Presets

Bitcrust ships with 115 factory presets across ten categories and supports unlimited user presets. Presets are stored as plain XML files.

Factory preset categories

• Bass — basses, subs, drones (Wobble Bass, Hubbard Saw Bass, Reese Bass, FM Sub, etc.)
• Keys — organs, electric pianos, bells (Leslie Organ, Wurli Electric, Inharmonic Bell, Celesta, etc.)
• Lead — mono and poly leads (Classic Saw Lead, PWM Lead, Ocean Loader, Wizball Lead, etc.)
• Pad & Atmosphere — strings, drones, evolving textures (PWM Strings, Crystal Pad, Dark Drone 6581, etc.)
• Chord Memory — stacked voicings (Minor Triad, Power Chord, Quartal Stack, etc.)
• Pluck — short envelopes and rhythmic patches (Arp Pluck, Kalimba, Sequencer Pluck, etc.)
• FX & Texture — sound design (Acid SID, Resonant Sweep, Glitch Stab, Vinyl Crackle, etc.)
• Sequenced — step-sequencer-driven patches
• Drum Kit — single-hit drums (SID Kick, Snare, Hi-Hat, Tom, Clap)
• Init — blank starting point

Browsing presets

Open the PRESETS tab (keyboard shortcut 1) to access the full browser.

• Category sidebar — click a category to filter the list. All Presets shows everything. Favourites shows starred presets.
• Search — type in the search box to filter by name, author, or description. Matches are instant.
• Tag filter chips — below the category sidebar, tag chips let you narrow results further (e.g. #Bass, #6581, #Mod-Matrix). Click a tag to toggle it; click Clear to remove all tag filters.
• Preset list — click a row to select it and preview its metadata in the detail pane on the right. Double-click or press LOAD PRESET to apply it.
• Arrow buttons — the < and > buttons in the header step through presets sequentially. Keyboard shortcuts: [ (previous) and ] (next).

Favourites

Click the star icon next to any preset (in the list or in the header bar) to mark it as a favourite. Favourited presets appear under the Favourites category in the sidebar.

Saving presets

Click SAVE in the header bar to store the current state as a new user preset. The save modal asks for:

• Name (required)
• Group (category)
• Author
• Description
• Tags (semicolon-separated)

User presets are kept separate from factory presets and survive plugin updates.

A/B compare

The header bar has A+, A, B, and B+ buttons:

• A+ captures the current state into snapshot A
• B+ captures the current state into snapshot B
• A and B recall the respective snapshot

Snapshots are session-scoped and include the full synth state plus FX rack ordering. They are not persisted to disk.

Import and export

In the PRESETS tab, use the IMPORT and EXPORT buttons at the bottom of the detail pane to exchange individual preset XML files.

User preset storage

INIT button

The 🆕 button in the header bar is a one-tap shortcut to load the Init preset for sound-design from scratch. If the current patch has unsaved edits the button confirms first; on a clean patch it loads silently.

Dirty marker

While a preset is loaded, any synth, modulation, or FX edit that diverges from its saved state decorates the preset name with a trailing *. The marker clears on save, on (re)load, and on A/B recall (the dirty flag is tracked per snapshot side). The marker is intentionally local to Bitcrust’s UI — the host’s track name is left clean so it doesn’t flicker on every knob tweak.

Host preset sync (AU / VST3)

AU and VST3 hosts see Bitcrust’s full preset list via the JUCE programs API, so the host’s own preset menu stays in sync with the internal browser (factory + user presets, save / import / delete). Parameter tweaks do not rename the track — that’s what the dirty marker is for.

Logic Pro limitation. Logic only auto-renames the track when a preset change is initiated from its own AU preset menu, not from Bitcrust’s internal browser. The plugin notifies the host via updateHostDisplay(programChanged) in both cases, but Logic only ties auto-rename to selections it initiated itself. The AU preset combo still stays in sync regardless of who initiated the change.