Atmosphere

Virtual "Rompler" done right!

This is in my opinion the first virtual instrument plugin that in many ways easily outperforms it's hardware counterparts. First of all, it sounds just incredible. Originally intended to be the ultimate pad sound machine, it is now almost an allround "Dream Synth". The price may be a little steep for some hobby-ist, but considering the quality, size and effort that the developers put into the core library, I think it is justified.

The UVI engine performs quite well, the overall sound is transparent and fat. CPU usage is moderate and it has some of the best filters I've heard so far in the virtual intrument world. And don't make the mistake to see this plugin as a pure preset machine. Since you can layer 2 of the 1000 sounds and change quite a number of sound parameters for each layer, the sound creation possibilities are almost endless. The controls offered to manipulate the sounds behave also quite musically, means if you turn a knob, you get a "result" and not some abstract behaviour that I've seen in other plugins.

Envelopes are fast and flexible enough to shape the sounds into various directions, though I would like to see more than the 4 standard stages sometimes. Nice also that the voice allocation follows the standards set by hardware synths and gives held notes a higher priority. This is something that a lot of other soft synths and samplers don't do correctly.

+ Huge library
+ Quality sound
+ Layering concept
+ Musical behavior
+ Correct voice handling

- LFOs not syncable to host (planned for an update)
- Fast pitch bends sound stepped
- Challenge response copy-protection (though they allow unlimited installs)
- Price may be an issue
- Long installation procedure

(The installation procedure takes ages, since Atmosphere decodes and copies data from 6 CDs onto the harddrive and the progress bar moves very slowly. The first time I thought the computer crashed, so I started from scratch...)Read Review