Russ takes a look at the Ample Guitar T Acoustic Guitar virtual instrument in this extended video review. Check out what he thinks playing a guitar VI when he owns the real guitar!

Russ takes a look at some of the drum sample libraries from Drums on Demand. The libraries work with Structure, Kontakt, EXS, Reason and Garageband.

Mike presents a show & tell review of the Cedar Studio for Pro Tools plug-ins and covers the DNS One, DeBuzz, DeClip and Adaptive Limiter 2 plug-ins.

Russ takes a look at the NI Battery drum sampler and asks in a world of samplers and drum VIs is there a need for a dedicated drum sampler and have Native Instruments done enough with this new version?

Russ takes a look at the XLN Addictive keys free piano and asks how good can a free piano be? Find out. Download it here http://www.pro-tools-expert.com/free-pro-tools-plug-ins/

Russ and James take a look at both the Focusrite Forte and Apogee Duet and see how they compare.

Once you’ve watched the video then download the stems and/or the Pro Tools 10 session and take a listen to both of them in action.

• Pro Tools 10 Session
• Audio stems 24 bit 96khz

Russ takes a look at the Waves Manny Marroquin plug-in series and gives an extended show and tell and let’s you know what he thinks.

Russ takes a look at the Spark EDM and gives a full show and tell and his thoughts about the brand new beat box from Arturia.

Transistor Revolution is an instrument library for Native Instruments’ Kontakt 5 or Kontakt 5 Player by Wave Alchemy. It contains meticulously sampled versions of the two most legendary Roland Rhythm Composers, the TR-808 and TR-909. Each instrument provides the same adjustments offered on the original hardware devices but this library costs a fraction of the going price of a used unit.

In addition to the faithful reproduction of all of the available sounds, this library provides EQ, Compression, Transient Shaping, Tape Saturation and more on every instrument. As this is a sample library for Kontakt, it does not include the pattern sequencer from the original instruments so you’ll need to use your DAW or other sequencer to create and edit your patterns and beats.

Eric Johnson takes a look, head to over to the product page to hear demo songs and a demo version of the product.

Mike takes a different look at the new Avid Pro Limiter and concentrates on the loudness metering features.

Russ takes a look and of course a listen to the new Avid Pro Limiter and finds out that it has a couple of hidden surprises.

Russ takes a look at the Waves REDD Abbey Road console emulations and gives an extended show and tell and his thoughts on them.

Mike reviews Unveil, the de-reverb plug-in that Zynaptiq have just released an update for. New features in v1.6 include…

• Now also supports 64bit operation as VST on Windows systems.
• For the AAX Plug-In, AudioSuite Preview functionality is now enabled for ProTools version 10.3.3 and above.
• Improved compatibility with Apple Final Cut Pro X.
• The RTAS plug-in now supports EuCon in ProTools.
• Mac: Authorization now valid system-wide.
• Mac: Authorizer app now launches on install.
• Increased time-out and removed nag screens for the free trial version.

You can find out more about Unveil and download the demo.

 Russ takes a look at the Scuffham Amps S Gear Amp emulation. See what he thinks.

Russ takes a look at one of the new UVI Vintage Synth legends series, the FMX1. This synth is based on the DX1 synth from the 1980s. See what he thinks and download the demo yourself from UVI.

In this video James takes a look at the Focusrite Liquid Channel and its Pre Amp section simulations. He takes you on a tour of the front panel features and shows off some of the pre amp tones.

I remember standing in the Hilton Hotel at NAMM 2012 when I first had the vision of Ignite shared with me. ‘Musicians are not engineers and we need to enable them to make music in a way that makes sense’ was how Ignite was pitched. It wasn’t even called Ignite then, it went through several cringe worthy iterations of a name before its final moniker, but discretion forbids me from outing them.

Of course the vision for Ignite makes sense, trying to make music with the average DAW is becoming more and more challenging, as layer upon layer of technology barriers are added with feature creep.

The job of any Product Manager is to realize a vision, so the big question is ‘does Ignite realize that original vision?’ I’m going to make a video to give a full show and tell of how it can become part of any songwriter or composer’s workflow and how to get it into Pro Tools, but for now this is my first impressions review.

Ignite is a FREE (please do not read crap for FREE) download from the AIR website, so you can head over now and download it for yourself.

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With the big names such as iZtope, Waves, McDSP et all having such a huge share of the plug-in market, it must must be hard to try and get in with a new idea, let alone an entire range.

Some of you may not be aware of Plug & Mix, born out of the site Don’t Crack, their mission is to create high quality, affordable plug-ins. When we recently had news of their entry into the AAX format, we had to take a listen.

The range sports no fewer than 40 plug-ins, covering everything from top end rack emulations, vintage amps and Boss pedal emulations. Although right now 14 of them support the new AAX format.

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