Here at last...

Propellerheads released RECORD today. They are going to make a metric ton of money with this I think. Maybe a ton plus: It’s listed as a $149 upgrade NOT the $129 price quoted everywhere. Factor in $20 shipping to the US, and that’s $169 out of the door. On the plus side: The box set includes an upgrade to REASON4 for owners of REASON versions 1 – 3 and that’s a helluva deal for those folks. But if you have REASON4 already, it’s just an extra $20 for naught.

I’ve really got to give it to the Props: They know how to make a helluva product trailer.

The sonic painkiller...?

You just gotta love this end-of-year stuff. Image-Line is selling Morphine for $99 instead of $159 until the end of the year.

Morphine is an additive synthesis VI. It’s CPU and user friendly and has some really cool features like four morphable sound generator sources controllable via a built-int mix/morph envelope or external MIDI controller. It also has tools for re-synthesizing a sound.

Anyway, it sounds good – the pads and atmospheres in particular.

________________________________

• More on Morphine can be found here.
• For those interested in additive synthesis and re-synthesis, there are two other plug-ins on the market that take a similar approach: CamelAudio’s Cameleon 5000 and VirSyn’s CUBE.
• Also, CamelAudio will release Alchemy very soon. Alchemy features additive, spectral and granular synthesis and resynthesis, sampling, and a virtual analog engine with unison and PWM. (More on this when it’s released I promise.)

Just a quick note: In an earlier post, I noted that Blue was available online for $239. You can also buy Blue (and if you register it before 31 December get a free Albino 3 license) for $189 from AudioMidi.com.

I’ve bought stuff from them several times and they are a decent outfit, provide good service, and ship internationally. You also may want to check out their “Blowouts” and “Specials” while you are at their site.

___________________________________

AudioMidi Blue details are here.

AudioMidi blowouts, b-stock, and specials are listed here.

$99 must be a magic price point…at least for me. When I see that a plug-in that I took a pass on has been reduced to this price I take notice and reconsider it in light of the new price. If the value proposition changes because of this new price, I might at that point pick it up.

There seems to be a lot of these markdowns floating around. Must be that whole end-of-year sale thing + the recent downturn in the economy + time for new versions to appear. Whatever. There are some decent deals to be had this month.

Now at a smashing new price...

Case in point: Guitar Center is selling Arturia Analog Factory for $99. This is a decent VI featuring either 2000 or 3500 (depending on the version) analog synthesizers sounds selected from the Arturia Classic Synths (Minimoog V, Moog Modular V, CS-80V, ARP 2600 V, Prophet V,  Prophet VS and Jupiter-8V). With the 10% off coupon in their recent flyer, the price is $89.10 so I picked one up. Note that the GC advert seems to refer to version 1.0 of the plug-in but when I went in the store they handed me the newest 2.0 version.

UAD1 and UAD1e

I had read in various forums (forii?) that UAD customer support is first class. Well I sent an inquiry to them about the blow-out deals. I heard back from them in just a couple of hours and got a second response email in just a few minutes. Excellent.

Anyway, I wanted to make sure my math was right about the special offers. I received this response from UAD:

“You are correct in all your calculations… *($750 voucher with Express [Editor's note: I'm pretty sure he meant Expert] plus $150 coupon for new UAD1 purchase/reg and free upgrade for UAD1 – UAD2 plugins).

One last thing you forgot!!  If you register the UAD1e first… THEN register your UAD2 product you will get an ADDITIONAL cross-grade voucher for being an ‘existing UAD1 customer registering a UAD2 product’!! Purchase and register a UAD2 Solo you get an additional  $100 voucher… UAD2 Duo $150… UAD2 Quad $250.

A great time to purchase!”

I’ll say.

[EDIT 11/19: Note Corrections] So let’s get this right. Buy a UAD1e Express Pak for $299 and a UAD2 Solo for $499. Get a $100 voucher with the purchase plus a $150 coupon when you register the UAD1e.

With the release of UAD2, Universal Audio is blowing out its stock of UAD1e cards. The prices are pretty phenomenal:

• UAD1e Express Pak (includes $100 voucher for UAD plugins) was $399 and is now is $299
• UAD1e Expert Pak (includes $750 voucher) listed for $999 (MAP was probably around $899) and is now $599
• UAD1e Extreme Pak (includes all 32 plugins thru version 4.5) listed for $2499 and is now $1299.

UAD-1 Powered Plugins Included with each card:

• 1176SE: Definitive Vintage FET Compressor Emulations
• CS-1: Complete Professional Channel Strip (+3 plug-in modules, included)
• Nigel: Amp, Cab, & FX for Guitar and Beyond (+8 plug-in modules, included)
• Pultec EQP-1A: Classic Silky EQ
• RealVerb Pro: Industry Standard Reverb

The siren call of the blow out sale...

Now the crazy thing: UAD is having a promotion wherein if you purchase and register a new UAD-1 (PCI), UAD-1e, or Xpander, your ‘my.uaudio.com’ account will be awarded with an additional UAD$150 coupon, good for any Powered Plug-In in the UA Web Store. So add $150 to each of the vouchers up there.

The deal is looking pretty sweet.

Now you may ask, why bother with a UAD1e when the new UAD2s are out? Really has to do with price and what capabilities will work for you. Take a look at this chart.