New Music Gear Monday: PreSonus Studio One 5 Digital Audio Workstation Update

There are a lot of great DAWs on the market right now – so many, in fact, that you probably can’t go wrong if you purchase any of them. There is one in particular that has been steadily growing in popularity and capabilities over the years along and that’s PreSonus’s excellent Studio One. The latest updated version, Studio One 5, takes it to a whole new level though.

Studio One 5’s new feature list is indeed long and includes:

• Score Editing
• Show Page
• Clip Gain Envelopes
• Keyswitch support, editing, and mapping
• Poly pressure and MPE support.
• Melodyne 5 Essential integration.
• Tape-Resample Timestretch mode
• Marker Track Inspector
• Studio One’s native effect plug-ins have both a new look and some new features 
• Extended Mixer Scenes
• Aux Channels
• Independent Listen Bus
• Recording and playback in 64-bit float WAV format
• External MTC/MMC Sync
• Studio One 5 Artist now includes:
  • VST2/VST3/AU plug-in support now included (64-bit only) 
  • Rewire support now included 
  • Studio One Remote support now included

Probably the two new features that will get the most attention are the built-in Score Editor that allows MIDI editing directly from the score, and the Show Page built especially for use in live performance. While many other DAWs also support some level of score editing, most aren’t set up for the stage. Here you can use the plugins and virtual instruments during a gig, or set up your tracks for live playback. Very cool.

Clip Gain Envelopes is something that will be used a lot as well since many mixers use this feature instead of fader and mute automation these days.

There are a ton of new plugin features as well. These include:

• Analog Delay – State Space Modeling Drive stage and improved width control
• Autofilter – State Space Modeling Drive stage
• Beat Delay – Improved width control
• Chorus – Improved width control
• Compressor – Filter for external sidechain input
• Expander – Filter for external sidechain input
• Fat Channel XT – External sidechain input
• Gate – Filter for external sidechain input and Threshold control consolidation
• Limiter2 – External sidechain input, alternative curve modes, and alternative attack modes (fast, normal, slow)
• Multiband Dynamics – External sidechain input
• Pedalboard – Improved Autopan modulation
• Phaser – New Soft modulation mode and Stereo Spread control
• ProEQ2 – Additional phase-linear low-frequency EQ (fixed at 20Hz, 50Hz, 80Hz) with 12dB/24dB modes, input meter display, new 12th-octave analyzer mode with keyboard overlay, adjustable meter range, metering peak hold function for sidechain input
• Rotor – State Space Modeling Drive stage
• Tricomp – State Space Modeling Drive stage, external sidechain input, and alternative attack modes (fast, normal, slow)

Studio One 5 Professional is now available for a U.S. street price of $399.95, and updates from Studio One 4 Professional are $149.95. Studio One 5 Artist is available now for a U.S. street price of $99.95, while updates from version 4 are $49.95.

Check out the dedicated Studio One 5 page for more info, or watch the video below for a list of new features.

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