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You'll find extensive selections of parameters lurking in the sub-menus. This is PhaseMistress's Tweak menu.

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• Review
• Manufacturer's Description

You get what you pay for, right? Well in some walks of life, yes, but in the plug-in market, the proliferation of high-quality freeware effects is causing many people to question whether that old maxim still holds true. The big commercial companies are still in business, but there’s no doubt that they’re having to work harder than ever to convince punters to shell out for their products.

Developers like SoundToys, then - who are used to producing TDM-only, high-end, high-price plug-ins - must see the native market as a massive challenge. With their Native Effects Bundle V3, though, it looks like they’re making a serious bid to conquer it. This six plug-in collection retails for just under $495 - while that might sound like a lot if you’ve been bred on freeware, when you consider SoundToys’ TDM prices, it actually starts to look pretty reasonable.

The effects

The six effects cover modulation (PhaseMistress and Tremolator), delay (EchoBoy and Crystallizer) and filtering (FilterFreak); you also get Speed, SoundToys’ time and pitchshifting plug-in, but in terms of support, this is the odd one out as it’s AudioSuite only. Indeed, native though this package is, it’s worth mentioning that it only contains Audio Units and RTAS plug-ins for Mac. There’s currently no VST or PC support, which is a big shame.

To get up and running, you’ll need an iLok key and account, so factor in another £30 if you’re not already suitably equipped. On the upside, you can buy the bundle as a download from the SoundToys site (it’s just over 100MB): at the current exchange rate, this means it costs around £250.

Without wishing to generalise too much, it’s fair to say that the overall theme of these effects (Speed aside) is analogue emulation. For TDM users, part of the attraction of SoundToys has been the way in which they’ve worked through various famous boxes and pedals (Echoplex, Bi-Phase, Sherman and many more) and created plug-ins that accurately replicate their sounds. Combine their excellent design skills with a multitude of presets and you’ve got an extremely useful plug-in suite.

In-depth look

Let’s start our run through the plug-ins with a look at FilterFreak. This comes in two forms - single filter and dual filter - and in both cases combines a typical resonant filter (offering low-pass, high-pass, band-pass and band-reject filtering) with an extensive modulation section. Once you move away from a simple static filter, the modulation section really comes into its own. Offering everything from a simple envelope and LFO to custom rhythmic patterns, the breadth of effects it enables you to create is impressive. If this all seems a bit much, you can retreat to the preset list, which runs to upwards of 200 entries.