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Hey, who stuck an SSL in that box?
It's staggering how much you can do natively with a modern computer's CPU, but even the most powerful systems have limits. For those who cry "morel," several companies make DSP add-on products (usually PCI cards or FireWire devices) that provide additional number-crunching power to a host DAW computer.
The name Solid State Logic needs no introduction for most EO readers; their large frame analog and digital consoles have been "big studio" staples for years. But Duende is their first computer add-on product intended specifically for DAW users.
BASICS AND INSTALLATION
Duende, a 1 U rack unit, contains four 333MHz DSP 40-bit floating point chips. Each has eight "virtual slots;" you can run one mono plug-in per slot at 44.1/4SkHz, for 32 plug-ins total. Duende supports 88.2/96kHz, but this halves the plug-in count. Stereo instances use twice the DSP resources of mono instances.
Duende connects to the host via a FireWire cable (ideally, it would get its own port, if not interface), and there's a second port for daisy-chaining other devices. Duende can be bus-powered or use the included universal power adapter, which has a nifty "pop in the correct plug for your country and electrical system" design.
Software installation is easy. VST and AU support is native; if you're a Pro Tools user, you can also install a light version of FXpansion's excellent VST to RTAS adapter/wrapper. As I already had the full version of the wrapper on my computer, I was concerned about how the installer would handle that - but the SSL plug-ins just installed into my existing version. The installer even includes a built-in firmware updater for the hardware.
Like most DSP products. Duende runs only plug-ins that have been coded for it. Currently, only two come with the basic Duende package: Channel Strip and Bus Compressor. These are based on the algorithms from the high-end SSL C-200 digital console, which was itself modeled after SSLs own analog consoles like the XL9000K. While they're not identical to the C-200 algorithms (according to SSL, they're refined for Duende), with a lineage like that. Duende certainly looks promising.
APPLYING THE PLUG-INS
The SSL Channel Strip plug-in (Figure 1) replicates the controls on an SSL hardware...