14 DAY TRIAL // One of the world's best open-source and cross-platform DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) software, Ardour, has been updated to version 5.5 on the first day of December 2016, as announced by developer Paul Davis.
Ardour 5.5 comes exactly two months after the 5.4 release, and it's now considered the most stable and advanced version, further sustaining its position as a mature Digital Audio Workstation application that can be successfully used for amateur and professional music making.
Prominent features of Ardour 5.5 include support for Virtual Studio Technology (VST) 2.4 plugins on the macOS platform, support for Steinberg CC121 Control, Artist Mix Control, and Avid Artist Control surfaces, the ability for MIDI input to follow MIDI track selection, as well as improved Open Sound Control (OSC) and scripting support.
Users can now do horizontal zoom via vertical dragging on the rulers
Another interesting feature that landed in the Ardour 5.5 release is the ability to do horizontal zoom via vertical dragging on the rulers, a functionality that seems to have been requested many times before. Moreover, the developers managed to implement "fanning out" of instrument outputs to both new busses and tracks.
"As in the past, some features including OSX VST support, Instrument Fanout, and Avid Artist support were made possible by sponsorship from Harrison Consoles," reads the release announcement. You can download Ardour 5.5 for GNU/Linux and macOS operating systems right now from our website.
There are hundreds of small, yet important improvements and bug fixes in Ardour 5.5, but it would be impractical for us to list them all here. Therefore, if you're curious to know what exactly has been changed in this version, don't hesitate to check out the complete changelog attached below.