3rd Wave Terminal: More Clarity for Deep Patches

On the laptop, the sequencer appears as a piano roll. According to Coover’s demo, notes can be drawn and edited, instead of having to shape a musical idea solely via the hardware interface. His key point: The sequencer was already there. Terminal isn’t about bloating the instrument with new features, but about making it easier to use. A refreshingly understated promise.

Carr knows the other side of this usability question. In his big review from July 2024, he demonstrates how turning a knob immediately brings up the relevant display page. Much is right at your fingertips; for deeper programming, though, you still need the screen, context-sensitive knobs, and buttons. Carr puts it this way:

This automation has a downside for him: If he leaves the multisample editing page by changing a parameter, he then has to search his way back. Regarding the sequencer at the time, he also describes not having found a way to delete individual notes. These are observations from his earlier review, not a test of the current hardware. But they make it clear why an additional graphical workspace can be more than just screen cosmetics.

Sam Gutman takes a different focus in his February 2025 video. He praises the immediate access to filter, envelopes, and LFOs; he accepts a bit of menu work when assigning modulation. Groove Synthesis provided him with the instrument for testing and the video, as he openly discloses. His standard remains distinctly musical:

How much can be behind such moves is shown in his patch Sine of the Times: Eight differently tuned sine waves form a kind of overtone series, with their levels moved by LFOs at different speeds. The mod wheel adds vibrato at different rates for high and low notes. These are patches you want to play, not just manage. The screen doesn’t have to replace the knobs at all.

Terminal adds to this overview. Coover plays a note and shows the ongoing wavetable movements of two wave envelopes. He then sets up a modulation and explains that connections can also be displayed as patch cables. With the 128 modulation destinations he mentions, that’s a real orientation aid. He considers the parameter overview especially helpful for the 8M and module versions; for the keyboard, he says it’s less necessary.

It also gets hands-on with your own sound material: Coover drags audio from the desktop, selects sections, and creates a wavetable from them. In the sample section, he changes loop points and crossfade and describes transferring it to the synthesizer. These are concrete work steps where a graphical surface plausibly helps—not just a prettier preset list.

According to Coover, the app is free for keyboard, 24-voice module, and 8M after registration. The current synthesizer OS is required. The shimmer reverb he also demonstrates, he attributes to this OS—not the editor. This distinction is important: a more convenient interface and new sound features from the firmware are two different things.