam was also showing
the VL-S21 monitors. These little guys
are less than an inch
thick and come with a Sub-Woofer.
They will sell for $99.
Universal Audio
The UAD-1 has
two new plug-ins heading into
the line-up.
The first is a high quality
limiter
that is very transparent
and will be a great way to
keep your digital levels
in check.
The second is the Plate 140
Reverb emulation. It is hard
to make sonic judgements
on the AES floor, but the
reverb tails sounded excellent
to my ears. The plug-ins
will be available directly
from Universal Audio.
Native Instruments
Native Instruments Battery
2 has been one of the hottest
updates of the year. Not to
reston their laurels, Native
Instruments announced Absynth
3 at AES. Absynth 3 adds new
oscilators, real-time fractalize,
and audio input to its bag
of tricks. Many synth-tweakers
are looking forward to this
one. Absynth 3 will be available
in December. Native Instruments
also announced Guitar
Rig 1.2
which will add four new distortion
modules. The update will be
FREE for
all Guitar Rig owners.
Presonus
 Presonus
has been on a roll as of late. The Eureka channel
strip is gaining a great
reputation and the FirePOD is
a nice new FireWire interface.
At AES Presonus announced
the Firebox, a portable/bus-powered
FireWire interface that
would make anyone with
a laptop drool.The FireBox
has two micr/instrument
preamplifiers, two analog
line inputs, six balanced
analog outs, and S/PDIF
and MIDI input/output.
All this at around $400 bucks.
Submersible Music
Submersible Music are the guys behind
the popular drum sampler/loop
library Drumcore. You can read
the audioMIDI.com review here.
The exciting news is that Drumcore
1.5 is coming and will now
be both Mac and PC compatiable.
Look for it in early 2005.
There will also be an Apple
Loops version of the Drumcore
content as well as MattPack
1, a add-on drummer pack filled
with the drumming of Matt Sorum.
The MSRP for the Apple Loops
will be $49.95, MSRP for MattPack
1 will be $79.95.
SE Electronics
SE Electronics has a new, state-of-the-art
fabrication facility and a
brand new microphone model
as well. All SE Electronic
mics are hand assembled and
if you would like to here them
for yourself you can check
out our Mic Demo. The new mic
utilizes a titanium diaphram
which is purported to be
more responsive and consistent.
The MSRP will be $750 and the
mic should be available sometime
in January.
Arturia
Arturia, known for there excellent virtual
recreations of the Minimoog,
Moog Modular,  and
Yamaha CS80v is now adding
the ARP2600 to its lineup.
If their other virtual-instruments
are any indication this will
be a great sounding synth.
The original ARP 2600 debuted
in 1972 and was known as the
"Blue Meanie". Less than one
hundred of these synths were
made so it will be great to
have a "virtual" model available to
the masses.
DSP Quattro
If you haven’t heard of it yet, and you own a Mac then you need to take
a look at DSP Quattro. DSP Quattro is a popular new sample-editor for OS X at
a great price. The brainchild of Stefano Daino, who also worked extensively on
the TC Works Spark editor, the latest update to DSP Quattro has some cool new
features for batch-processing. The software also acts as an virtual-instrument
and plug-in host, allowing you to play a virtual-synth and record your performance.
Look for an upcoming audioMIDI.com review of this unique sample editor for OS
X.
PSP
PSP Audioware has updated all there plug-ins for VST, DXi, and AU compatibility.
Even more exciting, the PSP team has devised an elegant Preset system that
allows you to define which presets will be loaded and also allows you to interchange
presets between different versions of the plug-ins (AU and VST for example).
If you haven't heard of Vintage Warmer or the PSP 42 and 82 delay plug-ins
you are missing out.
BIAS
BIAS was showing
SoundSoap 2 at AES this year.
If you are not familiar,
SoundSoap is a great program
for cleaning up hiss, crackles
and hum in your recordings
or restorations. SoundSoap
2 did an amazing job and
cleaning up messy dialogue
and crackling vinyl in the
demo I heard. It also has
a nicely designed GUI and
is very easy to use.
Edirol
Edirol was showing
a couple interesting new
products for anyone into
location recording. The R1
is a small little handheld
unit not much bigger than
an iPod. It can record to
Compact Flash and has a stereo
mic built in, You can easily
transfer your remote recordings
to a computer via the USB
2.0 connection. The on-board
mic was impressive for such
a small unit, and the fact
that it can record up to
24 bit WAV files is a big
plus. The R4 is set up more
like a traditional 4-Track
location recorder and has
a 40GB internal hard drive,
4 mic inputs, digital I/O
and can also use Compact
Flash. The R1.
As always, stay
tuned to the audioMIDI.com eNews
for the
latest
reviews and
new product info.
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The “City By The Bay” was the host of this years
Audio Engineering Society’s convention at the Moscone Convention
Center. AES is a smaller
show than winter NAMM in
Los Angeles or Musik Messe
in Frankfurt, Germany.
Filling only one large
floor (rather than 3-5),
it was easy to find and
see everything at the show.
Also, the W Hotel dressed
up as the "Remix Hotel"
for Halloween weekend,
hosting live performances
and new products from companies
like M-Audio and Native
instruments. Overall it
was a great show and it
was nice to see the first
time booth from Tape-Op
magazine. 