Welcome; What Is A Bus Effect - Arturia EQ SITRAL-295 User Manual

1. WELCOME

1.1. What is a bus effect?

As far as audio effects are concerned, bus or masterbus effects occupy a place of their own.
These effects are used to polish a more complex, composite sound, be it a group sub-mix or
even the final master bus output. Since their main goal is to perfect and balance the overall
sound spectrum (and maybe add some color to it), they are specially tailored for and tuned
to those tasks.
Therefore, their audio circuits are more carefully planned and usually more complex, their
components are chosen with top quality in mind, and more expensive and retro components
are used, like real tubes for example.
All in all, what one wants to achieve is a sound that's richer, fuller and with more body,
maybe supplemented with the kind of saturation you don't usually get in today's pristine
audio chains, where we aim for the cleanest sound possible. And why not add a touch of
EQ to make the sound a bit more transparent and detailed in certain bands.
Traditionally, there are just a few types of these bus effects: Equalizers, compressors
(usually called bus compressors, to differentiate them from the usual channel compressors),
and maybe more complex units with complete audio channels, comprising several modules.
Arturia - User Manual EQ SITRAL-295 - WELCOME 2