Product Reviews by KVR Members
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Reviewed By Vospi [all]
September 23rd, 2025
Version reviewed: 1 on Windows
Let's goooooo.
Lovely filters in a new and accessible package, free. What's not to like?
An esoteric thing that requires a good ear and, from my experience, manual separation of channels (L/R or M/S done with splitting). So for me, it works best on mixes that "ran their course" but still need some polish, and you want to try a quick thing because you run out of time. For example, in M/S configuration and used carefully, it can give you very quick and very powerful stereo results on master; especially when you have no other "compositional' ways to pull that stereo up. However, it's sometimes hit or miss, and also you have to read the manual to have the slightest idea of what's happening at all, trust me. (In short, it's three compressors that work together and talk to each other, but not really.) Other than that, at this point I'm ready to say that it's tried and tested in the real world for multiple years, that it works and sometimes works as an irreplaceable thing, IMO - and I'm usually the first to hate on both compressors and black boxes.
Reviewed By Vospi [all]
November 4th, 2024
Version reviewed: 1.0 on Windows
Didn't test it extensively yet, but did use it a lot in one production project (https://youtu.be/L3YSHdWGc0Y) and was very, very happy with how it sits in the mix. Quick responsive interface and not too hard on the CPU.
Reviewed By Vospi [all]
November 4th, 2024
Version reviewed: 1.0 on Windows
Simple, wonderful to use, great sound. VoS never disappoints.
Used that in actual productions already and was very happy with the performance.
Literally saved me once when I had a difficult situation with a client. Amazing, just worked. Thank you.
Reviewed By Vospi [all]
July 12th, 2023
Version reviewed: 1.0.1 on Windows
upd-4: Everything is fine. I'm extremely happy to bump my score to 5. The bug was swiftly fixed. Awesome.
Extremely good first impression. Every One Synth Challenge guy should be jumping on this. I'll give it more time, but for now, you get my solid vote. Good luck.
P.S: One feature I would really wish for is channel linking. That would add a great deal of value for drums vs pads examples. So far, the two knobs approach to striking a balance between saturation and compression is fantastic. Once you know what to listen to (and there's a clear visual indication as well), you're off to understand the compression/limiting issue very well.
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(From here, I list previous issues I had with the plugin, I no longer have the issues, it's fixed.
upd: ok. Once I press "disable" button in the latest stable legit FL Studio, it leads to a whole DAW crashing and closing immediately. Which makes this AWESOME plugin unusable for me. Please please fix this. I don't want to downgrade my developer challenge grade for this, because I was waiting for something that operates, looks and sounds like this for months and months. Please? If you need any extra info/videos, feel free to PM me. (Checked this on the latest FL Beta as well, same issue.). Deleting the plugin from the chain altogether doesn't cause the crash. Enabling one thread, disabling "smart disable" doesn't help, so these are not the features that cause incompatibility. Once again, it's all resolved once the plugin is bridged away from FL.
upd-2: A workaround for the issue below is Make Bridged option in FL Wrapper. I use a VST3 version.
upd-3: The Wave Observer didn't cause similar issues for me. Great, awesome GUI work.
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upd: If you make plugin Bridged in FL Studio AND keep the buffer fixed, then you can use it, it seems like. Not completely sure as of now. Will try and make this work cause, honestly, I really want to.
I appreciate so many things about that. I instantly gave it a 4 out of 5 in the challenge. I really need that specific configuration for free - bandwidths and LR and all. I happen to think they are key. But. After adding a single band, this plugin instantly slammed my legit FL Studio with a bunch of crackle noise; then I turned the fixed buffers on for it (which fixed the issue), but not 5 minutes have passed for it to block my channel and cause even sends to get silent (loud DC signal and nothing else, unfortunately common for "self-written" plugins. So it's, basically, unusable for me.
I'd be very, very happy to change my rating if these issues resolve. It's a noble task you're after, great deal of interest from me. Free space doesn't get a decent fine-tunable LR equalizer for whatever reason... However, it just so happens that I really don't approve of plugins that might break my creative work later, that might not work down the line with no explanation and fix. EQ is rather replaceable, I get it, but still. I want my projects to last.
Good luck with everything and feel free to PM me if you need to.
P.S. Could you make ST-L-R, Band Shelf and especially bandwidth lists react to a mouse scroll? That saves me so much time in other products.
Lens proved to be an essential part of my free toolkit. Beautiful idea and execution, if you're intricately familiar with multiband compression. You could use it without such knowledge, but its utility and innovation really shines when you understand the problems that mb-comp tries to solve - or plugin designers try to solve when sketching the product out.
Up to 64 bands with great fast control in one window, linear phase and a manageable CPU overhead? This is extremely useful for sounddesign, and I can't be grateful enough for the free version, as it makes so, so easy to recommend this to students. Yes, Pro-MB offers a very fine-tuned control, but not only it is around $200, but also it's a different beast at the end of the day.
I don't know anything like Lens, and I became a fan in the first day.
My applause to you, Auburn, you did it again.
Response from Guillaume Piolat from Auburn Sounds on December 28th, 2022
Thanks, it's an honour. It's not "linear phase", it's more "constant phase", you pay a constant phase cost for passing into Lens.
Reviewed By Vospi [all]
June 4th, 2021
Version reviewed: 1.0 on Windows
I always prefer to work with zero-latency.
For this, the Thrillseeker is a literal life-saver. As for its sound, it's a middle ground between a transparent multi-purpose limiter and a straight-up saturator/waveshaper. It helps me limit my dynamics with ease. As for cons, I would note CPU consumption on a slightly higher end of the range. Otherwise, it grew on me, and I'm very thankful it did.
+ Free
+ Great and unique sound (although NOT a transparent one)
+ No peaks over a threshold
- x86 only, so use a bridge or FL Studio or Reaper
- a bit heavy on CPU
- some UI elements update a bit "lazy" sometimes.
Reviewed By Vospi [all]
December 6th, 2020
Version reviewed: 2.7 on Windows
This is so awesome.
I'm so glad that you've uploaded it here, otherwise I would've never heard of it. Please post updates. The work is amazing, the sound is SO TRUE TO LIFE when keep the output clipping at bay. I love the way it diminishes highs and adds hiss. It's fantastic.
So happy that someone've implemented physical modelling, and in a free plugin, and with a relatively short delay, and with a dry/wet knob.
Thank you.
