Blue Cat Audio releases MB-7 Mixer 3.4 10th Anniversary Update

4th May 2021 - KVR Audio News

Blue Cat Audio has released a significant update of Blue Cat's MB-7 Mixer for the 10th anniversary of this multiband multi-effects processor, also capable of transforming any third party plug-in into a multiband effect.

With a focus on performance and stability, this new version adds a new multicore processing engine that can process each band on a separate CPU core, with up to 7 times the processing power, to load more effects. Many aspects of the DSP have also been optimized to reduce the CPU and memory usage, and more third party plug-ins can now be loaded thanks to several compatibility improvements. With many additional features and fixes (full list below), this 27th release is a major step forward for this plug-in that was initially released in 2011.

An optimized build for the new Apple M1 Macs is also available to customers as a preview, with great performance improvements, as shown in the company's benchmark comparing Apple M1 and Intel Macs for audio.

The free update can be downloaded from the same location as the original full version for MB-7 Mixer V3 owners (link received by email upon purchase). And for new customers, it is on sale (23% off; 99 EUR or $99 instead of 129) until June 4th, while existing customers will receive an even better deal by email. Demo versions are available on www.bluecataudio.com in most plug-in formats for Mac and Windows PC.

New Features & Improvements:

Up to 7 times more processing power with the new multicore engine that processes each frequency band on a different core.
New DSP workload meter that displays the DSP activity and CPU load.
Added MIDI control support (MIDI CC messages) for Next and Previous Preset commands, with MIDI learn.
Reduced time to load the MB-7 Mixer or any built-in plug-in.
Multiple DSP performance improvements.
Level meters and frequency analyzers are not computed anymore when the user interface is closed, reducing CPU usage.
Reduced the number of threads used by the plug-in.
Improved global and preset settings window loading time on Windows.
Added ability to select the plug-in to load when a shell plug-in file is dragged and dropped onto a slot.
Full unicode support.
Preset files can now be dropped onto the preset LCD area to be loaded.
Improved "Tone Maps" user interface (available for 9 built-in effects).
Native Apple M1 support available as a preview.

Fixes:

Fixed host loop end value not properly passed to hosted plug-ins, for the VST2 version.
Fixed several crashes upon load for multiple third party plug-ins (mostly VST3).
Fixed MIDI control for hosted plug-ins not always working when fed with silence.
Fixed VST3 (and sometimes VST) version freezing Ableton Live upon save on Windows.
Fixed harmonizer and Pitch Shifter built-in plug-ins that did not always flush their buffer upon bypass (short sounds could be heard when getting out of bypass).

System requirements: