Analog Signature Studio Channel SC-226

I've been using the SC-226 channelstrip since almost a year now in many situations and on many sources.

The user interface has a comfortable size, is clear and very intuitive and fun to work with. It's not a swiss army channel strip but can be the right tool for many channels of your mix.

The four band EQ does the job very well, especially the low band and the two mid bands. I personally never became friends with the high shelf for the reason that it has a thin and thus digital sound (due to it's slope). I only use it for very small boosts or set to "bell" instead of a shelving band. The low and high bands can be switched from bell to shelf. The two mid bands have either a wide or narrower Q.

Compared to the many other plugin compressors I have, I think the one in SC-226 does a very good job! It grabs the audio very well and can have a nice and punchy character (esp. when set to RMS mode, which it is by default). Definitely a musical sounding compressor that is able to glue your drum buss or other instruments very nicely.

The highpass section (which is selectable from 20Hz to 80Hz) is the only thing I can't give good credits for. The reason is that it's not set up correctly. Switching from off to 20Hz does not feel right because it starts cutting above the labeled 20Hz. To be sure I've analyzed it and got the confirmation that it starts near 80Hz. I have reported it to Nomad Factory, which they will hopefully fix.

The warmth section, which emulates tube saturation is a welcomed addition to this channelstrip. Using it at low settings sounds very "warm" and gets you a bit closer to that "warmth". At high settings it can get grainy/fuzzier (not in a bad way!) which is often exactly what the doctor has ordered.

Last but not least: You have a phase switch and a limiter built in.

The plugin hasn't crashed once in all this time. Besides the HP filter and the "digital" sounding high shelf, I'm liking the SC-226 a lot and use it in every mixdown because it's very easy to tweak and shape the audio. Also worth mentioning is that it is VERY (!) easy on my CPU.

A very useful plugin!Read Review