Every plug-in that’s part of a chain can be edited using either its own GUI or a list of its available parameters. They can be dragged from here onto an audio clip, or into the Plug-In Chain area on the right. These can be viewed by category, vendor or type and the list is also searchable, which is a nice touch. The application comes with a bunch of its own processing plug-ins (more on this in a moment) but also supports AU and VST plug-ins from third parties, which appear in a list on the right. Incidentally, a large number of customisable key command shortcuts are available in the Preferences section. Dragging and dropping content within and between different clips is also easy. Many of these pop up a new window when activated, letting you tweak, preview and then process the tool on the selected area. Here you’ll find all the usual suspects as well as some more advanced stuff including élastique timestretching, iZotope 64-bit sample rate conversion and dithering, auto trim and others. Few of the tools seem to be available via right click when you have selected part of a clip, but they are available in the Process menu. Audio ToolsĪudio editing is what SOUND FORGE is all about and you can of course get all the way down to sample level when doing this. I couldn’t find any window preset system though, which would be nice for instantly flipping between layouts. The wave editor section can display two files at once either horizontally or vertically, and both sections also support tabs for managing multiple open documents. You can arrange sections within panes too so it’s easy enough to set up custom views that work for your needs. It’s essentially a one-window app, with sections that can be shown and hidden using the Panes and Views options at the top right corner. It can record at up to 24-bit / 192kHz rates and of course import almost any audio file format including audio streams from a number of video file formats. Being Mac native and a relatively young app means it feels nimble, with no heavy graphics or bloated menus.

The feel of SOUND FORGE on the Mac is pretty stripped-back and surgical which is no problem at all, since such an approach tends to help with usability.

Sound forge pro mac 2