Anyone actually pay for synths? NO it's not a pirating question

[sikter]

This is interesting!
About a year ago I bought Korg M1 and started using it on my songs.
I new nothing about MIDIS and soft synths by the that time so I used samples from M1 and recorded
everything DI to my cheapy SB Live card. I posted my song Room 52 in mixing clinic and, among many others, came critic about poor samples I used.
It came from one deeply respected guy and I understood that I must check up the MIDI world.
I bought a new audio card (M Audio F410) and I started to record and edit midis in Cubase.
My VST-instruments were Hypersonic and Edirol Orchestral.
It worked for my piano line but now after a whole year I can’t make strings to sound even close
like I did it the first time using M1. I'm obviously doing something wrong but I’m almost losing any hope to find out what is it.

Here is the clip with my strings:
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pagemusic.cfm?bandID=640994

There are two full versions of the song on my signature but the strings line is just the same on both of them.

I appreciate any help. This is making me crazy.

 

[travelin travis]

The free plugs I have tried have been uninspiring. I’m a classical pianist. I have a hard time not being distracted by some of the canned sounds.

I'm a beer drinking guitarist but I've had the same experience with the free instrument plugs. I don't care much about recording quality but I am a bit of a tone whore. An instrument should be inspiring.

 

[beezelbubba]

I'm a beer drinking guitarist but I've had the same experience with the free instrument plugs. I don't care much about recording quality but I am a bit of a tone whore. An instrument should be inspiring.

It's hit or miss.There are a lot of plugs available, and many of them have dozens of sounds(and that's just the presets).You have to indulge your curiosity and play around with them.
When you have some free time, just start D/Ling instruments at KVR and fuck around with 'em.

 

[Reilley]

"It is very convenient to have low standards!"


"Right.... I guess if you want your songs to sound bad I guess it is."




Sounds to me that person A made a tongue-in-cheek comment, person B followed in the same vein, more or less, and person A went ballistic and ground out profanitites.


Brothers and Sisters, let us join together in a spirit of understanding and non-musical harmony, pour the healing balm of forgiveness on our collective wounds, and vow to go forward in a mood of happiness and co-operation.

 

[Reilley]

""When I still had Reason, there were so many sounds to choose from I spent most of my time trying to decide which ones to use.

The sounds of the free/cheap synths can be real good, but to be honest, I've yet to use one that sounded anywhere close to Reason's sounds (strings, pads, etc.).

Which is good for me because I can't record anything up-to-par with those sounds so it just sounded fake.""
___________

Danny, I don't quite follow. Which ones could you "not record anything up-to-par with," and why couldn't you? I think I'm just a confused by your phrasing, and I'm probably the only one who doesn't get it. Thanks.

 

[travelin travis]

It's hit or miss.There are a lot of plugs available, and many of them have dozens of sounds(and that's just the presets).You have to indulge your curiosity and play around with them.
When you have some free time, just start D/Ling instruments at KVR and fuck around with 'em.

just to be clear. i'm not saying all the free instrument plugs i've tried sound bad. i just haven't used any that are inspiring.

 

[DavidK]

One advantage (right now) that hardware synths have is the ability to find sounds very quickly. With a synth like a Roland or Korg, there are going to be 100s of sounds to use out of the box.

I have found that working quickly is probably the most important thing for my music. The tracks that take the least amount of time are usually the best. Hardware is right in front of you, I am usually playing something on a keyboard then press record with one hand while I am playing with the other.

I wrote an instrumental piece yesterday in real time. I was playing and got an idea, so I hit record (on a midi track) and just did it. I didnt change a note, I literally wrote a 4 minute tune in 4 minutes. When it came time to find the right patch, I tried a zillion. I went with the original patch.

I cant do that with a softsynth. Too much time wasted on loading, inserting, blah blah.

 

[travelin travis]

One advantage (right now) that hardware synths have is the ability to find sounds very quickly. With a synth like a Roland or Korg, there are going to be 100s of sounds to use out of the box.

I have found that working quickly is probably the most important thing for my music. The tracks that take the least amount of time are usually the best. Hardware is right in front of you, I am usually playing something on a keyboard then press record with one hand while I am playing with the other.

I wrote an instrumental piece yesterday in real time. I was playing and got an idea, so I hit record (on a midi track) and just did it. I didnt change a note, I literally wrote a 4 minute tune in 4 minutes. When it came time to find the right patch, I tried a zillion. I went with the original patch.

I cant do that with a softsynth. Too much time wasted on loading, inserting, blah blah.

soft samplers/synths are a pain in the ass in that respect. loading is a drag.

 

[StackableMusic]

I make electronic music and I started out by using Reason rewired to Cubase... over time I've moved to a hardware-based rig, the only software involved is Recycle and Ableton Live, with some fx plugins supplementing Live (mostly compression because Live's compressors suck).

Reasoning behind dropping the soft stuff (from most to least important):

#1: Hardware holds its value. Software has negligible resale value. By contrast, I bought a K2000R 4 years ago and I could sell it right now for what I paid for it.

#2: Software is, in my experience, far less reliable than hardware. The reason I started going the hardware route was that most of my tunes relied on rewiring Reason's sampler into Cubase... but there were weeks at a time when that connection wasn't working for some reason. I was hamstrung. My s5000 has screwed up a couple of times but never anything that stopped me from working. Nothing, NOTHING is more frustrating than actually getting some time to work on tunes and instead spending it troubleshooting software.

#3: Worrying about CPU headroom is a drag. If you work all inside the computer, on every session there's going to be a point where you decide not to try out some musical idea because you're afraid it will pin the CPU meter. I was accustomed to that reality for a long time but when I examined it I found it a little horrifying - that the speed of my computer was having an influence on what ideas I was willing to try out. Driving a bunch of hardware boxes with MIDI, I never worry about that. Instead, I have to worry about not having enough mixer channels.

#4: I think it sounds better. Others may disagree, but anyway the sound is just a bonus, I would have switched if they sounded exactly the same.

 

[beezelbubba]

software.

#3: Worrying about CPU headroom is a drag. If you work all inside the computer, on every session there's going to be a point where you decide not to try out some musical idea because you're afraid it will pin the CPU meter. I was accustomed to that reality for a long time but when I examined it I found it a little horrifying - that the speed of my computer was having an influence on what ideas I was willing to try out.

I finally have a computer where that almost isn't a consideration anymore.