Waves X-Noise

Have you ever recorded a guitar next to a computer? For anybody who has, I'm sure you'll have noticed the annoying hum that can occur. This is due to the magnets of the pickups picking up various frequencies that electronic gear tends to give off and amplifying them. It can be a real pain to deal with as you'll need to face the guitar away from any electronic gear when recording. That can be real impractical if you're doing everything yourself as you'll be looking away from the monitor and keyboard. Thankfully, Waves has a nice plugin that can help remove some of that hum and hiss that occurs when recording near electronic devices. It's packed full of features and has adjustments such as threshold, reduction, dynamics, attack, release, high shelf, gain, noise profile learning, and tons more. To use this, simply enable it on whatever buss you need the noise removed from. I've never read the manual, but this is easy enough to use without ever having read the manual.

SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

Waves plugins have always been some of the most stable plugins I've experienced. They're cross platform compatible, so they'll work with both PCs and Macs. As a Mac user, that's a huge advantage for someone like me. They run in 32 bit mode, but Logic uses a wrapper-like application that runs so you don't interfere with your 64 bit interface. I've tried this on various different buses, and it seems to work on anything with ease. It even works nicely on MIDI, which I found a bit surprising. There are no performance issues at all, and that's a huge plus when working in a DAW filled with all kinds of synths and tracks running tons of plugins. These plugins came with my Mercury package, and I've had that for a few months now.

OVERALL OPINION

This has saved me quite a few times before. I mostly record guitar when I'm doing recording, and I'm pretty close to the monitor. As a result, I usually get some hum that occurs. I can either deal with it or turn around while recording. Either method works, but neither are ideal. This plugin helped remove some of that annoying hum that occurs while recording guitar near a monitor. If you deal with recording guitars, I highly recommend you check this out.

The Waves Ltd. X-Noise was quite easy to install and was a process that was error and pain free.  I had the plug-in working within a few minutes and haven't had any problems with it since.  I didn't have any compatibility issues or other problems at all and the interface was pretty easy to figure out.  The interface has parameters for release and reduction as well as attack and release in the dynamics section and a high shelf that has parameters for gain and frequency.  It also has resolution options and a variety of metering and graphs.  Everything is easy to follow and is laid out smartly.  The typical functions are easy to find and a manual isn't needed to learn the plug.


SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

While I generally only use the Waves Ltd. X-Noise one at a time, I've never had any problems running it.  I currently have it running on a Mac Book Pro that has a 2.2 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 4 GB of RAM.  I use the plug-in in Pro Tools LE 7.4 that runs with a Digi 002R audio interface and have also used it on a Pro Tools HD system.  No matter which system I am using, I've never had any problems whatsoever running this and I can't imagine a situation where you would even need to run more than one of these at once anyway...

OVERALL OPINION

All in all, I think that the Waves Ltd. X-Noise really does a great job of eliminating noise without killing the rest of your signal.  While I try to avoid too much noise from the get go, sometimes it can be avoided and this plug-in does me a big favor when it eliminates noise for me.  It is great for use for traditional recording and during mixing but is also great for cleaning up older recordings or even vinyl transfers.  The plug-in isn't as cheap as you would like it to be, but I've really come to expect that from Waves plug-ins.  If you are looking for a great plug-in for cleaning up noise during mixing or otherwise, I don't think that you can get too much better than the Waves Ltd. X-Noise.

Typical installation, RAS.
No incompatibilities found (Win 46Bits)

SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

Config: Intel i5 3750, 8GB RAM, SSD.
Very stable.

OVERALL OPINION

I use it for about a year.
What I like most:

His walk, his walking even very good. I do a lot of sampling, including jazz and blues, and I often sample old records. Grave this plug, I get to give them a new lease of life to integrate them into my mixes. It's really easy, already without adjustment, insertion of the plug, you feel a huge difference. After which more detailed settings, this is the day and night. I use it on many things eventually. One can for example make a big "cleaner" distortion, although a priori it is not intended, we keep the density of the distortion, but it takes a lot of aggression, its can be interesting on some pojets.
For those who register their guitars at home in an environment necessarily prfait or preamp with too low quality, can be a real remedy even if its still a stopgap meteriel a good record.

I ime least?

Uh .... can be the 90s design, but who cares .

The quality / price ratio: It's expensive, it's really expensive, but lives with this stuff, then saves ...

With experience, you do again this choice?

I do not know, really, I'd like to try the Ozone RX7, but otherwise I would keep so!

Digression: For sound designers, this plug can be very funny: there is a "difference" mode, or you listen to only what the plug was removed to our sound. Certain sounds, leaving the difference mode is activated, you do excellent finds!