- Macro oscillator featuring 40+ fully-realized digital synthesis algorithms.
- Produce millions of different sounds easily — classic waves and telecoms babble, bells and whistles, percussion and ambience.
- Awesome for crazy complex waveform synthesis.
Made for Modular
Softube's Eurorack platform. Learn more
Modular exclusive
Mutable Instruments Braids
USD 45
Braids, by French Eurorack pioneers Mutable Instruments, is not an oscillator.
It sort of looks like one, with fine and coarse pitch/frequency controls, a v/oct input, and voltage-controllable tone/timbre controls.
It even sort of sounds like one, in as far as it outputs audio.
Mutable Instruments call it a macro oscillator, but even that is an understatement. It’s a hugely sophisticated digital synthesis engine, able to produce and manipulate complex sounds by means of 45 or so fully-realized synthesis algorithms, featuring multiple oscillators, wavetables, filters, VCAs, ring modulators, and so on under the hood.
"It’s so versatile and I just have to browse different settings in order to come up with something completely different. I use it for everything. Noisy flutes, lush chords, annoying percussion, and even some weird acid lines. If I could only use one oscillator while recording my next 12'', this would be it. Actually, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Stay tuned!"
Producer, DJ, remixer and artist
Have a listen
Any Sound You Like
Classic waves from vintage synths, bells, resonant filters, plucked and bowed strings, vocals and vowel/formant sounds, wind instruments, percussion, noise, granular clouds and more.
Meta-Parameters
'Timbre' and 'Colour' controls affect multiple different parameters per mode, morphing through all the sweet spots and ensuring every sound is lush, gorgeous, and useful.
Built-In Envelope
Using the trigger input and built-in AD envelope, each algorithm can even become a self-contained synth voice. No other modules required.
"If a module could be called essential it’s this one. Braids offers up so much in a tiny package, with some many shapes and possibilities. A beautiful edition to the suite of Softube modules, that can as complex or as simple as you wish. It’s a versatile beauty!"
Producer, DJ, remixer and artist
Digital macro-oscillator
In a sense, Braids can be looked at as both an encyclopedia of classic synthesis techniques, and a tool to bring them into the present-day, with tremendous sound-quality and ease-of-use to match.
Each mode represents a different, essential, and beautifully realised synth technique, with often very complex meta-patching going on behind the scenes. One, for example, features seven stacked and de-tuned sawtooth waves, while another passes a single oscillator waveform through a variable filter matrix to simulate vocal formants.
Incredible variety of sounds
Braids can produce an extraordinary variety of sounds, from 808-style drums to bowed strings, from bells and gongs to humanoid vowels, and from trance leads to Moog-ish basses. There's almost nothing this module can't do, especially in combination with other modules in your Modular system.
And what's more, it offers unprecedented ease-of-access to these sounds, with the heavy-lifting of the initial patch creation happening under the hood. All you have to do is select a mode, and use the two tone controls to find the precise flavor you want.
In short
- Made for Modular, Softube's Eurorack platform. Learn more about Modular
- Macro oscillator featuring 40+ fully-realized digital synthesis algorithms
- Produce millions of different sounds easily — classic waves and telecoms babble, bells and whistles, percussion and ambience
- Just two controls morph through the sweet spots of each algorithm
- Great for triggered percussion
- Awesome for crazy complex waveform synthesis
- Phenomenal for glitchy out-of-control modulated sounds
- Incredibly deep, but easy to use
- It’s like a library of the greatest synth sounds of all time
- Dive deeper: Mutable Instruments' own information on the hardware / Bob Borries’ excellent unofficial diagrammatic manual / A comprehensive video runthrough from Future Music
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System requirements
All Softube products require a computer with appropriate DAW host software (none of which are included).
Versions from 2.5.18 and newer of the Softube plug-ins have the following minimum requirements:
All native versions
- Mac OS X 10.13 up to 11.6.1 - MacOS 12 Monterey support pending
- Windows 10 64-bit - Windows 11 support pending
- Mac: Intel Core i3 / i5 / i7 / Xeon - M1 support pending
- Windows: Intel Core i3 / i5 / i7 / Xeon / AMD Quad-Core or newer
- Screen resolution larger than 1280x800
- 8 GB RAM or more is recommended, as well as at least 8 GB hard disk space for installation (individual plug-ins take less space, while sample libraries may require additional disk space).
- Softube account
- iLok account
- Internet access for downloading installers and managing licenses
- iLok generation 2 and up, if you intend to use an iLok key for authorizing your plug-ins (note that a physical iLok USB key is not a requirement)
In theory, any 64-bit VST, VST3, AU, or AAX (Pro Tools 11.0.2 or higher) compatible host application should work. However, due to plug-in host differences between DAWs - and our own rigorous testing standards - we only officially test our plug-ins and instruments in the most recent versions of Pro Tools, Logic Pro, Cubase, Ableton Live, Studio One, Reaper, and Cakewalk. Softube plugins are not tested in non-listed systems, but they most likely work as long as the system requirements are met. We cannot guarantee a solution for issues in unsupported systems.
Note: We have checked the basic functionality of our plug-ins, and Softube Central, in macOS Monterey running under Apple Rosetta 2, and initial tests do look promising. Silicon M1 native support is pending.
Note: We have run initial tests of Softube Central and our plug-ins within Windows 11 with positive early results. Further testing and announcements will follow.
With regards to the different VST formats, we strongly recommend using VST3 as some of our plug-ins have features that are not present in the older VST format. Supported sample rates: 44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, 176.4, and 192 kHz, in both mono and stereo. The most recent maintenance release of your DAW application is recommended. AAX DSP is not currently in active development. TDM/VENUE is no longer supported (old downloads are available on the Legacy Installers page)
Find the Softube installer you need both Softube Central and individual plug-ins.
AAX DSP version
- For AAX DSP you need to meet the above requirements for the Native versions. You also need to have an Avid HDX processing card. For plug-ins available for AAX DSP, see Which Softube plug-ins support AAX DSP?