EastWest has just released Quantum Leap Colossus and Quantum Leap RA. Colossus is a Kompakt based General MIDI compatible 32GB virtual instrument that covers all of the basic musical genres. RA is a Kompakt based "rare and ethnic" sound library plug-in.

RA and Colossus are available for MacOS X in VST, AU and RTAS plug-in formats and cost US$995 each.

Focusrite announces that its audio interface FireWire Saffire, will be available from May with a confirmed price of £349 (arround 536 euros). Previously shown at NAMM, Saffire is a DSP peripheral, with ultra low latency, 24/192 conversion, 4 ins: 2 preamps and S/PDIF, 8 balanced outs for monitoring/headphones or 7.1 surround. It will come with Cubase LE, and its own Saffire Control software which provides a flexible software mixer and allows control on every parameters of the interface.

Bitcarel announces a bugfix version 1.4b35 for iRecordMusic. This software enables you to surf and record Net audio to MP4-AAC. You can record multiple BBC radio streams, Hollywood movie trailer soundtracks and news webcasts at the same time. Recorded files are iPod compatible.

Info and download in the MacMusic softwares section.

Roland is now offering owners of the Fantom-XR synth module the ability to add Version 2-functionality to their rack with the FAN-XR-UP1 "Sample Tools Expansion Kit". This kist also includes an upgraded Fantom-X Editor Version 2, including S-700 sample-conversion software for Mac.

The FAN-XR-UP1 upgrade costs $49.

Motu announces that its sampler software MachFive is updated to v1.21b1, in both VST and Audio Units formats for Mac OS X. This is a public beta (pre-release) of MachFive 1.21 pending the final update of MachFive 1.21. The AU addresses compatibility with Logic 7's new AU validation process, and the VST adds compatibility with Ableton Live and Max/MSP.