Autumn 2020. I’m scrolling through obscure forum threads about vintage DAWs from the Win 95/98/ME-era. Suddenly there it is: a low-res screenshot of a DAW I’ve never encountered before: Ultranos Dreamer. It looks a lot like Propellerhead Reason which was initially released in 2000 and also reminded me of Synapse Orion (which was initially released in 2002). Ultranos Dreamer is also from that period.

The rack-based approach is clearly inspired by reason. Dreamer’s big feature is though: you can actually host vst plugins in it – a feature not included into reason for many years from the release of Dreamer, even though this feature seems to have been quite buggy.

An article on kvr stats the software’s features as follows:

Dreamer is an expandable virtual studio, in the style of Reason, that comes with a set of devices, that you can insert into the virtual rack of the song window.

Features

– Virtual rack module.
– Can be controlled by external sequencer (via MIDI soundcard or MIDI loopback device driver such as ‚MIDI_Yoke‘).
– Can record all 16 MIDI channels simultaneously.
– Samplers and drum machines have low-CPU high-quality interpolation.
– Dreamer makes use of video acceleration, so that you can use all of your CPU for DSP.
– Imports ReBirth 2.x songs.

Included Devices:

– Akemi – Digital Sampler.
– CR1 – Computer Rhythm.
– DDL1 – Digital Delay Line.
– M1X3R – Mixer 11:4.
– Musashi – synthesizer.
– SEQ1 – Sequencer.
– Di1 Distortion.
– FR Flanger.
– RV1 Reverb.
– VeloSiTy – VST Host.https://www.kvraudio.com/product/dreamer-by-ultrano

Almost 20 years later, lucky me stumbles upon the mentions screenshot – and I manage to get in touch with the original programmer after tons of research via the internet archive. He’s still working in IT nowadays but seems to have left the world of music production software programming many years ago. He’s very critical with his software from the beginning of the 2000s. „It’s not really good, and I made less money off it than what I make during coffee-breaks now,“ is what Iliyan Dinev says about Ultranos Dreamer. And: „Pardon the cringe in some of places, teenage years…“ I tend to disagree. The software is quite impressive for a one-man-project, especially from that era (believe me, I’m digging through a lot of crap from that time). And: you can hear its aesthetic surrounding very clearly in everything you do with the software. It’s a certain kind techno-ish aesthetics that somehow still roots in the late 90s – Dreamer is perfect for that. And: It actually sounds quite well, given its natural limitations. Not in the sens of hi-fi by today’s standards – but quite impressive for a techno machine.

You can download the software below. Iliyan Dinev, the programmer was so kind to remove the registration procedure so that what you will find here is the full version of the software. By this entry Ultranos Dreamer is available to the public after way over ten years!

By the way – both names „Ultrano“ and „Ultranos“ are correct – the name way changes due to a theft of the original domain (without an s) as Iliyan states.

Attention:If you’re getting an antivirus message after opening the archive, note this. I’m running it on a Virtual Machine on Win 98 even though I’m pretty sure that the software is not dangerous – but you never know, right? Iliyan Dinev says about that:

The old build of the app was calling the function IsBadWritePtr(), and this triggered antivirus false-positive with „RV1.instrument“. I’ve modified the code to not use that function anymore. It was a stupid way to provide stability, avoid use-after-free… I was too young back then. Included its srccode.

Actually the software runs of Windows 10 pretty decently. If you’re getting crackles, play around in the settings with options for slower machines.

And now, please hold your breath, here it is – the one and only Ultranos Dreamer.

The password of the zip archive is fleamarketaudiostuff. Download here

Wisefire kindly made a Mac-Version of the software with wine – download it here and please note:

Winebottled by Wisefire (https://wisefire.bandcamp.com)
using the Unofficial Wineskin Project by Gcenx:
https://github.com/Gcenx/WineskinServer
(Techie stuff: engine: WS11WineCX64Bit19.0.1-1 Wrapper:Wineskin-2.9.0.7-rc1)

Note: this app has not and will not be notarized by Apple.

Note2: Some virus scanners may still take issue with some of the instruments included in this package, please use at own risk.– Wisefire

Please not that this software by Iliyan Dinev is uploaded here simply for historical documentation, not for anything else. I am not liable for anything you do with the software or the software does with your computer. All rights of the software itself lie with Iliyan Dinev.