A Quick glance at the crystal ball reveals new products on the way from Kawai, Stepp, Tascam, Soundtracs, Ramsa, and others...

Offering 240 FM sounds, with up to 8-voice polyphony, and control via MIDI mono mode, the FB-01 takes the crown as the cheapest expander on the market today. Martin Russ casts his vote.

Tony Hastings begins a new series of valuable hints and tips aimed at helping owners of Ensoniq Mirage samplers get the best from their instruments.

Compact discs represent a superb source of high quality sounds for the samplist too lazy to sample their own. What's more, products like this D-55T CD player make the task even easier with their programmable auto-loop function. Paul Gilby explains...

Breaking into the audio industry has always been difficult, but attending a training course may well help you on your way. We report on one scheme offered by Manchester's School Of Sound Recording.

Since the release of their diminutive yet ground-breaking CZ-101 synth, Casio have been steadily improving the facilities of their Phase Distortion keyboards with each subsequent CZ product. The culmination of those efforts is now manifest in their best-ever synthesizer, the CZ-1, a truly professional performance instrument. Chris Jenkins says 'welcome'.

Part 2. Paul D. Lehrman takes up where he left off last month in his detailed description of how he recorded and digitally mastered an entire album using an Apple personal computer, the Total Music multitrack software, and a bunch of MIDI synths. Read all about it!

Apart from noise reduction systems, dbx make a studio quality range of 'budget' signal processors. Engineer Gareth Stuart put three of them - the 163X compressor/limiter, 263X de-esser, and 463X noise gate/expander - through their paces.

Whether you like his music or not, nobody can knock Paul McCartney's achievements as the world's most successful songwriter. In a rare interview he talks to Patrick Humphries about the music, recordings and personalities that combined to produce his first solo album for three years - 'Press To Play'.

Paul Gilby visits SRT Records & Tapes to unearth the 'inside views' of its managing director David Richardson, whose profound words shatter some of the illusions and myths that surround the record manufacturing industry.

The big boys of the synchronising world have sat back and observed the appearance of budget systems from Fostex and SMPL over the past six months. Now Audio Kinetics dip their not in considerable toe in the water with the launch of their own low-cost chase synchroniser system, the Pacer. David Mellor checks it out.

As it stands, the ADD-One is a new 8-channel sampled sound expander designed to be triggered from Dynacord's own drum pads. But user-sampling and disk storage promise to extend its range of applications in the near future. Chris Everard reports.

Jay Chapman explains the theory and practicality of using a master keyboard like Yamaha's KX88 in your MIDI set-up. What are the benefits it can bring? Read on to find out...

Part 2. If you developed a stomach ulcer through reading last month's instalment on the theory of line-up and haven't dared go near your tape machine since, you can stop worrying no was David Mellor tells you exactly what to do to achieve perfection in your recorded sound.

If you've the tenacity to take on and beat the (ex-)GLC, then putting together an upmarket 24-track studio is a piece of cake! Tony Hastings visited this South London studio to glean the details of how it came to be and what it offers.

Due to popular demand we have extended our coverage this month to bring you even more hot news, views and juicy gossip!