Waldorf released Microwave, a virtual instrument based on the company's first hardware instrument 35 years ago. Thanks to its vibrant and distinctive sound, Microwave was a hit in the nineties. Its unique interpretation of wavetable synthesis and analog filters showcased what hybrid synthesis could deliver. 

The Waldorf Microwave 1 Plugin sees the company return to its roots by painstakingly recreating the original hardware with all its quirks and wonderful singularities. According to Waldorf, the plugin was a multi-year effort that saw them analyzing and modeling the original instrument down to its finest sonic details. This was no easy task, as the original hardware was based on a custom-developed integrated circuit called the Waldorf ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit). This was used in combination with the legendary Curtis filter chips.

The digital section of the Microwave features modeling of digital-to-analog converters for each voice, two oscillators based on the same wavetable per multi-instrument, a unique digital noise generator based on ASIC technology, and a faithful recreation of non-interpolated pitch generation. The wavetables feature all the original wavetables of Microwave 1 based on the original coding and are bit-identical to the original. It also faithfully recreates the 8-bit quantization and aliasing and includes algorithmic and speech wavetables. In addition, the plugin faithfully models the revision A and B of the analog filters. Check out the official Microwave 1 website for the full specifications. The plugin is available at a discounted price of €119, down from the regular price of €149.