Cakewalk’s New $50 Studio Instruments: Keys, Drum, Bass, String With Slick Interfaces

Finding exotic software instruments is rarely a challenge. A lot of users stumble more quickly when it comes to the basics. Cakewalk has unveiled a new set of soft synths called Cakewalk Studio Instruments, and a number of things about it are immediately interesting:
It’s dirt cheap. US$49.99 for the whole package.
It focuses on a few basics. There are four modules: Drum Set, Bass Guitar, Electric Piano, or String Section.
It’s available via mass-market outlets. Music tech stuff only trickles into the mass market, as a rule. Cakewalk says you’ll be able to pick this thing up at Apple, CompUSA, Fry’s, Micro Center, J&R, and Amazon.com.
It does phrases. There are included, pre-recorded phrases. Might be redundant in the age of GarageBand, but potentially useful to have.
It has a slick interface. The UI is pretty, provides lots of visual feedback (the bows on the strings even move), and puts controls where you’d expect them in the real world — so electric piano effects show up on a stompbox, for instance, rather than floating in softwareland.
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