KV331 SynthMaster for iOS free

[Piktor]

In case you are interested in another freebie:

https://www.kvraudio.com/news/kv331-audio-gives-away-synthmaster-one-ios-universal-synth-app-for-free-until-april-15-48224

[jeffincltnc]

I grabbed it. Some good sounds. Not sure how much I will use it but free is free. It looked like 400 presets came with this and there are lot of in-app purchases to add on.

[Dr Mike Metlay]

First off, a pitch for the original SynthMaster:

 

As someone who's been using virtual instruments since the very first native one (Steinberg Neon, still out there and now free), I consider Synthmaster to be one of the best-kept secrets out there.

 

It actually is a remarkably deep synthesizer with a whole variety of sound engines under the hood: virtual analog, vector, granular, sample playback and more, all unified under a single UI that is very neatly laid out. It has solid MIDI integration and an extensive modulation matrix, nice-sounding integrated effects, and an efficient and easily searchable patch browser system.

 

KV331 Audio is a Turkish company, based in Istanbul and Ankara. It's run by the Biyikoglu brothers, Bulent and Levent, who are unquestionably two of the nicest guys you'll ever meet in this business. I always make a point of stopping by their booth at NAMM for a handshake and a cheerful conversation. They are constantly developing new features and fixing bugs -- almost all of which are now so far down in the weeds that most users never run into them. And upgrades are free until there's a major version release. Rev 3 is in development, and the current version is 2.9.

 

Note that the Player version of the app, which has limited sound tweaking, is always free, and that Synthmaster is beloved among hackers and independent musicians all over the world not only for its power but also for its stupid-low $99 price under most circumstances. In a couple of recent polls on software forums, it came out at or near the top of the rankings in terms of critical reviews and popularity among users, almost always beating out apps like Omnisphere and Falcon, both for its feature set and its value for money.

 

Yeah, there's a TON of in-app purchase content, and yeah, the price can climb fast if you get into buying bundles (which include not only presets but also necessary sample content when appropriate). But with some care you can focus just on your genre and get a few packs that will take you a long way. Nori Ubukata, one of the best synth programmers out there, has created a huge number of these libraries; I strongly recommend Art Rock Basics, which has samples for a variety of classic keyboards... including my beloved Mellotron. Most of the packs are EDM-related, so if you don't do EDM, you can skip them with no harm.

 

Now for Synthmaster One:

 

This is a much younger program, also very inexpensive. It's designed to have no tabs or multiple screens, with everything accessible. As a 1.x release, it's a little more buggy, but also has some great features and a solid sound. I have used it much less because it's far newer and I am very used to the original. My guess is that it will continue to develop and be a "grower" over the coming years.

 

And then there are the iOS apps, which feature a subset of the features of the desktop app, as well as full access to all of the same sound libraries used by the desktop app. In-app registration lets you connect your account and use whichever libraries you buy on either platform. Synthmaster Player has a limited performance-based feature set (like the desktop version), but it's great fun and portable as well as being quite affordable. They've just added MPE support, which is being debugged and fine-tuned right now.

 

Synthmaster One's iOS version is a lot closer to the desktop version, with a fair bit of programmability. It's a nice app anyway, and for free, it's a no-brainer.

[Jwave]

Thanks for the great info Mike. I've just bought the 173MB Art Rock Basics library for Synthmaster Player based on your recommendation: only $2.99 on the iPad! I already have the excellent Historic Synth Giants bundle.

[kwyn]

I bought the synth Giants but it won't download. It shows as a purchase and when I go to restore purchases, it's listed but it says downloading 0% and never downloads the presets

[SamuelBLupowitz]

They've just added MPE support, which is being debugged and fine-tuned right now.

Is it just me, or do iOS apps seem to be ahead of the curve a bit as far as MPE support? Maybe my sample set is just skewed, but could it be because developers on that platform are more used to pushing the envelope as a necessity?