KV331 SynthMaster 3 Review: The Synth That Does Everything (And Does It Well)

The SynthMaster 3 is the latest version of KV331 Audio’s flagship synthesizer, and it’s currently on sale for $39 (regular price $99). It’s an incredibly deep sound design playground with a huge amount of options for precise sculpting, and has 3150 new presets designed by a team of professional sound designers. You could spend all day browsing the presets, and even longer tweaking the individual parameters of the sound to make it your own, making the amount of potential options basically endless.

At its core, the SynthMaster 3 is a hybrid synth that lets you combine a wide range of synthesis engines inside a single preset. It’s got everything you need for complex synthesis, layer-stacking and modulation, plus options for sequencing, arpeggiating and mixing. But is it the right synth for your workflow? This review will break down the plugin design, controls and capabilities of the SM3, including a look at use-cases and standout presets.

Getting started

SynthMaster 3 is built around a simple idea: every sound is made from layers, and each layer is its own mini-synth. Each preset can have up to 16 layers, and each layer can host up to 16 modules (generator, filters, effects) and modulation sources.

You pick a generator for the layer, run it through whatever filters and effects you need, and then balance all of the layers together in the Mix View. The output can be as simple as a single oscillator, or as complex as a multi-layered instrument with evolving effects and sequences.

There are three main views for building your sound:

• Tab View – This is the most detailed sound-design workspace, and where most patches will start. It shows one layer at a time and gives you direct access to the generator, filters, modulators and effects in a clean layout. You can build the signal path here, edit generator parameters, adjust filter behaviour, tweak envelopes/LFOs, and manage per-layer effects.

• Track View – Track View is for controlling performance behaviour and global interactions rather than raw sound design. It gives you a broader overview of how layers respond when played: voicing settings, key/velocity zones, per-layer MIDI routing, and full-size editors for the step sequencer and arpeggiator.

• Mix View – Mix View is for focusing on the bigger picture. It shows all layers at once, along with their levels, panning, sends, and master effects.
  

Underneath those main views you get Info (details about the current preset), Shop (for checking out KV331 Audio’s expansion packs) and the Browser (for choosing presets). 

Generators

Each layer can host up to 16 modules, which you can choose from the list of oscillator and modulator types. There are six standard oscillators to choose from:

Basic Osc
The classic oscillator for classic subtractive synthesis. It gives you the usual waveforms (saw, square, etc.) and lets you shape them for basses, leads, plucks and general-purpose patches.

VAnalog Osc
A more detailed virtual-analog oscillator. It generates the waveforms to mimic analogue circuits, with two main wave shapes to morph between. There’s also a quality/oversampling setting to reduce aliasing. It’s aimed at hardware-style vintage sounds with more character and movement.

Wavetable Osc
The wavetable oscillator plays through tables of different waveforms. You can move the position in the table to change the tone over time, which can result in unique, evolving sounds. It supports loading your own wavetables, so you can bring in shapes from other synths or custom designs.

Additive Osc
The additive oscillator builds a sound from many separate harmonics instead of a single fixed waveform. You shape the overall tone by adjusting groups of these harmonics.

Vector Osc
The vector oscillator blends up to four different sound sources inside one module. You control an X/Y point to decide how much of each source you hear, and that position can be modulated over time. Another great option for complex, evolving sounds.

Granular Osc
The granular oscillator takes a sample or wavetable and chops it into tiny “grains”, then replays those grains in various ways. You can control how many grains are active, how long they are, and how the oscillator shifts between them. The granular oscillator is perfect for textural and experimental sounds.

Alongside the generator engines, SynthMaster 3 also includes built-in editors for sculpting your source sound more deeply. The Waveform Editor lets you draw or import waveforms; the Wavetable Editor allows you to import or build tables of waveforms and define morphing behaviour; and the Multi-Sample Editor enables you to import multiple samples, assign velocity layers and key zones, and play them using the granular engine.

Modulation

Once you’ve chosen a generator, you shape it with modulation, filtering and effects.

Modulators

Each layer has its own set of modulation sources: envelopes, LFOs and more advanced shapes like multi-stage envelopes. You can assign these to almost any parameter – oscillator pitch, wavetable position, filter cutoff, effect depth, and most other controls. This is the main way to create movement within your sounds.

Filters and effects

Filters are added as modules in the layer’s chain. SM3 includes several types, such as digital and analogue-style filters, ladder and diode-ladder filters, state-variable filters, comb and formant filters and phaser-style filter modules. They can be placed anywhere in the layer chain, giving you an extra element of control over your sound.

The effects are also modular. On each layer you can add distortion, chorus, flanger, phaser, delay, reverb, EQ, compression, limiting and utility modules like gain. On top of that, Mix View gives you global effects for the whole patch.

Arpeggiator, Sequencing and MIDI Controls

Performance tools can be edited in the Tab View, but the more advanced controls are in the Track View. These performance controls can be assigned to individual layers, meaning you can have different responses for different layers inside the same patch.

Each layer has a step sequencer for controlling pitch, gate and rhythm patterns, and an arpeggiator for generating patterns from either chords or single notes.You can use either on its own or combine them on the same layer. 

Track View also contains voicing controls, key and velocity zones for splits and layers, and other performance-related options that control how the patch plays from a keyboard or MIDI clip. Having all these tools makes SM3 a powerful live-performance instrument, as you’re able to create complex movement and evolving rhythmic patterns within a single patch.

Preset Browser and Sound Library

The preset browser for SM3 is simple and effective, with a fairly advanced tagging and search system. You can filter by product (which version of SynthMaster the preset comes from), author, attribute, style and type. This makes it simple to find and audition different sounds, and the number of attributes and styles making honing down a specific sound easy.

Because presets can use up to sixteen layers, many of them behave more like small arrangements than single sounds. It’s common to find patches where pads, plucks and textures are already layered with per-layer arps and sequencers. That complexity makes the factory content useful for both quick composing and tweaking a sound to fit your song.

Testing

I started by testing out a few presets. There was a great variety of sounds in every category, from classic digital synths to complex, multi-layered instruments to some decent attempts at acoustic sounds. None of the acoustic sounds were very realistic, with a few exceptions – the cinematic piccolo and duduk flutes were very real sounding and two of my favourite sounds overall, along with the guitar strum major chord and the egyptian darbuka percussion. 

In terms of collections, the Tron400 has some incredible orchestral sounds with deep layering and interesting timbres. Aiyn Zahev’s sounds include some great arps and sequences that’d be perfect for modern EDM, and some huge sounding synth leads. For hip-hop producers, there are some great sounds in Howard Smith’s collection, including dark keys and pads for trap and interesting FX to add texture and depth to your track. Filtering for “special effects” gives you loads of great options for ear-candy or transitions, perfect for experimental or ambient production. 

I’m not an expert sound designer, but I had to try to make my own sound from scratch. I started with a completely empty preset and built the most basic sound possible, with one layer, one oscillator and one filter. Using the VAnalog oscillator, I picked a simple saw wave and shaped the amplitude envelope into a short pluck. I added a ladder filter and lowered the cutoff to give it a softer tone. It took less than a minute, and it was easy to track all the changes I made. The undo button is a nice touch for speeding up the workflow without worrying about mistakes.

I then made a more complex patch. My goal was a pad with a lot of movement and texture, so I used four layers and processed each differently. The first layer used the granular engine for an interesting and textured foundation, the second layer was a wavetable with more movement, the third used additive synthesis for a shimmering top-end, and the final VAnalog layer with a shorter envelope gave it more of an impact. I balanced them in the Mix View and added some master FX to glue them together. Even with my lack of sound design knowledge, I was very happy with the result, and it showed me how easy it was to create a deep and interesting sound in SM3.

I used this pad as a background layer in a song I’m currently working on, and decided to record it on my MIDI keyboard to test the performance tools. I took some time to adjust the voicing and zone controls, which gave it much more variation and made playing it feel more like a live performance with evolving parts than a simple MIDI clip. The SM3 excelled in every area I tested it in except its analog modelling (the analog-style sounds need some extra mixing to sound realistic), and I genuinely think it’ll be my automatic go-to for any electronic or experimental compositions I work on in the future.

Conclusion

Pros

• Much more flexible than previous versions, with up to sixteen independent layers.
  
• Wide range of synthesis engines covering analog, digital, granular, sample-based and more.
  
• Clearer, more structured interface with separate Layer, Track and Mix views.
  
• Per-layer sequencer and arpeggiator for detailed rhythmic control inside a single preset.
  
• Huge preset library with improved browsing and tagging.
  

Cons

• The depth of the controls can be overwhelming at first, especially for simple patch-building.
  
• Multi-layer designs can push CPU usage noticeably higher than typical single-engine synths.
• 
  

Is it worth buying?

SynthMaster 3 is a major step forward for KV331’s flagship synth. The new modular, multi-layer system makes it far more capable than earlier versions, and the redesigned interface matches the depth of the engine. It’s a synth that can be useful for both beginner composers and advanced sound designers, with enough presets to suit any genre, and enough modular depth to create essentially any sound you can imagine. It’s definitely aimed more towards advanced sound design than quick or easy sounds, but even for a complete beginner $39 is amazing value for thousands of high-quality presets and a powerful, do-it-all synth. Unless you already have a favourite synth that you refuse to part with, the SynthMaster 3 is a must-have.

More info on kv331audio.com