This is a very niche synthesizer, catering mainly for 'rave' sounds - dissonant stabs, chunky organs, unique leads - and for that reason alone Ravernator should be recommended. Basically, if you need new sounds that capture the feeling of rave sounds (circa 1992-1996) then this is the sensible choice. Don't let this limit you though, a lot of the included presets would be suitable in many types of dance music.

It is based on the Wusikstation engine (current version of Ravernator uses v6) so I won't talk too much about that as you can read about Wusikstation elsewhere. Needless to say it is very powerful and very flexible, yet with the included presets it can also be very easy to use - pretty much open a preset and away you go.

The presets are very good. There are hundreds of them, and they are all very well organised. Broken down into categories, then each preset is broken down into variations (different fx, etc). This is both a blessing and a curse. It's good that you get so many usable well-organised presets, but unfortunately the Wusikstation preset management system doesn't seem to let you constantly cycle through folders - so once you have listened to all variations of a preset within a folder you have to click up a folder tree to choose the next preset and then you can cycle through its variations. Hopefully this is addressed in a future version of Wusikstation, as it is the main issue that I don't like about Ravernator. And of course, if it's just me not using the preset manager correctly I would love to be told so I can amend my review!

Also, as the presets are so well organised, the filenames are occasionally very long as they include so much detail about the construction of the preset. This meant that during installation on my system some of the filenames were too long and I had to ommit a handful of presets while installing. A small point, but one I think I should mention.

Installation is very simple. It requires several steps (install the plugin DLL, then copying the presets and sounds to particular locations) but is laid out in a very clear manner in the included installation instructions, even showing you with screenshots how to install it.

It requires a lot of space to install - several gigs - which is unfortunate. I would certainly have scored higher if it used less storage.

In conclusion, it's such a niche synth that if you are writing something with a rave vibe then this synth is pretty much your only choice for new sounds. It's also going to be useful for dance music producers whatever the genre - it's certainly not a one-trick pony.

Good: Hundreds of well organised presets, high ratio of great presets, powerful playback engine yet flexible enough for tinkerers.

Bad: Requires a lot of space to install, preset browser is a little awkward.

In ways I compare this sample pack to that of the bloated and disorganized PRISM soundbank for the Wusikstation. My main problem with this bank is it's sheer size and "decent" quality.

While this pack has a few preset gems, that does not make up for it's 8gb+ footprint. The problem with this is many standard Virtual Analog or other VST's (like the Korg Wavestation and M1) can do everything if not more than this soundbank can do:

1. a better/same price
2. with MUCH less CPU usage
3. virtually no hard drive space (megabytes vs gigabytes)
4. much more stable vst plugin

I find the sound quality on this one to be on par with that of the PRISM and by "on par" I mean sub par because you are dealing with a lot of long drawn out samples that do not translate well/correctly at higher or lower depending where they have been sampled.

I suppose if you found yourself owning this through a Wusik Group Buy it might be a good deal for just browsing through the large preset bank and carving out the useless fat (there is a lot), however if your going to drop the cold hard cash for it, I would highly recommend you consider other higher quality, smaller CPU/hard drive footprint VST's such as the following:

1. Korg Wasestation or M1
2. Steinberg Halion Sonic
3. DUNE
4. Crystal (free)

Even combining two VST's other than using this one you will be able to end up using less CPU and having a cleaner and easier to manipulate sound than this Ravernator pack because it deals in pre-recorded WAV's and those are nearly set in stone and IMO a huge waste of space when created as they are in this pack.