Cobalt VSTi is just awesome!
Today I want to talk about Cobalt, one of the best free soft synth I have played, it is a free VST instrument inspired by many of the digital synthesizers from the 1980s and it sounds really good.
Before talking about it some notes are mandatory:
| Name | Cobalt |
| Author | Sanford Sound Design |
| Synth Type | Hybrid |
| Latest Version | 2.0 |
| Platforms | Windows (32 and 64bit) |
| Download | http://www.lesliesanford.com/vst/plugins/ |
| Oscillators | 2 |
| Inbuilt Effects | Overdrive, Noise, Panner, Chorus, Delay |
| Patches | Yes |
| Registration needed | No |
Cobalt is a purely digital synthesizer but its overall architecture is very much like those early hybrid synthesizers of the 80s. It features a wide selection of waveforms, most of which were resynthesized from actual hybrid synthesizers, while providing traditional subtractive synthesis capabilities for sculpting its sound.
If you want to hear something about Cobalt have a look at this video, I’ve improvised some slow melodies to let you know how this VST sounds good:
Here are the key features:
- Very nice GUI created by grymmjack.
- 26 waveforms – many of which were resynthesized from 80s hybrid synths.
- Flexible modulation routes.
- Apply PWM to any waveform.
- LFO delay.
- Polyphonic Portamento.
- Key tracked envelopes.
- Rich overdrive effect based on a custom algorithm.
- Stereo delay effect with MIDI synchable delay times.
- Easy to use.
Yes, I’m in love with it! 😀
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Hi,
I downloaded the Cobalt from the website, then found I had to unzip the file.
But as I’m not 100% VST minded, the zip file was was like a Russian Matryoshka Doll. Loads of zip files within zip files; inside them just files.
Maybe I’m stupid; but I was expecting to see a digital version of a synthesizer like this ‘Reactor 5’ I have on my desktop. I did unzip all the files into one folder. But I haven’t the foggiest how to make the ‘synthesizer’ appear as it were ;-).
Any help would be appreciated 🙂
Regards,
Glen
Hi Glen,
I’ve verified just now the download and the directory structure I have opening the zip file is the following:
Cobalt
+-- Cobalt 64bit
+-- Cobalt 32bit
+-- README.txt
+-- CobaltManual.pdf
+-- CobaltBanks.zip
You have to pick the version for your OS (32 or 64 bit) and drag it into a folder on your PC along with the manual.
Now you are ready to use Cobalt since it has a good selection of patches defined by default.
The zip file ‘CobaltBanks.zip’ holds additional patches and are totally optional. If you want to use them uncompress the banks and you will get some files ending with “fbx”, those files can be loaded by your VST host as patches bank.
Remenber that you need a VST host to be able to use any VST, there are nice free solutions on Internet like VSTHost ans SaviHost by Hermann Seib, vPlayer3, nanoHost and many other… I may write an article about them if there is enough interest 🙂
I hope I helped you!