How would you rate Cool/Auditions stock plugins?

[scottboyher]

How would you rate Cool/Auditions stock plugins when compared to outboard gear?

Example..

The compressor and limiter is it better or worse than a 3630?
How would you compare the chorus to other chorus modules out there?
Reverb. Better or worse than an Alesis module?

 

[dobro]

Compared to my Lexicon MPX 500, Cool's onboard reverbs suck the big one.

But what do you expect? The Lexi unit costs more in itself than the whole of Cool Edit.

I mean, it's equally true that for what you pay for Cool Edit/Audition, their stock effects are fine. I'll give you an example: I bought the Ultrafunk EQ plugin back in the days before Sonitus got swallowed up by a bigger company. I paid...I think it was $60 for that EQ. I use it all the time nowadays because I find it easier to use than Cool's EQ. But as near as I can tell, it doesn't sound any better than Cool's EQ. And I think that's because $60 for the Ultrafunk EQ plug puts it in approximately the same quality range as the Cool Edit EQ. And *that's* why my next piece of outboard gear is going to be an outboard EQ that kicks ass. Dedicated outboard gear is bound to be better than a built-in effect which is only one of many, many effects in a moderately-priced piece of software.

 

[noisedude]

The reverbs suck but the compressor is fine and the noise reduction is worth the price of admission alone. Haven't really played with the others as much because, er, me and Audition ... well ... we're not best friends.

 

[ozpeter]

Depends what you mean by "better". All these things are simply different tools for different jobs. Every reverb has a different character from every other, and it's then a matter of deciding which has the right character for the job in hand. There's no implicit difference between standalone processors and PC based processors (they are both programs controlling chips which do the number crunching).

One factor to bear in mind is that if the outboard effect is being used to process the audio before it is recorded, then you're stuck with the effect on the recording. If you do the processing afterwards with Audition or whatever, you can change your mind as often as you like. If you do the processing afterwards using an outboard effect, you may lose quality in getting the audio out of your PC and into the outboard and back, depending on exactly how you do it.

Consider for instance Audition's limiter. It can be easily shown that it passes the audio through bit-for-bit unchanged except at the points where limiting is required. As soon as the peak has passed, there is absolutely no change to the original audio. Using an outboard effect, that might not necessarily be the case, and in any event you'd have a harder job to prove it.