Numerology Audio Unit Compatibility List

Last Updated: 7/27/04

This page lists the compatibility status of Audio Units with Numerology, so you can check up on your favorite AUs before using them with Numerology. This is also a good spot to find many of the great free AUs that are around. For general news and a comprehensive listing of plugins for OS X, visit osxAudio.com.

Numerology 1.4 has several changes that improve performance and compatibility with Audio Units from several vendors, and this list has been updated to reflect those changes. In particular, improvements to the way Numerology schedules MIDI notes resolves some issues with AUs from Native Instruments. And there were several plugins where you had to hold down the control key when using their edit windows; GMedia's Oddity was one of these. That issue has also been fixed.

If you are having trouble with a plugin, or see that one of your plugins is listed here as not being compatible, be sure to send email to Five12, and contact the developer and let them know that you are using Numerology. Although Numerology is a very straightforward AU host, and leverages AU hosting code provided by Apple, there are still problems that can arise.

If you already have an AU host, such as Logic or Digital Performer, remember that you can always host your plugins there, and stream MIDI to them from Numerology. Also, many plugins, such as those from Native Instruments, can also run as stand-alone programs.

Finally, keep in mind that there are many great plugins that have been ported to VST format for Mac OS X. By using the very reliable VST to AU Adapter from fxpansion, you can add even more great plugins to your Numerology setup. A few free VST's that run well in Numerology are listed below.

If you have updated information for this page, or any questions, send us some email.

Contents

• Compatible AU's, Free
• Compatible AU's, Commercial
• Compatible, Free VST Plugins
• Non-Compatible AU's

There are several Audio Unit plugins developed by Apple that ship with Mac OS X, including a SoundFont/DLS player, various filter plugins, and a pretty decent reverb. All of these plugins are compatible with Numerology and are always available.

Although Urs Heckmann now spend most his time working on Zebra, he was one of the first developers to support the AU spec, and his freebies are still great instruments: Zoyd is a very powerful semi-modular mono-synth. MFM is a matrix delay system, and Rumblence offers filtering and distortion. Rumblence is showing a bit of age: it will crash if you try to delete it from a Numerology session. Send Urs a note if you would like to see an update.

The Loop Synth is a great little monophonic looping sampler, designed primarily for textural loop sampling, but also amenable to percussive applications. The Ping Pong Delay and Phaser are also very handy.

Simple and effective AU effects for tweaking tracks. The saturation circuit on blockfish is very nice for adding subtle warmth.

There are a number of inventive AU synths and effects here. One standout, well worth checking out, is Scrubby, a delay plugin with a distinctively granular approach to mangling source material.

Thanks to a recent update, KTGranulator now runs just great in Numerology (version 1.2 and higher). This plugin creates dense streams of sample grains from it's input, and includes many parameters for tweaking the resulting sound textures.

Speedster is a high-quality pitch and speed shifting plugin, and happens to be one of the few Pitch shifter AUs of any sort. The AUStk instrument is an AU Synth that incorporates some examples instruments from Perry Cook's extensive STK toolkit, a set of C++ classes for realtime audio synthesis, with many tools for Physical Modeling synthesis.

Airy Synth still has occasional problems with stuck notes, but otherwise is a nice sounding poly synth. Both Airy Synth and Voweler feature a very interesting formant-type filter. There is a bug that affects Airy's au303 synth that will be fixed for Numerology 1.4.1.

A very powerful polyphonic synth. The latest version fixes almost all remaining AU issues. There is still a minor problem accessing factory presets from Numerology. This plugin also runs very well in the VST version when wrapped for AU usage.

A basic, but very effective and easy to use VA polysynth. This is definitely a case where less is more.

This VA drumsynth is currently only available with the Numerology 1.2.X downloads. A great sounding plugin that is highly amenable to parameter modulation.

A free sample-playback plugin with a select number of well-programmed sounds, an effective demo for their commercial versions.

This well-regarded shareware reverb plugin will now load properly in Numerology as of version 1.2.4.

As mentioned at the top of this page, Numerology 1.4's improved note scheduling resolves any remaining missing note issues with these plugins.

Over the last year, LinPlug has been busy converting their well-regarded virtual synths to the Audio Units format. These plugins all work well in Numerology.

Now in at version 1.5, Zebra is an extremely capable polysynth from Urs Heckmann.

An inexpesive but very flexible looper, well worth spending some time with.

Thanks to a timely tip on the CoreAudio list, these plugins can now be used in Numerology 1.4 without the user having to hold down the command key while editing them.

These plugins, developed by GMedia in conjunction with Ohm Force, work fine in Numerology 1.4.

Although Glaresoft does not officially support iDrum in Numerology, the current version works fine, including proper sync with Numerology's transport.

A powerful tool for slicing and processing drum loops. A tweaker's dream, especially when combined with certain Numerology sequencing features (gate division, parameter mod).

A simple but very handy (and cost effective) drum sampler, comes with a nice selection of Roland drum samples.

These are both powerful VA synths that are based on hardware synthesizers. The latest releases of these plugins clear up issues that appeared in earlier versions.

A very comprehensive software sampler. Despite it being very new, all indications are that it is fully compatible with Numerology.

Latest reports are that this plugin works fine in Num 1.4 and later.

Plugsound has a variety of sample-playback synths pre-loaded with sounds. If their Plugsound Free plugin is any indication, there are lots of great sounds to be found here.

Using the VST-AU Adapter from fxpansion, you can "wrap" many VST-X plugins to work successfully in Numerology, here is a short selection.

Hidden in the "Free Demos" section of their website, you will find Free ALPHA with a VST version for OS X. Wrap it up w/ the stuff from fxpansion.com, and you'll have a great little free synth.

Current versions of Tera and Cube crash in Numerology. Five12 has emailed Virsyn, but no response yet. There are newer versions of these plugins available for download, but as there is no demo yet, we cannot determine if they are compatible or not.

These plugins crash in Numerology. Five12 is in the process of contacting TC Electronic.