[Whitecat]

Last night I was doing a very un-scientific comparison of a few different SW limiters that I've had around [but not used very much] on some film score pieces I did last year. It was really just to get a feel for what they could and couldn't do, and of course, to see how hard I could slam them before they crackled. Traditionally in the past I've used PSP's MasterComp to bring up my overall levels, but it's not UB yet, so I was trying out the W1 (which is the L1 'clone,' allegedly, that's been mentioned above), Elemental Audio's Finis, and Wave Arts' Final Plug. The clear winner was the Wave Arts' plug, it was very good, I would say as good as MasterComp (albeit without some of that extra vintage 'flavour' that the PSP can impart, but I don't always want that). The Finis, in mode II was only OK. Mode III sounded terrible, and mode I was just, well, boring. The W1 sounded awful, and was completely unusable. I'm no fan of the Waves L-series stuff anyway.

I'm a big fan of the Wave Arts' stuff, but I've never used FinalPlug before at all really even though I've owned it for a year. Might give it a go on some future self-mastered projects. As you've been told, nothing is a replacement for a good ME though. It's the extra set of experienced ears if nothing else that will help you the most, no matter what kit they use!

I also love the Massey limiter, but I prefer to "master" with Peak Pro, so it just doesn't tend to work that well with my workflow, but that's just me. As has been stated, YMMV.