Crazy Diamonds

Crazy Diamond is a pleasant surprise of a 'freebie' (though you are expected to pay for it in the long run) that is both more AND less than what it claims to be.

LESS, because its sound (to me at least) is closer to a lush, deep organ than to any string - real or synthesized - I have ever heard. This is not a string quartet - you had better turn to Cheeze Machine if you are looking for that. Hardly surprising, mind you, given the author's history.:^) There is no documentation, and only a handful of presets, nice though they are. The interface is stylish; a bit unusual, but while I miss the traditional knobs, I am also happy to see the digital readouts. In any case, it is better designed than the vast majority of VSTi's out there that are fighting for attention with often outrageous and dysfunctionally funky GUI's. Some people find that categorizing the controls as 'Milk' and 'Cream' and 'Butter' are disconcerting, but I actually LIKE these rather descriptive names.

MORE because, though it is definitely a one-trick pony, that trick is AWESOME. Crazy Diamond is not designed to be a universal VA or some such beast, but a cream machine, the perfect synthesizer for a certain category or class of sounds that Pink Floyd once made their own. And that it does fabulously, offering 27 different controls for fine-tweaking the silky beauties.

OVERALL, I DEFINITELY WANT IT IN MY ARSENAL. It runs OK on a Win2K PIII450 256MBRAM SBLive! machine in Orion Pro 2.75, although changes between presets are a bit slow and buggy (takes a sec or two to visually update). Give it an update or two, and I am certain it will be one of the best niche softsynths on the market! As it is, a must to download.Read Review