Product Reviews by KVR Members

Minimal Audio's Current has clearly demonstrated that the Wavetable Synthesis era is far from over. This review is written before the actual relaunch (after the drama dealing with rent-only pricing), so the bugs mentioned may not be present in the future.

The Good: A whole plethora of new unique wavetable spectral warp knobs that give you endless possibilities even with just a Sawtooth. Combining them and resampling into the wavetable importer is a clean process. Current also has a large selection of morphable filters as well as complete access to Morph EQ and Rift Filter for very quick yet powerful subtractive synthesis. Morph EQ allows you to create custom filters as well as quickly modulate EQ parameters. The rest of Minimal Audio's best FX such as their Distortion/Delay/Reverb/Chorus are also included. Not only are the FX unique in quality and capabilities, but you can stack multiple of the same FX in any order; In comparison to synths like Serum/Vital which can only have 1 of each effect.

The Bad: FM section is a bit weird to use, you have to replace the filter window with the FM matrix. Feels like it could be better placed in my opinion. All other bugs I mentioned in my previous review have been fixed for the most part!

(Edited Verdict - March 2024): I initially rated this 4/5 due to bugs. All synths come with bugs on release. Since then I've purchased the full version and the plugin runs smoothly now. Infact... this plugin is starting to become my absolute favorite. This plugin really feels like Serum/Vital version 3.0. The filters are amazing and unique; the formant filter is way better than most other synths because the cutoff goes much further, and the morph knobs give you tons of creativity when combining with Rift. The Harmonic stretch warp mode and phase disperser have far higher quality compared to Vital's. Some of Current's warp modes are even additive (although Vital still has a better spectral filter since you can draw the shape). The wavetable importer is so clean and easy, and easily takes in Serum/Vital/Phaseplant tables. Overall, beautiful wavetable synth. 5.0 stars.

THIS SYNTH NEEDS A SEQUEL.

This is a super old plugin that has definitely stood the test of time. This plugin has a high skill ceiling due to it's many features and poor outdated UI, but sounds crystal clear and is still very useful for producing just about anything a producer of today would want. I still use Sytrus alongside with newer VSTs such as Serum/Pigments, and will continue doing so as this synth is unique in the way it produces sounds. I really hope we get a Sytrus 2 one day that fixes all the outdated problems Sytrus currently has.

This synth has a fixed modulation setup that cannot be altered, and can be viewed by one of the icons in the top right corner. First a waveshape is generated additively through an Oscillator's wave editor. You can choose between analog sine/tri/square waves, and then edit those waves by shaping them with the tools provided. The real unique and amazing part of Sytrus is that you can then add non-Sine harmonics based on the waveshape you created. You can even wave-edit a 4 harmonic oscillator and then "convert to sine-harmonics" to further edit the spectrum, however this process becomes laggy with more than 4 harmonics (imagine if Sytrus 2 allowed for endless harmonic edits). No other additive synth I've seen can do this while ALSO being able to FM/RM between the 6 oscillators. After FM/RM, you can further edit the sound through 3 subtractive filter oscillators which are each equiped with a powerful editable Waveshaper. Unfortunately the modulation ends with filters and FX, so you cannot FM a filtered wave (FM8 and most other FM synths can do this). The FX are limited to a metallic reverb, a decent 3 layer delay, and a decent chorus. I personally don't care for VST fx as I usually use other fx anyways, but others might find this limitation a problem for sound design.

Sytrus really needs an update, after 10 more years this plugin probably should deserve 4 stars instead of 5. For now it certainly deserves 5 stars.

This is the only plugin I ever bought JUST from hearing the init patch saw wave. I agree with everyone else, that Diva is the best analog emulation plugin to date. A must-have for electronic producers.

Since this plugin is praised so much, I will mostly be listing the cons. I honestly thought I would consider this plugin to be rated as 4/5 stars, but the sound is just too amazing and fat for such a rating.

Biggest problem with Diva, (not cpu!) is that it isn't really semi-modular. You can slap an LFO/EG to filter/FM/amp/tune/pwm, but most subtractive plugins already do that. You have a lot of ways to manipulating LFO's/Envelopes using the "add/multiply/etc" features, but doing so is FAR more tedious than modulation in most other VSTs such as Serum/Pigments/Massive/etc. The modulation is only really useful for engineering analog chaos. Real analog instruments may have the advantage of having infinite sample rate, but the real analog sound comes from the imperfections of circuits and how heat effects transistors. Diva has already engineered almost all of these analog features to the point that you don't need to reinvent the wheel. If you want to add some more analog chaos, then perhaps you can make use of some of the semi-modular features.

Additionally, you will find some knobs that you want to modulate, but you can't. The modulation is messy and very limited. U-he even made a separate tab for working with the modulators, but since modulation is so limited, I feel like it's just a waste of space/a tab.

Last issue is more personal, but I didn't find the effects very useful or good sounding. The only effects I liked were Chorus/Rotary. I'd suggest using external FX for reverb/ phaser/ delay.

CPU isn't much of a problem if you use high hardware buffer and a good soundcard. However, this plugin definitely uses the MOST CPU out of any plugin. If you do not have the hardware, then you must bounce everything to rendered samples, which is reasonably too much work for some people.

Now for why I love this plugin: The generators and filters are beautifully engineered to emulate the REAL analog circuits. There are 5 generators and filters that each sound like their own VST plugin. I'd almost consider Diva to be 5 fat sounding VST plugins in one, but without much useful modulation. I bought this purely for the sound, and many others will too.

Simple but very effective. This plugin was on my wishlist back in the day, and I'm happy it became free. Has a unique amazing sound. I highly recommend for psytrance music.

Beautiful free VST.

Basically does everything that Serum does but better (minus the filters, Serum filters are the main selling point difference).

My absolute favorite plugin. I really regret putting off buying this while using more recent versatile wavetable plugins such as Serum or Harmless via Image-Line's signature bundle. When I finally got this from the end of year sale, I stopped using most of my other plugins because my ears are too addicted to Harmor. The sound is more than just luscious, it is crisp additive ecstasy.

Speaking of additive, this plugin is advertised (as well as Harmless) as a combined additive-subtractive engine synthesizer. Coming from subtractive and wavetable synthesis, I was skeptical how Harmor could compete with other plugins. Why not just use Sytrus to add edited waveshapes and them FM / filter them through a matrix? Why would I care about a plugin that just "adds" and "subtracts"? I was gravely mistaken.

Combining additive+subtractive engines is actually extremely powerful. You aren't just adding harmonics and passing it into a filter, rather the filter is WITHIN the additive engine. These spectral filters are special as the filter has a custom and crude cut off that directly subtract the "additive" harmonics, which creates a clean, fat, and crisp filter sound. Normal plugin filters and post FX filters have various slopes and are imperfect are filtering the sound perfectly. Harmor on the other hand essentially acts as a pure additive engine, where you create harmonics (starting from the classic all over-tone Saw wave or any other custom variation of sine harmonics) and pass them through two additive spectral filters/two spectral resonators/spectral phaser/blur (additive preverb)/pluck (time-controlled spectral filter) and perhaps add more harmonics through the harmonizer and special distortion effect while controlling the inputs for all additive engines and effects. Not to mention the powerful remappable Unison pitch and Prism harmonic detune. Additionally, Harmor has a unique image synthesis, which basically takes an image or sound and creates a spectral additive wavetable. All engines including the image synthesis engine can by modulated and there are remap features to create custom additive engines. The power and crisp of sending additive wavetable into the other additive-subtractive engines elevates the possibilities beyond infinity. Harmor is it's own unique plugin, you have complete control over the power of sound by adding and subtracting harmonics to shape perfect crisp high quality sounds.

I use to use all kinds of other plugins, but I can't imagine I'll stop using Harmor soon, the possibilities of doing additive subtractive at the same time are limitless. I love this beautiful piece of art instrument.