We called Baby Audio’s Smooth Operator Pro plugin a “must-try” – it’s now just £59 at Plugin BoutiquePlugin Boutique is running a sale on a range of Baby Audio plugins, including the Pro version of its Smooth Operator spectral signal balancer.
The plugin, which is essentially a souped-up EQ-compressor hybrid, received a glowing review from MusicTech this summer following its April launch, in which we called it a “must-try” for mixing and mastering engineers. It’s one of 11 deals currently active on Baby Audio products via Plugin Boutique.
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Currently down from its list price of £99, you can now get your hands on Smooth Operator Pro for just £59. The original launched back in 2021, but this newer upgraded version introduced a complete overhaul of its features, with a vast number of improvements guided by user feedback.
According to Baby Audio, these changes were implemented without “compromising on the fast workflow that made Smooth Operator 1 so popular”. On the whole, the plugin is made to remove the bloated frequency energy your tracks don’t need by eliminating mud, harsh resonances, and masking.
It helps you to fix specific problem areas with “surgical control”, or you can re-shape the tonal balance of a mix entirely. Users can simply set their desired target curve, then turn the global threshold knob until the plugin starts balancing the audio, or experiment with a range of optional deep settings for further control.

A number of other Baby Audio gems included in Plugin Boutique’s sale are its Crystalline reverb, now just £29, and its Super VHS multi-effects tool, which taps into the lo-fi tones of old synths and tapes (this is down to £23).
If you’d like to go all-out on a feast of Baby Audio goodies, there’s also a Complete Bundle available for £219 with a saving of £100. Inside, you’ll get access to all of its award-winning plugins, including Humanoid, Transit 2, BA-1, Atoms, and plenty more – including Smooth Operator Pro.
To view the full range of Baby Audio deals, head over to Plugin Boutique.
The post We called Baby Audio’s Smooth Operator Pro plugin a “must-try” – it’s now just £59 at Plugin Boutique appeared first on MusicTech.

How to get Teenage Engineering’s OP-XY at a discountThe Teenage Engineering OP-XY synthesiser workstation is notoriously pricey at a hefty $2,300, but we’ve seen a way you can get it for less via zZounds.
First introduced in November last year, the OP-XY is the successor to the Swedish brand’s OP-Z synth, described as an “all-in-one powerful synthesiser and composer with deep, direct sequencing capabilities”. It takes the advanced sequencing of the OP-Z and places it in a smaller enclosure, more similar to the brand’s OP-1.

READ MORE: “The computer case you can’t buy… ‘cause it’s free”: A Teenage Engineering freebie? The Computer-2 is here

Although a sophisticated synth, its high price puts it out of reach for many music makers. We even compiled a guide to all the things you could buy for the same price or less – including all nine of Teenage Engineering’s Pocket Operators, an OP-1, an OP-Z, and an EP-133 K.O II for less than the sum of the mighty OP-XY.  Still, the OP-XY is beloved by many — it’s even received praise from Azealia Banks, who said she was “obsessed” with it in an Instagram post.
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If you’ve been holding out for a deal on the OP-XY, now’s the time. You can currently grab one for less via zZound’s open-box buyer’s option — these are listed only as like-new or in very good condition, so they make a perfect option if you want to get your hands on one, and you’re not bothered by cosmetics or packaging.
The OP-XY is available for $2,061 in like-new condition via zZounds, meaning only its packaging has been compromised. You can get it for even less at $1,944 in very good condition, which may have small scratches or scuffs – though still inclusive of all parts, the manual, and a full factory warranty.
You can refresh your memory on how it sounds below:

To find out more about the Teenage Engineering OP-XY or purchase one now, head over to zZounds.
The post How to get Teenage Engineering’s OP-XY at a discount appeared first on MusicTech.

Red Timbre Audio GraphitiBring new life to your sample library with Graphiti, an analysis-based granular sampler and synthesizer for creating new instruments, textures, and foley. This innovative tool uses analysis and AI to organize sample audio into clusters of grains, creating a sonic space that you can explore intuitively by drawing paths to produce unique mashups of your sound library. Simply drag and drop your samples, select your analysis features, and let Graphiti paint you a picture. Crafted for musicians, sound designers, game developers, and foley artists, Graphiti embodies our commitment to creative audio software offering new ways to create and explore audio. YouTube.com/watch?v=uJ0j2wnFDDc Read More

e-instruments releases FREE Desolate Guitars Fragment for Kontakt Player
e-instruments releases Desolate Guitars Fragment, a FREE vintage chime guitar instrument for Kontakt Player Desolate Guitars Fragment is the lite version of the premium Desolate Guitars library (€149), and it’s available to download for free. You’ll need Kontakt Player 7.6.1 or higher, which is also free. The primary difference between the two versions is that [...]
View post: e-instruments releases FREE Desolate Guitars Fragment for Kontakt Player

Dystopian Waves releases Drox, a FREE glitch effect for Ableton Live
Dystopian Waves has released Drox, a free Max for Live device for glitchy, real-time audio manipulation in Ableton Live. If you’re into creative sound mangling, this one’s worth checking out. I don’t personally use Ableton Live, so I haven’t tested Drox, but it looks like a really fun tool for anyone who enjoys glitch processing, [...]
View post: Dystopian Waves releases Drox, a FREE glitch effect for Ableton Live

Sonnox Oxford Inflator is just $19 but the offer ends TODAY!
Sonnox has slashed the price of Oxford Inflator to just $19 at Plugin Boutique, down from a whopping $200, but the offer ends today. If you’ve been curious about this well-loved loudness enhancer from Sonnox, now is the perfect time to check it out. I stumbled onto the Oxford Inflator many years ago while searching [...]
View post: Sonnox Oxford Inflator is just $19 but the offer ends TODAY!

The Crow Hill Company release Lo-Fi Strings The latest Vaults release delivers a selection of string sounds that are described as “unrefined, and fully adulterated through a knackered cassette tape with just a pinch of wobble”. 

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2025 One Hertz Challenge: A Flaming Oscillator and a New Take on the Candle Clock
Candle clocks were once an easy way to build a clock without using complex mechanical devices: just observe how quickly a thin candle burns down, mark an identical candle with periodic gradations, and you had a simple timer. These were the first candle-based timekeeping devices, but as [Tim]’s flicker-based oscillator demonstrates, they’re certainly not the only way to keep time with a flame.
Generally speaking, modern candles minimize flickering by using a wick that’s designed to balance the amount of wax and air drawn into the flame. However, when several candles are brought close together, their flames begin to interfere with each other, causing them to flicker in synchrony. The frequency of flickering is a function of gravity and flame diameter alone, so a bundle of three candles will flicker at a fairly constant frequency; in [Tim]’s case, it was about 9.9 Hz.
To sense this oscillation, [Tim] originally used a phototransistor to detect the flame’s light, but he wanted an even simpler solution. He positioned a wire just above the flame, so that as it flickered it would periodically contact the wire. A flame has a different dielectric constant than air does, so the capacitance between this and another wire wrapped around the bundle of candles fluctuates with the flame. To sense this, he used a CH32V003 microcontroller, which reads capacitance, performs some signal processing to get a clean signal, counts oscillations, and uses this time signal to blink an LED once a second. The final result is unusually mesmerizing for a blinking LED.
In something of the reverse of this project, we’ve also seen an oscillator used for an (artificial) candle. There’s also a surprising amount of science that can be learned by studying candles.

Dystopian Waves DroxDrox is a powerful, real-time audio manipulation device for Ableton Live, designed to bring unpredictability, movement, and rhythmic chaos to your tracks. It combines glitch, jump, and stutter effects into a single, intuitive interface, allowing producers and live performers to create everything from subtle tape-style imperfections to extreme, glitchy textures. With Drox, you can: Simulate tape dropouts and physical imperfections for a vintage, lo-fi character. Trigger CD-style skips and jumps that instantly add surprise and rhythmic variation. Generate stuttered repetitions that can evolve dynamically, with random pitch, filter, and playback variations for a lively, ever-changing soundscape. Control the balance and playback direction of the processed audio with a simple Master section, giving you fine control over wet/dry mix and forward/reverse playback. Whether you're adding subtle imperfections to a cinematic soundscape, creating aggressive glitch textures for electronic music, or experimenting with rhythmic chaos in live performance, Drox puts a wide palette of creative possibilities at your fingertips. https://youtu.be/k9xhkDXxrxQ Read More

Erica Synths introduce the Formant Erica Synths' latest DIY system offers ambitious builders the chance to recreate the Elektor Formant modular synth that was originally released by Elektor Magazine during the late 1970s.

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Judge says FTC investigation into Media Matters ‘should alarm all Americans’A federal judge has blocked the FTC's investigation into Media Matters research around advertising and antisemitic content on X.

2025 One Hertz Challenge: STM32 Blinks In Under 50 BytesMany of us have run a Blink program on a microcontroller before. It’s effectively the “Hello, World!” of the embedded space. However, few of us have ever thought about optimizing our Blink code to be as miniscule as possible. But that’s precisely what [Rudra Lad] did for this entry into the 2025 One Hertz Challenge!
This example of Blink, delay_blinky_13, is built specifically for the STM32F4 Discovery microcontroller development board. [Rudra] notes the code is “highly optimized” and compiles down to a binary size of under 50 bytes. The code doesn’t even use RAM, and it aims to get the blink as close to 1 Hz as possible. Many optimizations were used to crunch it down as small as possible. For example, the standard startup code isn’t used, with the entire program instead written in the Reset_Handler to save space. Bit-band is also used to write to peripheral registers to blink the LED, since this uses less instructions than the typical methods. Meanwhile, with many tweaks to the delay counting routine, [Rudra] was eventually able to get the blink frequency to 1.00019 Hz, as measured on a logic analyzer. That’s pretty darn close!
While it’s rare that you have only 50 bytes of binary space to blink an LED, work like this is a great way to flex your coding muscles. Code is on Github for the curious, and if you’ve worked up your own impressive tiny binaries, don’t hesitate to let us know!