Gold is the latest plugin conceived, designed and created by Acustica Audio.

The realization of GOLD is the result of our continuous hunt for vintage and rare outboard and our desire to achieve perfection in our emulations.
This plug-in represents the most unique offering on the market for any lover of the sound of the legendary vintage British consoles.
The rarity of emulated devices, the detail in the emulations, the design work… all this makes this plug-in as precious as pure gold…

Five different equalizers, two extremely rare compressors, seven preamplifers and a routing control section prove how this is one of the most complex and complete ACQUA plugins ever released.
Anyone in search for faithful emulations simply must try this vintage British channel strip (complete with its standalone modules).
Acustica has decided to create an Anthology (Analog Dreamware Anthology) plug-in. It's not just a series of plug-ins: our goal is to provide all customers with a complete collection enclosing all inestimable outboard of the past.. in order to realize our goal we are ready to hunt them down to the ends of the earth.

"GOLD Standalone modules" consisting of:

• GOLD COMP
• GOLD PRE
• GOLD EQ

To help unleash the incredible potential of our GOLD’s modules, we have created a BUNDLE including each individual module of gold, enabling sound engineers to use each component separately, with a significant saving in terms of CPU. This will help enhance your mixes ensuring quality, versatility and the distinctive sound peculiar to Acustica’s plugins. We hope "GOLD Standalone modules" will meet our most demanding customers’ requirements.

Features actually supported in Core9:

• Variable speeds on vector nodes improving the sound quality of the compressors and allowing to reach very fast speeds and precision.
• Envelope followers based on control sources.
• Queue messages used for several widgets like knobs improving the behaviour, control, and stability of plug-ins.
• Hiddend components fault-tolerant inside nebula/acqua engine to minimized crash/bugs.
• New wrapper to get better balanced AAX format
• Several minor fixes and improvements (about trimming, sample rate conversion, distribution of sample rate packs, fixes on loaded program rate).
• This engine is linked to Nat4 to allows the full automatic compressor sampling.
• Switchmode optimization reducing CPU loading
• Lazy loading pattern introduced to improve the loading of the objects

http://www.acustica-audio.com/index...tegory_id=74&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=189

 

Yep this one is absolutely golden, legendary Neve (pre 75, when neve got bought) absolutely perfectly rendered in those few plugs.
The bundle costs 160 euros (-20%) in presale for one month (after it will be 200) and if you already own Navy (also a neve recreation but more recent gear), you get an additional - 30 % (so for owners of Navy the launch price is actually 110 euros).
It's an extremely rare gear that has been sampled, which is hrd to get access to, one (actually several) that has defined the sound of an era. Being able to get that so fantasticely sounding at that price and itb, AA is really spoiling us...

 

Last edited: Apr 20, 2017

Sold! This one is mine \m/ thanks for posting it i was gona do this aswell \m/ i love the pre's on this Beast !

 

Last edited: Apr 20, 2017

Yeah those pre's are crazy...I also wanted to do a post too as soon as I got it, but I got caught up testing it...Nice to have taken the time to do a video too, thanks for that @ddd999 !

 

IMHO, Gold is the finest sounding plugin ever. I've been using it now for 2 weeks and it is sounds fantastic on everything you can throw at it. AA are raising the bar with this one, well worth the demo. As always, to each their own.

 

Just bought it, cant wait to try it!!

 

Definitely a flaghsip product for 2017! For those interested in extra 10% discount for GOLD, please get in touch, I have only 3 coupons left (I got a lot of requests in only 24 hours after the official launching). 30 days trials available on their website: http://www.acustica-audio.com/index...tegory_id=52&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=189 Also, for those interested in other Acustica plugins, I might have some other coupons left (different discounts). PM, please!

 

If you think about it.Even for the regular price, at 200$ this is a f-ing steal.Think about how much time and energy they put into development of these special plugins.
You would have to pay serious, serious money to get hardware with such musical properties.

 

Amazing Channel Strip.

 

I'm finding Gold perfect for vocals, so many EQ options, both compressors and all the different preamps have Gold at the top of the list for how fast it brings vocals to a useful state. Follow it with Surge for tighter EQ with Veri Level and watch out for goosebumps.

Drums & Percussion...... I've NEVER been able to sit down and get drums this right, this fat, this fast in software. Fatten a kick in seconds, thicken and tighten a snare in seconds, tame those hats instantly without loosing their top, shaker smoothed instantly, and watch out for Gold 8066 buss on the drum buss before a Sand comp...... so damn tasty.

I've had surprisingly fantastic results using Gold on digital sounding strings too, it really gives them some life they lack.

Piano check, bass check, synth bass check, horns check, ...... there is not much I can't check with Gold. The tone of Gold is absolutely perfect for digital audio IMHO as it just brings realism to music.

Gold will take time to know, I'm still learning the tube pre's, the 8252 comp and the EQ's tone differences, it's the subtle tonal variations Gold has that put it over the top for me.

Gold is my top tool moving forward, to each their own.

 

Gold preamp tip..... the Neve 2254 compressors are 1272 line amps with dynamic level control added, so the 8254 preamp in Gold, is actually a 1272 preamp.

Yes, I am a Neve freak, and the 1272's are my favorite Neve preamps for drums.

 

I've replaced pearl2 strip that I had on a project on voxes (I was already glad with the result) with gold strip, honestly it kicks its butt. The result, is...how to put it...more sparkly. I've tried to approach the same result with pearl 2 for hours but it just sounds dimed next to what I get with gold, just a bit grey. And the numerous pre's on this Beast is an absolute plus.
I love it, even while not being an expert at all like you in the vintage neve area.

 

Best review gold and others aqua plugins

 

Wow, sounds amazing. Going to grab the demo now

 

Hey all,

I'm just going to preface this post by saying I don't want to derail this into an audiophiles pissing contest a la Gearslutz. I'm here to learn and get other peoples perspective on this:

Why is there so much aliasing in a product that's priced this high?

Why do developers such as Cytomics, who know a lot more about DSP than anyone here (other developers excluded), bother with internal oversampling and Acustica apparently does not?

 

Last edited: Apr 22, 2017

There's a difference between aliasing and harmonics.

 

When you compare the aliasing with other products I suggest to check the eq and the preamps, where we really shine ;)
In the eq department we are close to perfection (if you print the same picture you understand why our approach is so much better then competition)
Here the diamond case:


If you ask to me, price of our products is CHEAP considering how good they are ;)

 

Yes of course. The pattern that is moving from left to right is harmonics, however the pattern that is moving from right to left on the FFT is aliasing that is being reflected back from nyquist. You can tell them apart as you move the pitch of the tone generator up, the fundamental and it's associated harmonics move from left to right while the aliasing moves in the opposite direction. Do the test for yourself.

 

Last edited: Apr 22, 2017

I will for sure check out your eq and preamps-and please don't take this as me bashing your work. I in fact very much like the sound of the gold demo.

I am just wondering why you do not integrate internal oversampling like the aforementioned develover(s)? Is there some kind of technical limitation inherent in your tech or it's just due to CPU considerations?

I love the sound and am definitely excited by the tone of this demo, it adds a certain something, just have a few questions. :-].

PS-having aliasing and other digital artifacts at -180 DBfs in Diamond is impressive, kudos.

 

Last edited: Apr 22, 2017