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In-depth Feature:
TC|Works Powercore 1.5
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In Use
The Mac review has already detailed the excellent quality of the plug-ins provided. This reviewer's experience concurs completely on the PC platform. All featured well-designed, useable interfaces, excellent audio quality. The reverb and finalizer alone justify the cost of the card, especially with the ability to run more than one simultaneously without overloading the host CPU. This is less true with the more basic effects - EQ, simple delays, etc. - where the difference between running similar effects on the host CPU to running them on the TC Powercore is less drastic. The exact benefit of the card for such processes seems to vary by the host CPU's power - on a 1.4 GHz system, the host CPU was quite capable of managing such tasks, while a 400 MHz system struggled more - making the benefits of the Powercore more apparent. Still, the user can easily run native and Powercore plug-ins side-by-side, so they can always choose to save the DSPs for more intensive effects algorithms.
Conclusion
As Mac users have known for a while, the Powercore offers impressive processing power, especially for complex effects. PC users should be pleased that they can now take advantage of these features. Furthermore, the forthcoming soft synths are eagerly anticipated - this is another area that could really benefit from extra processors. Overall, I found the card easy to install and use out of the box. The supplied tools alone justify the cost of the card and once the third party support begins to kick in then there could be a wider acceptance of the Powercore format.
Street price for the Powercore is $1099
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