Mix Bus Compressor vs SimplComp

This compressor has the lowest total harmonic distortion of any plugin we have seen, including desktop units. At the heart of it is a unique envelope follower design that makes it possible to compress the signal without creating distortion harmonics. On the spectrum of compressor tone that ranges from "vintage analog" to "pristine digital", this plugin sits at the extreme end of low-noise digital clarity, but it is different from other low-noise digital designs because it doesn't use digital look-ahead. Therefore its response time is immediate, it adds no extra delay to the signal chain, and it works great for processing real-time performance effects. It uses no oversampling so there is no phase distortion or loss of high-frequency energy from anti-aliasing filters. It also uses no digital-style filters (FIR filters) and no digital look-ahead, so it adds no additional latency to the signal chain. Although it is not a model of an existing piece analog hardware, every component of its signal path is realizable in the analog domain. We think of it as a digital model of our ideal analog compressor: it could exist as an analog circuit but would be very expensive to build with physical analog electronic parts. The user interface is 100% scalable, designed specifically for iOS, so it looks beautiful at any screen size or orientation, from tiny portrait views in AUM on iPhone to the largest full-screen views on iPad Pro.

Introduction SimpleComp is very simple general purpose compressor that’s easy to use and very light on CPU. Sometimes you just need some basic dynamics processing that doesn’t add “character”, or that relies on sophisticated techniques or performance expensive DSP. SimplComp was designed for those times! SimpleComp is an AUv3 effects plugin that can run standalone, or in any AUv3 compatible host such as Logic Pro, GarageBand or AUM. SimpleComp currently runs on iPadOS / iOS (iPad & iPhone) and macOS (Intel & Silicon) and is available as a Universal Purchase from the Apple App Store. If you’re planning on using SimpleComp on Mac / desktop, please ensure that your favourite DAW / host supports AUv3 (not just AU). Parameters ACTIVE - toggles the effect on or off. IN - sets the level of the incoming signal. Typically you would leave this as 0dB, i.e unity gain. The meters to the left of the panel show the level of the incoming signal. COMP - sets the compression threshold. Note that unlike many compressor plugins, the threshold is reduced as you turn up the control, so as you turn it up, you get more compression effect. The bar meter below this control will give an indication of how much over the threshold the input signal is. RATIO - sets the compression ratio. A higher ratio results in a more noticeable “squashing” effect on the signal. OUT - sets the level of the output signal. You may need to adjust this is you wish to manually make up the gain lost by the compression effect, e.g. when AUTO is off (see below). ATK - sets the attack time of the compressor. REL - sets the release time of the compressor. AUTO - toggles automatic makes gain. When switched on, SimplComp will automatically adjust the gain to compensate for the gain reduction that occurs when compression is applied. This is calculated using the compression threshold and ratio. MIX - sets the balance between the compressed and original / dry signal. This allows SimplComp to be used for parallel compression. Factory Presets There are a few factory presets included to get you going. The overall compression will be dependent on the level of the input signal so you will need to select an appropriate factory preset as a starting point, then adjust the COMP parameter up or down for more or less compression indicated by the bar meter below the control.