Macs making music: NAMM show debuts sound, music apps

MacWeek, Feb 9, 1998 by John Poultney

Los Angeles - The Mac was out in force at the National Association of Music Merchants show here at the end of January. Several vendors showed off new products and updates for sound and music applications.

BitHeadz Inc. of Capitola, Calif., previewed Retro AS-1, a new application that mimics an analog-style synthesizer. The package, which will be available in mid-March for $259, will provide 16-bit, 44-kHz stereo output, along with controls for reverb, delay, chorus, flange, overdrive and distortion effects.

Depending on CPU speed, Retro AS-1 will support up to 16 voices, BitHeadz said. The program will have controls for up to three oscillators; each will have an eight-octave range and be able to produce Sine, Triangle, Saw, Pulse and Noise waveforms.

Mark of the Unicorn Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., showed off Digital Performer 2.3, the latest update to its MIDI sequencing and digital-audio recording application. Version 2.3 now boasts stereo tracks, which operate like mono tracks and hold stereo pairs of sound bites that remain locked during editing. The update also lets users apply unlimited crossfades; shift audio portions regardless of tempo alignment; and save preferences for Unisyn, the company's universal editor for MIDI devices.

Digidesign, a Palo Alto, Calif., division of Avid Technology Inc., previewed the ADAT bridge I/O. Scheduled to be released in March for $1,195, the device will allow users to connect Digidesign's Pro Tools recording system directly to Alesis Corp.'s ADAT digital tape recorders.

Metric Halo Laboratories Inc. of Poughkeepsie, N.Y., introduced a Pro Tools plug-in version of SpectraFoo, its professional audio-analysis application. SpectraFoo TDM is available at an introductory price of $500; regular pricing has not been determined.