Harrison's Mixbus32C puts a classic analogue console in a DAW

Harrison already has one DAW on the market in the shape of Mixbus, but now it's releasing a second in the shape of Mixbus32C.

A separate product to the regular Mixbus, the focus here is on replicating the sound of a classic Harrison analogue console - the Mixbus32C.

"Each Mixbus32C channel strip incorporates an exact emulation of the original Harrison 32C parametric four-band sweepable EQ with a separately switchable filter section including second order high-pass and low-pass filters," explains Mixbus product manager Ben Loftis. "Every resistor, capacitor, and transistor was modelled. To run this complex DSP on every channel strip was impossible just five years ago."

The mixer page can almost be approached as if it were musical instrument, says Harrison, with one knob per function and a clear control set. Other key features include 12 stereo mix busses, each with individual level control, latency compensation, and a master channel incorporating Harrison tape saturation, bus compression, and tone control functionality.

Find out more on the Harrison website. Mixbus32C is available now for Windows, OS X and Linux priced at $299.

Harrison Mixbus32C

• Straightforward "knob per function" mixer layout based on Harrison's renowned 32-series music consoles
• Precise emulation based on Harrison's famous 32 series analog console circuit designs
• Precision algorithms for EQ, Filter, Compression, Analog Tape Saturation, and Summing
• Fourth-generation Harrison "True Analog Mixing™" processing engine with enhanced compressor/limiter algorithms; built-in sidechain busing, and increased plugin flexibility
• The Mixbus32C engine is internally dithered, ramped, and gain staged so that sound quality is preserved as close to analog as possible
• Unlimited stereo or mono input channels, each with unlimited plugins, sends, and hardware inserts. (limited only by CPU and disc speed)
• Unlimited MIDI tracks, each with virtual instrument support, unlimited plugins, sends and inserts
• Phase, Input trim, Sweepable 4-band EQ with second order HP and LP filters, Compression, and 12 mix bus sends on every track
• Mixbus32C has an optimized signal flow with 12 stereo mix buses and a master bus, all featuring Tone controls, Compression, Sidechaining, and Analog Tape Saturation simulation
• Stereo Master bus that features Tone controls, Analog Tape Saturation, K-meter, Stereo Correlation Meter, and Limiter
• Automatic plugin delay compensation to support effects such as parallel compression without time misalignment
• Comprehensive "at-a-glance" metering with peak, peak hold, and compressor gain reduction visible on every track and bus
• Extensive DAW editing features including "Smart Tool", Ripple Edit, and configurable keybindings for nearly every operation
• Industry standard plug-in support: Mixbus32C loads VST plugins on Windows, AudioUnit (AU) plugins on OSX, and LV2 plugins on all platforms
• Industry standard audio I/O support: Mixbus32C uses ASIO/Directsound on Windows, CoreAudio on OSX, and ALSA/JACK on Linux
• Mixbus32C provides professional features such as Loudness Analysis (dBTP+LUFS+LU Range), LTC (SMPTE) generation and sync; video pullup/pulldown
• Persistent undo (undo remains possible after closing and reopening a session)
• Multi-core and 64-bit optimizations provide increased track counts across all OS platforms
• Over 50 'MIDI filter' plug-ins including functions such as transposing, velocity scaling, etc
• Support for video timeline, video window, and audio+video exports
• Includes a brand-new virtual instrument: "SetBfree", a lovingly modeled Tonewheel Organ by Robin Gareus plus Harrison's Dyno-Mite envelope-designer plug-in for drums
• Recording operates like a tape machine: punch-in on the fly, and use per-track input monitoring just like a multitrack tape machine
• Extensive export features including multitrack stem export, simultaneous multi-format exports, multiple export ranges, CD track markers, silence trimming, normalization, and command-line arguments to trigger third-party encoders or file-management scripts
• Audio regions are stacked in "layers", and every region fadein/out is a crossfade to the region(s) beneath it
• Plugin "pin connection management" provides rich editing of signal-flow through each channel's path, including full support for dual mono, mono-to-stereo, sidechaining, and other advanced flows
• The user interface scales to fit your monitor; larger monitors will get bigger knobs and sharper text
• Refined workflow and graphics, including scaling and support for HiDPI (Retina) displays
• Incredibly cost effective because of our world-wide open source collaborators
• Generic MIDI devices can use "MIDI Learn" to assign MIDI controls directly to on-screen knobs or use MIDI profiles to select many pre-configured device layouts from a pull-down menu
• Mackie control protocol is provided for motorized fader controllers, and the Mackie protocols have been extended to ergonomically control the Mixbus channelstrip EQ, compressor, and 12 mix bus sends. Dedicated support is provided for popular devices like the Presonus Faderport, Mackie MCU, and Behringer X-Touch controllers
• OSC (Open Source Control) protocol supports ethernet-based wireless tablet controllers such as TouchOSC and Lemur for iOS and Android to remote-control Mixbus32C
• Mixbus32C will open Mixbus sessions. However, the EQ will not covert since they are completely different.