Native Instruments is releasing some cheaper ways of getting at their software guitar modeler, Guitar Rig, in the form of a cheaper software version and a hardware bundle:

• Guitar Rig 3 XE is a "lite" version of Guitar Rig, focused on the basics — 5 guitar/bass amps, 12 cabinets, and 21 effects. It also some of the "helper" modules from Guitar Rig, including a metronome, tapedeck, and tuner — but no looping module, which is one of my favorites. (See the full list.) US$99 on its own.
• Guitar Session bundles the XE software with Cubase 4 LE, some pop drums for KORE player via a soundpack, and the Session I/O audio hardware. US$250 for the bundle, available June 1 worldwide.

Native Instruments remains the unchallenged heavyweight of instruments and effects. Apple’s Logic Studio 8 recently got a formidable upgrade and a big price drop (US$499), but its bundled instruments and effects, behind cosmetic improvements, are largely unchanged from previous versions. Cakewalk, Digidesign and others have also gotten in the ring, but no one can match up to the insanely massive collection of sound production and mangling in NI’s software. So, when NI offers an upgrade, we notice. I’ll be meeting up with NI next week at the AES show for a full preview of the new KOMPLETE kitchen-sink bundle and updated individual apps (plus KORE 2, due in November), but here’s a quick look.

• New Sampler: KONTAKT 3 is the latest version of NI’s flagship sampler, and in terms of raw breadth and depth of features, Kontakt appears to remain at the top of the heap. New in this version: a 1000-instrument, 33 GB sample library, a new looping/slicing/syncing Wave Editor, new envelopes, new amp and cabinet emulations, better browsing, and more. I’m curious to see how the Performance View and the updated KORE stack up to OnStage in Logic 8 (or even what it’s like using both together).
• New Guitar Effects: GUITAR RIG 3 adds new amp models, new matched cabinets, new effects (tape echo and ring mod!), and more. Guitar effects competition is brisk, but Guitar Rig’s edge to me has been its range of sound possibilities, straight out to the bizarre/experimental.
• Addition of Massive: MASSIVE is NI’s latest soft synth, especially geared for “sonic impact” (read, great basses and leads), with drag-and-drop, semi-modular sound creation.
• Lots of updates: Refreshed versions of previous synths include Absynth 4, Akoustik Piano, Battery 3, B4 II, Elektrik Piano, FM8, PRO-53, and Reaktor 5. With the exception of Reaktor, most of these have gotten feature improvements lately, and all have been updated for Vista and Intel Macs.

It’s time to make sense of brand names / bundles / pricing / feature sets again! Today’s victim: Ableton Live. Here goes; let me know if I make this make sense.

If you bought an M-Audio or Digidesign interface with Ableton Live Lite and haven’t upgraded to the full version of Live, Ableton has a free upgrade offer for you. “Lite Enhanced” (erm, Diet Live? Live Rite? Tab?) has some pretty serious features in it from the full-blown Live:

Plug-in Delay Compensation, MIDI remote control, full ReWire support, high-definition recording and rendering (up to 32-bit), Mackie Control support, Track Freeze, and the â€Å“Complexâ€Â? warp mode for high-fidelity, on-the-fly time stretching.

Okay, rewind: one feature there is very important. Live Lite previously didn’t allow MIDI control, so that you could use your knobs on your new M-Audio keyboard (or any other MIDI device) to control the software. That’s well worth downloading the upgrade. With the more advanced features, this is a pretty terrific deal for a freebie (more so for many users, I would think, than M-Audio’s homegrown entry-level app Session).

So why does Ableton still think you’ll upgrade to the full version? As with previous versions of Lite, you’re limited in number of tracks and scenes. This should still be more powerful enough to play around with and use in your music, but naturally Ableton would save something for the full Live experience. Keep in mind, as well, Live 5 Lite lagged pretty far behind Live 5, and Ableton told us at NAMM in January we’d see Live 6 later this year. All that aside, we love freebies:

Grab it, M-Audio customers (including Live Delta users), or Digidesign users

How about you: are you using software you got via a hardware bundle? Or did you buy your software a la carte? (Sorry, we don’t talk about five-fingered / one-hook discounts round these parts.)

Waves, the people behind some highly-respected, extremely high-end audio processing effects, have turned their attention to singers. The new Vocal Bundle includes some old favorites, plus relatively new automatic tuning and pitch correction and breath removal plugins. The bundle includes:

Tune Automatic pitch correction and “melody transformation.” (also available separately for US$600 list)

DeBreath Breath removal (a description that also applies to me attempting to play soccer); this one is designed to work as transparently as possible

Renaissance Channel Channel Strip

Renaissance DeEsser “Intelligent” Sibilance Control

Doubler Emulates Double-Track Effects

Grand total: US$1000. And those of you who already have a Waves bundle can expect to see Tune LT for free. Supports most Mac/PC hosts (Pro Tools and Native alike). Copy protection via iLok dongle, as with other Waves products.

Waves Vocal Bundle

The Tune effect is the most intriguing to me, as it includes MIDI export, formant correction, and other editing tools. Pitch correction just gets more and more sophisticated, making it possible to use it for ever-subtler effects and new far-out special effects, rather than the “let’s over-correct everything” approach that gained popularity in the studio for a while.

This also vindicates something else for me: there’s a market for more software products for singers. (Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to take advantage of the brilliant sound of my Shower Pro effects processor on the velvet fog that is my voice.)

Okay, I’m behind on Steinberg. But the summer lineup from them is just making me yawn, I’m afraid:

Steinberg Studio Case II: Status: just announced. US$299, Windows/Mac September, watered-down versions of everything Steinberg makes. For entry level users, this could be a decent deal: Reason, by comparison, costs $450 and has a lousy sequencer and no audio recording. Ableton Live costs around $400 and doesn’t have as many instruments. But there’s nothing here to write home about: stripped-down versions of everything? Spend the extra couple of hundred bucks and get what you really need.

HALion String Edition: Status: just started shipping. This one appeals a little more to the snob in me: 9 GB, nothing but strings. Haven’t heard it yet, but it sounds like it could be first-rate. Of course, you’ll be missing several sections of the orchestra, but . . . wait . . . that’s kind of a problem, isn’t it? Then again, strings are usually the hardest to sample, so if you need some violins to supplement your existing sample library, maybe this is for you.

The Grand 2: Status: shipped in July. I missed this because I was busy with Native’s new product, Akoustik Piano. The Grand has a strong reputation, but also a lot of competition: aside from Native’s virtual piano, there’s the renowned PMI libraries, cheap offerings from M-Audio, Ivory, and basically a zillion sampled pianos everywhere from Logic to Kontakt to MOTU Mach Five. What’s cool here: key click, pedal and hammer sounds and four-channel surround implementation. Upgrades are just US$99, and the whole thing runs US$299, so it’s bargain priced, and unlike some Steinberg products, it supports VST, DXi and AU (though Digi fans, you’re stuck with ReWire — no TDM/RTAS). Only time will tell: I want to get The Grand and Akoustik Piano and others together and see which sounds best.

Bottom line:

Studio Case II: Diet Steinberg? Ho-hum.

HALion String Edition: Why not a full orchestral edition?

The Grand 2: Verdict reserved until the Akoustik Piano shootout.