Product Reviews by KVR Members

KV331 Audio: SynthMaster 2 review

First off I have to say this synth is brilliant and my new “1st out of the tool box” synth, its both easy to use for noobs, intermediates (like myself) or Pro’s, the first impression on the GUI when you load it up is it reminds you of NI’s Absynth as the default view is a big presets window – this is a good thing, you can choose from different options to get to the type of sounds you’re looking for such as Instrument Type, Attributes, Music Style and Author, I love this sort of setup as you can choose your Music Style (such as DubStep) and you get all the sounds that are good for that music style, there is also option to browse an online library of presets which is great and appears to be free, unlike other synths that require subscription to the library or charge for presets, they play upon clicking them too, no need to be redirected to download from websites.

This synth has wayyyy more control and parameters than any normal synth, it has 2 x Layers that control the synths main components, half In one layer and half in the other, there are 4 x Oscillators in total (2 per layer) with 4 x Modulators, 4 x Envelopes, 3 x FX, 2 x LFO, 2 x Multistage, 1 x Key scaling, 1 x Arp, 2 x Filters and 2 x 2D options per layer, each component has so many parameters and options its unreal, It has loads of different waveforms for the oscillator’s including ones from classic hardware synths like Roland, Korg, Moog synths etc, way more scope than your average soft synth, infact Iam gunna have to get the manual out to learn how to use some of the stuff on it!!

It has a decent built in effects panel for your presets, consisting of Vocoder, Chorus, Echo, Reverb, Compression, Tremolo, Layer FX Routing, Layer Sends and Global Effects Routing. Each one has many options to play with and the quality of the effects are top drawer. There is also a Preset window which allows you to enter details about your sounds, you can also see comments or descriptions of built in sounds.
The panel on the right of the synth contains the global settings and Matrix windows, here you have pairs of what appears to be Triggers & Sends. You can also set a global ‘quality’ level so if your PC hasn’t got much punch you can leave it on ‘draft’ but if you have the power you can punch it up a few notches…I love this. There is also a Global ‘Tune’ knob so you can tune it with any other instruments you might be using.

The sounds on this synth are top dollar, very clean and crisp with punch, it’s amazing how good VST’s can sound these days, when you play really low notes where other synths sound like farts this doesn’t, it really does produce hardware like results. The CPU hit is minimal too using about 10-20% of my 1.8Ghz AMD Turion CPU.

My review doesn’t really do it justice, go and download a demo from their website now, you will be very impressed, I will be looking out for other KV331 products from now on.

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GOOD SAMPLE BASED SYNTH

This is a bit like Omnisphere in that it uses sample librarys and manipulates the sounds with effects, it has some great sounds but as they are sample based you cant really tweak them much, other than basics like reverb, delay and gate etc - you cant get right into the 'core' of the sound and change it liek you can on proper synths that create the sounds themselves.

it has a nice thick sound and most of its presets are great.

the user interface is nice and comes in white or black, its CPU usage is minimal but higher than average for sample based playback.

this synth can be bought as a hardware synth too.Read Review

This is a MUST HAVE in everyones VST arsenal, it is always the first synth I open when starting a track, if your read other reviews you will see other people do the same, thats how good it is.

What strikes me about Lennards synth is the fact that is sounds 100% like a real Analog synth and uses virtually NO CPU!!!

the sounds are warm, thick and punchy, the effects built in a very good too - it can hold 512 (4 x 128) presets and the ones built in are very good, the synth is so popular there are hundreds of banks you can download and import, this is another good thing about it: being able to import entire banks as most synths only let you import single presets (sylenth1 can import or export both presets and banks)

The user interface could probably be improved upon but that shouldnt put you off buying it.

head over to Lennar Digitals website and download a trial today... you will NOT be disapointed..

in 2 recent top 10 lists made my computer music this synth 3rd in one and 1st in the other.Read Review