Review: Beatskillz SampleX
Classic samplers get reimagined in this intuitive plug-in from Beatskillz.
Price £54
Contact Beatskillz
This new plug-in package the crusty lo-fi sounds of vintage hardware samplers in an accessible software format. It captures the sound of the converters, preamps, filters and processes involved, and provides simple controls that cover bits, sample rate, shift and drive, the latter based on the input drive of the Akai S900. You also get a resonant ladder filter to help refine the sound, as well as wet, dry and output sliders.
Using the shift control to dial in pitched, aliased artefacts and then adding drive creates instant thickness and vibe on clean drums and other material. Our only gripes are that the presets don’t have especially useful names and some aren’t volume-matched, and that the filter slider could be weighted to make it more useful and easier to use.
Key features
- Vintage sampler emulator
- 4-bit to 24-bits
- 96kHz-2kHz sample rate
- S900 drive emulation
- Built-in resonant ladder filter
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