MOTU has introduced the 896mk3, a cross-platform FireWire audio interface with on-board effects and mixing.

Features include eight XLR/TRS "combo" style analog inputs with high-quality preamps, true hi-Z guitar inputs, a total of 28 inputs and 32 outputs, 192 kHz analog operation, signal overload protection, a 32-bit floating point DSP for digital mixing and effects processing, two banks of configurable optical I/O and much more.

Effects include :

- Classic Reverb with five different room types, three frequency shelves with adjustable crossover points, shelf filtering and reverb lengths up to 60-seconds
- compression/limiting with two forms of compression : a standard compressor with conventional threshold/ratio/attack/release/gain controls and the Leveler , an emulation of the legendary LA-2A optical compressor
- EQ with 7-band parametric EQ modeled after British analog console EQ's, featuring 4 filter styles (gain/Q profiles), LP and HP filters with slopes that range from 6 to 36 dB

The 896mk3 will ship this summer for a price of $1,295.

This month Sweetwater's Giveaway is dedicated to Pro Tools : they are giving away a powerful Pro Tools setup to one lucky winner!

The package starts with the 003 Rack Factory which comes with industry-standard Pro Tools LE software, heaps of free plug-ins, and the massive Pro Tools Ignition Pack. The package also includes the following plug-ins : Transfuser, Eleven LE, Strike, Structure, Hybrid, Velvet, and Xpand.

To participate, you just have to answer a bunch of questions at the following address :

QuikQuak unveils Fusion Field, an easy to use diffusion reverb that QuikQuak has created in response to requests for a RaySpace 'light' and a version of Glass Viper's own diffusion reverb. Some audio demos are available.

Features :

- Smooth reverb for the whole diffusion tail.
- Fast editing, for that quick grab effect.
- Clear diffused sound, without early reflections.
- Great for adding sheen to vocals, strings and ambiences.
- Plain visual feedback of filters.
- Adjustable complexity, for lower CPU usage.
- Zero latency.
- Low cost.

Pricing and release date have not yet been announced.

Ohm Force has released updates for its entire plug-in range and announced the launch of a Video Tutorial Contest.

Updates details :

- Several minor bugs fixed (Mac/Windows).
- MIDI out disabled by default, fixed (Mac/Windows).
- Huge performance boost on all Mac versions (Mac/Windows).
- Some installation problems fixed (Mac).
- Unreadable presets problem, fixed (all RTAS versions for Mac).
- Bug in browser, fixed (Symptohm:Melohman - Mac/Windows).
- Mouse wheel scroll in browser added (Symptohm:Melohman - Windows).
- Bug on funky skin, fixed (Symptohm:Melohman - Mac).
- Problem recovering default presets locations when loading/saving (Ohmicide:Melohman - Mac/Windows).
- Some parameter names have changed to reflect its GUI labels (Ohmicide:Melohman - Mac/Windows).
- ...

Seelake has just released the AudioStation, a Windows-based user-definable digital audio workstation (Hardware).

It features a mixer that embeds a VST/VSTi host with multiple slots per channel, independent MIDI routing engine per channel, independent Audio monitoring per channel, MIDI/WAV/MP3 player/recorder plus metronomic click. It can be controlled with the provided remote (and integral part of the device), and by any external MIDI controller. Plus it can control every parameter of VST and MIDI parameters of external MIDI devices. It also features a secondary partition with a dedicated OS, separated from the audio one, so it can be used as standard PC with no risk for the audio system.

Features :

- 20 channels with I/O Audio and MIDI.
- Microphone class A preamps with phantom ...