Cherry Audio has released the DCO-106 softsynth for Mac and PC. The plug-in emulates the famed Roland Juno-106 with some additional features, including 330 presets, MPE support, 16-voice polyphony, reverb, and a flexible LFO for modulation. Best of all – it’s only $25 bucks.
Cherry Audio DCO-106
Cherry claims the Juno-106 emulation is so authentic that users can even import Sysex data from the original hardware and transfer the data into the VSTi. We’re not exactly sure of how this is done precisely, but that’s interesting.
What could possibly be really exciting is the MPE (MIDI Polyphonic Expression) feature. We’re not sure how this is handled or what attributes are affected by the MPE implementation, but this is another dynamic feature that would modernize the this 25 year-old synth’s performance functionality.
Cherry also added waveforms to the LFO section for a total of six available, which can be beat-sync’d. There is also a new unison mode with detune for beefing up the sounds. A reverb at the end of the signal chain with three different algorithms is available. The demo patches on Cherry’s website are somewhat drowning in reverb, so it’s hard to tell precisely how they stand up on their own, but you can download a 30-Day trial and find out yourself.
DCO-106 Features:
- Every aspect precisely modeled in exacting detail
- 330+ presets, including original 106 Factory Presets
- Up to 16-voice polyphony
- Rich stereo chorus
- Three lush reverb modes, gorgeous new proprietary reverb algorithm
- Full-featured delay section with tempo sync
- Multiple voice assign modes
- Single-key chord memory mode
- Expanded LFO section with six waveforms and tempo sync
- Unison detune for massive lead and bass sounds
- MPE support
- Full MIDI control
- Full DAW automation for all controls
- Fully compatible with original 106 SysEx commands
- DCO-106 is available in AU, VST, VST3, AAX, and Standalone formats.
A free 30-day demo of DCO-106 is available. This demo will play white noise periodically, but is otherwise unlimited. Apple MacOS Requirements: macOS 10.11 or above, 64-bit required. Quad-core computer with 8GB of RAM recommended. Windows Requirements: Windows 7 or above, 64-bit required. Quad-core computer with 8GB of RAM recommended.
