New snapin from Kilohearts, Compactor. Doing the ring mod sidechain thing as well regular ducking/clipping. Seems very well made, extremely accurate in my limited testing. The resulting distortion from the amplitude modulation is of course present but this is as you'd expect and will work with some genres.
Anyone had a chance to use it?
KHS COMPACTOR
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- KVRian
- 854 posts since 22 Jan, 2022
Downloaded last night and messed around with it a few minutes this AM. Directly compared it against Wavesfactory Trackspacer, which is my go-to ducker.
In the short test I did - sidechaining a kick into a synth group - the results were very similar to Trackspacer. I need to test more, but my initial thoughts vs Trackspacer were that from a usability perspective I like Trackspacer a little better. I don't love Compactor's visualization (or most khz UIs in general) but it's fine/ok.
Overall, I found Compactor to be a little more 'fiddly', but that could have been because it was my first attempt. That said, after twiddling around, I think I landed mostly on the default setting. So after some experience with it, it's likely a wash or maybe slight advantage to Compactor. I often find myself going into Trackspacer's advanced options to adjust attack and release, so it's possible that after some experience with it, Compactor will be faster to set up for most use cases.
Compactor has detector circuit options (Peak, ISP, RMS) and Trackspacer does not. In my test, which IMO is the most obvious use case, I couldn't really discern much difference. However, there could be other use cases where it makes sense. You can do some interesting, creative distortions with Compactor, which you wouldn't be able to do in Trackspacer. Not sure that's something anyone would use often though.
Trackspacer lets you box in the frequency of reduction and Compactor does not, so in practice I found Trackspacer to be a little less 'destructive' and natural sounding. Whereas Compactor works better when you just want brute force volume reduction. I'll work with it more, but given the two options and knowing what I know right now, I'd probably stick with Trackspacer, but I could see use cases with Compactor might be a better option.
Overall opinion is very positive. It works as advertised, and does so very well. Given that it's free, if you need a good ducker it's an amazing option. Way better that sidechaining a compressor, IMO.
In the short test I did - sidechaining a kick into a synth group - the results were very similar to Trackspacer. I need to test more, but my initial thoughts vs Trackspacer were that from a usability perspective I like Trackspacer a little better. I don't love Compactor's visualization (or most khz UIs in general) but it's fine/ok.
Overall, I found Compactor to be a little more 'fiddly', but that could have been because it was my first attempt. That said, after twiddling around, I think I landed mostly on the default setting. So after some experience with it, it's likely a wash or maybe slight advantage to Compactor. I often find myself going into Trackspacer's advanced options to adjust attack and release, so it's possible that after some experience with it, Compactor will be faster to set up for most use cases.
Compactor has detector circuit options (Peak, ISP, RMS) and Trackspacer does not. In my test, which IMO is the most obvious use case, I couldn't really discern much difference. However, there could be other use cases where it makes sense. You can do some interesting, creative distortions with Compactor, which you wouldn't be able to do in Trackspacer. Not sure that's something anyone would use often though.
Trackspacer lets you box in the frequency of reduction and Compactor does not, so in practice I found Trackspacer to be a little less 'destructive' and natural sounding. Whereas Compactor works better when you just want brute force volume reduction. I'll work with it more, but given the two options and knowing what I know right now, I'd probably stick with Trackspacer, but I could see use cases with Compactor might be a better option.
Overall opinion is very positive. It works as advertised, and does so very well. Given that it's free, if you need a good ducker it's an amazing option. Way better that sidechaining a compressor, IMO.
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- KVRAF
- 2723 posts since 15 Apr, 2004 from Capital City, UK
I'm not sure comparing it to Trackspacer (which I have) is a useful exercise. They aren't really doing the same thing at all, so the results fro using them will be vastly different.
You mention that creative distortions are possible, which one coulldn't achieve in Trackspacer, but funnily enough, I think the main fun is exactly those distortions and the intermodulation of whichever-2-noises go into it. I'm pretty sure the original circuit shown by AU5 (I think) didn't even have amplitude response; it was "put this (bass) in one side of the ring-mod, and this (kick) in the other".
I imagine the results of compacting a 12-string guitar against a distorted 808 would be quite different from simply using Trackspacer to 'notch-out the frequency area'.
Compactor will end up in the EDM world, shmashing the ever-loving life out of kicks and basses, although it might be interesting finding a use for it in a mandolin/double-bass folk outfit.
You mention that creative distortions are possible, which one coulldn't achieve in Trackspacer, but funnily enough, I think the main fun is exactly those distortions and the intermodulation of whichever-2-noises go into it. I'm pretty sure the original circuit shown by AU5 (I think) didn't even have amplitude response; it was "put this (bass) in one side of the ring-mod, and this (kick) in the other".
I imagine the results of compacting a 12-string guitar against a distorted 808 would be quite different from simply using Trackspacer to 'notch-out the frequency area'.
Compactor will end up in the EDM world, shmashing the ever-loving life out of kicks and basses, although it might be interesting finding a use for it in a mandolin/double-bass folk outfit.
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- KVRian
- 500 posts since 3 Dec, 2021
At default settings it does what it says on the tin. Haven't explored the abuse options yet. Or how it goes in the Kilohearts hosts. Already had Ringmod Side chain covered but this saves a few clicks. Nice.
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- KVRian
- Topic Starter
- 1407 posts since 1 Jul, 2023
Excellent post- thanks for sharingbillinder33 wrote: Thu Aug 21, 2025 1:55 pm Downloaded last night and messed around with it a few minutes this AM. Directly compared it against Wavesfactory Trackspacer, which is my go-to ducker.
In the short test I did - sidechaining a kick into a synth group - the results were very similar to Trackspacer. I need to test more, but my initial thoughts vs Trackspacer were that from a usability perspective I like Trackspacer a little better. I don't love Compactor's visualization (or most khz UIs in general) but it's fine/ok.
Overall, I found Compactor to be a little more 'fiddly', but that could have been because it was my first attempt. That said, after twiddling around, I think I landed mostly on the default setting. So after some experience with it, it's likely a wash or maybe slight advantage to Compactor. I often find myself going into Trackspacer's advanced options to adjust attack and release, so it's possible that after some experience with it, Compactor will be faster to set up for most use cases.
Compactor has detector circuit options (Peak, ISP, RMS) and Trackspacer does not. In my test, which IMO is the most obvious use case, I couldn't really discern much difference. However, there could be other use cases where it makes sense. You can do some interesting, creative distortions with Compactor, which you wouldn't be able to do in Trackspacer. Not sure that's something anyone would use often though.
Trackspacer lets you box in the frequency of reduction and Compactor does not, so in practice I found Trackspacer to be a little less 'destructive' and natural sounding. Whereas Compactor works better when you just want brute force volume reduction. I'll work with it more, but given the two options and knowing what I know right now, I'd probably stick with Trackspacer, but I could see use cases with Compactor might be a better option.
Overall opinion is very positive. It works as advertised, and does so very well. Given that it's free, if you need a good ducker it's an amazing option. Way better that sidechaining a compressor, IMO.
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- KVRian
- 500 posts since 3 Dec, 2021
That's a bit like saying clippers killed the need for limiters and saturation.ere2learn wrote: Fri Aug 22, 2025 11:03 am Probably the best free plugin this year, all sidechain specialty plugins are dead now
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- KVRist
- 468 posts since 26 Jun, 2024
As much as I think this plugin is great, I concur with Igro. This does not do frequency specific ducking so that's a lot of tools like Trackspacer that won't be replaced by this snapin.
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- KVRian
- 500 posts since 3 Dec, 2021
So at default settings (no lookahead, no release) this nulls with the Melda method.
Then if you start to dial in some lookahead attack and some release, there seems to be some volume ducking added and things clean up a lot. Pretty cool
Then if you start to dial in some lookahead attack and some release, there seems to be some volume ducking added and things clean up a lot. Pretty cool
Last edited by dysjoint on Sat Aug 23, 2025 5:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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- KVRian
- Topic Starter
- 1407 posts since 1 Jul, 2023
It sort of does do frequency specific because it uses ring mod. Ring mod in this context is essentially am derived from a modulator but with the input rectified and carved out at audio rates. The sidebands create mess though.Morty-C-137 wrote: Fri Aug 22, 2025 7:40 pm As much as I think this plugin is great, I concur with Igro. This does not do frequency specific ducking so that's a lot of tools like Trackspacer that won't be replaced by this snapin.
I will experiment a bit with using it in Multipass- could open things up significantly.
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- KVRist
- 188 posts since 28 Jun, 2013
I think this plugin is unusable in reality, because it introduces a breathtaking 10ms of latency, even after you set attack/release to zero. It should introduce exactly 0.0ms / 0 samples of latency.
...So in the end, the design/concept already is flawed, and naming the lookahead "attack" doesn't help here either...
However thanks for making this freely available.
...So in the end, the design/concept already is flawed, and naming the lookahead "attack" doesn't help here either...
However thanks for making this freely available.
