This isn’t a problem for me, because I have a folder where I place all manuals when I install a new plugin. The manual isn’t accessible from the main GUI panel. The learning curve isn’t very steep, and once you understand how to use the smart bands you’ll find yourself using them a lot! Con. You have to spend a moment with the manual to understand how it works, which is encouraged behavior in its own right, but not something typically needed in an EQ. The smart bands aren’t intuitive to use for someone who has never used them before. Let’s dive in to the pros and cons I’ve found. This will leave you with less work to do on the individual tracks! From there, use the 4 smart bands to carve out mud quickly on the whole mix. Load it on the 2 bus, then set your initial balance. Here’s a link to the preset file I made for smart:EQ+ to use on the 2 bus. He was using Pro-Q from fabfilter, but I was able to replicate it quite easily in smart:EQ+ without sacrificing any of the 4 smart bands. In part 25, Nolly shows the eq curve he’d been mixing through as a preset on the 2 bus in a top down approach.

I’ve applied a curve similar to the one Adam “Nolly” Getgood demonstrates in Creativelive’s “ Studio Pass: Periphery”. This is expected behavior in clean digital eq’s these days, but it’s worth noting.

There’s no noise floor, and you can’t clip the plugin internally. Smart:EQ+ isn’t modeling anything from the analog world. But if you can afford the latency, it’s well worth it! After familiarizing myself with how to use the smart bands, they quickly became a favorite! It’s because of this amount of detail that smart:EQ+ needs to use a bit of latency. The smart curve that is applied attempts to correct these deficiencies, and can be quite intricate. Smart:EQ+ offers 4 “smart” bands, which analyze the incoming audio to recognize spectral deficiencies. So now that you know that, let’s dive in. And to ensure that you know I’m leveling with you, my license is an NFR given in exchange for a review. My intention is to be impartial, and I will list pros and cons of smart:EQ+. But that aside, I’m not gonna let this be an article written just to convince you to buy something.

More developers should take advantage of the digital domain and bring fresh ideas to the table…and that’s exactly what Sonible does. I find it hard to get excited about another eq these days, unless there’s something truly new and unique it brings to the table. Do we REALLY need another EQ? We have stock eq’s, free eq’s, hardware eq’s, dynamic eq’s, analog modeled eq’s, digital eq’s that can do a zillion cool things…

Sonible smart eq review