Toneboosters Barricade v4

[Butwug]

Double post. Was tryna fix spelling and quoted myself

But Ill add that it also has a loudness meter and lots of different inputs models. Such a versatile plugin.

[nicksohn]

yup, this limiter is ridiculously great!

[Cooker]

Want to try this someday on the mixbus rather than mastering as a low-cpu coloring solution.

[Mr. Spock]

It is ridiculously easy to understand and i would say even more so when you compare like for like, consider it as three plugins.
Saturator into a compressor into a Limiter, quite probably one of the best plugins i have ever bought, and i am not a dynamics collector like some, for years i only used 1176 and LA.

Im still wondering if there is a compressor out there as good as this thing. The clipping into compression into limiting is ridiculously dope.

Been thinking of picking up Klanghelm MJUC as Ive heard nothing but good things about it, but Barricade4 is so easy to understand do to the amazing UI, so not sure I would use MJUC much. One thing I like about Barricade4 is how the compressor attack and release times are in milliseconds and you can visually see all the readouts. Helped me tons when learning about attack and release times.

MJUC is very different sounding. It has a lot of mojo and "movement". b4's compression is clean and more comparable to Kotelnikov. It Sounds great and can be punchy. MJUC is very musical and syrup-y which I personally love.

[Butwug]

MJUC is very different sounding. It has a lot of mojo and "movement". b4's compression is clean and more comparable to Kotelnikov. It Sounds great and can be punchy. MJUC is very musical and syrup-y which I personally love.

Ive read that MJUC is musical elsewhere as well, but Im not sure exactly what that means. Can you elaborate? What does it do that cant be done with Barricade4? Im not a pro at mastering but have some basic understanding so trying to wrap my head around what you mean with musical.

For instance when you say it can be punchy, cant that be done with settings that have
- a ratio around 2:1
- slow attack to let transient through
- fast release to give it the punch
- threshold to where it tickles bassdrum, but enough to give it a ever so slight pump mojo with the release time and threshold combo.

Not sure if theres other stuff going on under the hood that is unique to MJUC. Guy over at subsekt forums likes MJUC a lot, and used his post for learning a bit on mastering. That thread is the one that made me want to pick up MJUC, but have used his guidelines with good results using Barricade4.

https://www.subsekt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5108

[Mr. Spock]

MJUC sounds groovy, juicy, soft in a way, not sterile or "only practical". You just can't compare the two at all.

[DrReacto]

Barricade gives you a lot of bang for the buck and low cpu. V4 is very flexible, really like the saturation options. I like MJUC as well but it isn't a limiter like Barricade. Plus, it thickens everything up so much I find it difficult to use on a mix bus. If you put a sine wave through MJUC and analyze, you'll see a lot of harmonics.

[Butwug]

Barricade gives you a lot of bang for the buck and low cpu. V4 is very flexible, really like the saturation options. I like MJUC as well but it isn't a limiter like Barricade. Plus, it thickens everything up so much I find it difficult to use on a mix bus. If you put a sine wave through MJUC and analyze, you'll see a lot of harmonics.

Ended up buying MJUC and I like it! But as you said, it colors the sound quite a bit. Was mixing into it so built sounds around it. Slapping it on after will definitely change the sound. Good purchase for sure.

I still have Barricade 4 before MJUC to clip, and after to limit. I love you Barricade. Months back, I read someone saying Barricade4 might be the best vst ever created. Now that I understand music production a bit more, Im starting to think he wasnt exaggerating. Ok no more fanboying over this vst. I promise

[Butwug]

Had a track where I had two instances of Barricade on master with slight clipping on each. One to tame the peaks for compressor, other for loudness. Noticed that pulling down the clipping slider changes the sound even before it starts clipping and makes the mix sound thin. Took the first instance and put it on my drum kit to tame peaks there. Same thing there. Thinned out the sound way before it started clipping. Using it as last plugin to clip, compress, and limit, works good. Just wish that using more than one instance of clipping didnt thin out the sound, even before it starts clipping.

[SiliconDeath]

What I like about this limiter is the threshold selector, as it seems to be something missing in the Pro L2 I've trialed. I'm not running mixes hot, so the idea of having to "boost and cut" volume either within Pro L2 or outside it, seems rather silly, when I don't need to do any of that "dance" with this thing.

It's also curious that despite not having any oversampling (outside from true peak mode afaik), the Barricade 4 is really clean. And if that wasn't enough, it also has much lower latency. This means you could also use it for podcasting or gaming, since the latency is under 3ms with 48khz sample rate, making it almost perfect for real-time use.

Since I much prefer the use of threshold in the workflow, I can't quite seem to grasp the benefits the Pro L2 might offer. What is it that people see in Pro L2?

[medienhexer]

What I like about this limiter is the threshold selector, as it seems to be something missing in the Pro L2 I've trialed. I'm not running mixes hot, so the idea of having to "boost and cut" volume either within Pro L2 or outside it, seems rather silly, when I don't need to do any of that "dance" with this thing.

It's also curious that despite not having any oversampling (outside from true peak mode afaik), the Barricade 4 is really clean. And if that wasn't enough, it also has much lower latency. This means you could also use it for podcasting or gaming, since the latency is under 3ms with 48khz sample rate, making it almost perfect for real-time use.

Since I much prefer the use of threshold in the workflow, I can't quite seem to grasp the benefits the Pro L2 might offer. What is it that people see in Pro L2?

It’s a different perspective on workflow. Usually, you leave about 6dB headroom on your Master channel before mastering. Pro-L defaults to increasing level and loudness towards the final -0.5 or so dB Peak. It’s the perspective of showing you the end result of your mastering work.

If you just need it to cut off peaks on a bus, press the Alt key while changing the Gain value. This will automatically adjust Output Volume to keep the current level.

That’s basically what the Threshold does in a plug-in if the resulting level stays the same. Normally, lowering Threshold would cut signal and thereby lower the resulting volume. If the level stays the same, there’s automatic volume compensation going on in the background.

[digitalboytn]

Barricade 4 is a killer plugin and big step up from v3...

It is so flexible with the compression,limiting and saturation etc...

I use it at at the end of the master buss and for mastering duties,but it really can be used anywhere...

MJUC is a character compressor,but it is not really a limiter and it is not transparent...

You don't really want that one on the master buss

[SiliconDeath]

Thanks for the tips, now I know a little better how L2 works

[Vortifex]

..

[Dasheesh]

top three. i hear people going back and forth between Barricade, stealth limiter, and A.O.M invisible limiter. good debate going on there.