PSP Audioware: PSP Saturator $99

Saturation can be a fantastic tool for bringing sounds to life, but does this new offering from PSP have what it takes?

PSP Audioware is a well established developer with a portfolio of industry respected plugins, including classics such as VintageWarmer and SpringBox. One of their long established bundles is MixPack 2, which includes six mix bus processors covering dynamics, transient shaping, EQ, enhancement and saturation. It’s the MixSaturator plugin from this bundle that forms the starting point for PSP’s new saturator plugin.

Nevertheless, with 20 years on the clock, they have clearly decided it was time to go for a total overhaul. So, although there’s a lot of familiarity here in terms of controls, the new plugin now runs on completely rewritten or substantially redesigned algorithms.

These not only take full advantage of PSP’s current DSP know-how, but have also been tweaked sonically, making PSP Saturator a completely new plugin with no backwards compatibility issues.

New for old

PSP Saturator (VST, VST3, AU, AAX) is designed to deliver everything from subtle enhancement to deep saturation but avoids extreme distortions. The main engine emulates valve and tape-style effects and uses a combination of harmonics, filtering and dynamics. It has three core algorithms with a main saturation option joined by more bespoke low and high saturation effects. The Low feature emulates a low frequency bump and includes adjustable frequency (20Hz to 400Hz), Level (+/-15dB) and amount (Warmth).