Your Fav Soft Synth

D4Dirty · Joined: May 16, 2007 Posts: 7 Location: Australia

Hey Guys, I’ve got a question for you all that I am posting at a few other forums to see what kind of answers I get and publish the result. Here’s the premise:

You are setting up a new studio for a friend. The time has come to purchase some soft synths. Because the budget is limited and he only wants legitimate copies of each synth he has asked for only 5. Which 5 would you buy, and if you have to answer, why these 5?

Mine are:

* Vanguard

Love the filters, and I love the digital sound. Might not suit all sounds but it’s got some great ability for trance/electro sounds.

* Z3ta+

Love the ability to destroy the sound, and the matix is one of the best. Great for digital sounding harsh synths and big pads.

* Rob Papen Predator

Pro 53 would have been on this list of I hadn’t of tried predator. In my eyes they are very similar but predator has a much cleaner sound to it. Great for hardstyle and dirty breaks.

* moog modular v

One of the best moog emulators for when you want that old school big sound.

* Albino 3

I love the albino filters, they are superb. Also love the OCS and the matrix.

elektro80 · Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 4:13 am Post subject:

This might be the wrong forum for posting this in, but I reckon the most excellent moderator Kassen will point this out later on.

As for softsynths, I don´t have any favorites. However, some are more interesting than others. A nice one is Absynth. Reaktor is nice too.
For clones, both Arturia and G-Force ( distributed by M-Audio ) have really good stuff. The Waldorf plugin bundle which includes the PPG 2.x thingie is also really good ( and silly cheap these days ).
AAS is making great stuff too. You might also want to check out what Camel Audio is up to these days.

D4Dirty · Joined: May 16, 2007 Posts: 7 Location: Australia

Thanks mate, i tried this in the instruments section but i didn't get any responses. I didn't want electro-music to go unrepresented and i figure most of the people reading modular synthesis would be interested in plug ins.. but if there is a better place ill gladly move it there!

elektro80 · Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 4:22 am Post subject:

We can move the thread later on. No probs.

elektro80 · Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 4:26 am Post subject:

I forgot to mention the Korg Legacy Collection stuff. Brilliant stuff.

Adam-V · Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 4:09 pm Post subject:

I'll throw in a vote for Absynth. Good for weirdness, good for pads, good for basses. With the ability in later versions to include samples, probably good for mangling too.

I like FM7 too. It's a DX-7 on steroids! (I believe they just released FM-8 which I guess has more features)

Cheers,
Adam-V

KarmanHardon · Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:58 pm Post subject:

AdmiralQuality's PolyAna.

Nice, niiiice analog emulation. Pretty cheap as well.

Everything can modulate everything... lovely.

Mohoyoho · Posted: Fri Jun 22, 2007 7:01 am Post subject:

Reaktor -- The king of soft synths
Absynth -- Incredible envelopes
Moog Mod V2 -- Love the sound and sequencer

stringtapper · Joined: Jan 23, 2007 Posts: 22 Location: Texas

Three cheers for Zebra 2!!!

State Machine · Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 6:32 pm Post subject:

I love Spectrasonics "Atmosphere" ... Great for "moody" pads and wonderful bass sounds! The best part about it is that the patches evolve over time. This plug in is also great for doing film scoring if you so desire.

I also love Native Instruments FM7. I suppose FM8 is even better!

For really HOT ear popping drums, I use Spectrasonics "Stylus" advanced groove engine! It has an awesome features called BUZZ and Chaos ... very cool stuff for the "glitch" artist.

I also love the Jack Dark "Hands of Darkness" ......... Holy crap, what cools sounds from this thing!

Bill

State Machine · Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 6:39 pm Post subject:

Jason · Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 7:38 pm Post subject:

Kontakt
FM8
Absynth and yes pretty much all NI products
Stylus and all Spectrasonics products
I love Vanguard as well though I find it somewhat
limiting in terms of its timbre.
Arturia's Jupiter 8 is nice too and pretty realistic
And I really like Steinberg's Hypersonic of all things even if it
has a lot of stock sounds. With all the nice sample libraries being released too all the time it's pretty amazing what you can do depending on the direction you wish to go.

And on the Mac side there are some very impressive ones that are only for that platform , though I have used many, there are still some I have yet to try. I always liked the idea of metasynth for one....
But that is kind of different.
SO many out there..... and so many more to come.

a.b.o.z. · Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2007 5:45 am Post subject:

hai

i like audiobulb sophia. fantastic for soundscapes, sound fx..can do a lot.

gravehill · Joined: Apr 12, 2005 Posts: 49 Location: Berlin, Germany

Hmm, let's see.

For modular synth stuff, VAZ Modular is the one and only option, no doubt about it.

Z3TA+ sounds wonderful and is one of the most flexible synths around. Zebra2 is a viable alternative.

For all electronic drum stuff, Stylus RMX is very flexible and sounds awesome. Plus you can expand it with official "expanders" and also with REX files.

For pads and such, Absynth is my favorite. Another possibility would be Atmosphere but it's not nearly as flexible as Absynth. It does also other types of sounds very well.

For everything else (literally!) try Reaktor. If it can't make the sound you're after, it's not the programs fault.

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2007 12:39 pm Post subject:

Do not forget the Tassman from AAS Exclamation

doctorvague · Posted: Sun Jul 01, 2007 12:17 pm Post subject: Re: Your Fav Soft Synth

Nth L0gik · Joined: Jul 07, 2007 Posts: 71 Location: near DC,USA

atm i like the Anarchy sound software's swarmsynth,muon tau pro,NI absynth, Linplug delta III,greenoak's crystal,
Gmedia's oddity,Blueshock's tsunami & the synapse audio junglist v3.0,.... and a few of my own (vs1 visionsynth,the Vx delta & DS2)

norman phay · Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 3:01 am Post subject:

Kontakt is my favourite, by a long long way. Very easy to use, sounds great, lots of interesting stuff to play with, reasonably processor-light as long as you avoid the convolution processors.

I like the Korg digital legacy set, it's great to have a wavestation living inside yr computer and not having to listen to the LCD whining annoyingly is a plus too. I find the interface a bit tiresome though - it's cool to be able to see everything, but the way you change parameters makes my hands ache.

Rumpelrauch taips "Crazy Diamonds" string synth is a one-trick pony, but it's a great trick, I use it a lot. I wish I had a hardware version of it! The guy who made that one also has "AZR3", a B3 emulator that I like. Both donationware:

http://rumpelrausch.de.vu/

Other than that, nothing I've seen has really grabbed me.

machvingtsun · Joined: Jul 07, 2007 Posts: 11 Location: Galway

favoutite soft synth?
I cant choose between Reaktor and the stunning and cheap Kubik.

Also impressed by Terrartec Komplexor, best soft synth filters. Cronox is similiar to Absynth but faster to use.

cbm · Joined: Oct 25, 2005 Posts: 381 Location: San Francisco

I like all the U-He stuff (Zebra, Filterscape), Camelion 5000, and many of the Logic plugins.

kara · Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2007 5:05 am Post subject:

Since he has a limited budget, why not try some freebies.
1. Buy CM magazine.

2. Install

* DS404 : A good and underestimated sampler
* SR202 & CM505 : 2 good drum machines
* CM303 : Bass synth
* CM101 : Lead synth
* Chrystal : Pads & Drones

3. Go to http://karmafx.net/ and intall
* Karma synth : a true modular beast

Budget spend : the price of one issue of CM magizine.

If he can't make decent music with this, tell him to change hobbies Smile

k

Grizzle · Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2007 8:21 am Post subject:

My 5

NI Massive

seems I am the only one with Massive down so far. I think it's an unbelievably brilliant synth. Big deep growly satisfying bass and really great for formant type digital sounds. Also the interface is all on 1 page which makes it really easy to use. Also it's wavetable so more than just your standard VA type sounds.

SynthEdit

It great for learning the basics of modular synthesis and the community is very friendly and dedicated. It has been the cause of many crap synths but also I imagine the reason many people get into electronics and synth building. Best $20 I ever spent.

Ableton

I see ableton more like a phrase sampler than a sequencer. I love being able to bend things, twist things, resample things. I really use it as a giant performance sampler.

Rob Pagen Blue

I just like it for the presets. I never really program anything on it but it has loads of great presets. So I use it when I just want a bass or sequence or... It's very quick and handy and if I just needs good sounds to hand quickly then I always go to Blue.

Altiverb AudioEase with the Sanitarium IR library

I know it's a reverb but if you get the Sanitarium IR Library it effectively turns it into an extremely powerful sound designing tool. You can put in any sound and get out cinematic ambiences with very little effort. Many of the IR responses completely alter the character of the original sound so it is almost unrecognizable.