Jump to content

What's a good, relatively cheap Analogue Synth simulating plugin?


Recommended Posts

Sorry if this is the incorrect section for these sorts of questions, it's not exactly an error or problem so I didn't figure it'd fit in the Help forums.

For a while now, I have been using the plugins that came with Pro Tools 8 when I had purchased the DAW a few years ago, for starters they worked fine and what's more were free (on top of the limitations to RTAS plugins since Pro Tools lacks compatibility with VST plugins, which are pretty much the only format free plugins come in) but I'm starting to desire some more powerful/better sounding plugins. After using the two synths that came with the program for a while (Vacuum and Xpand!2, the first an analogue simulating plugin the second a standard soft synth that runs on soundbanks) I've come to like the control over the sound, process of creating the sound and just general sound of the analogue modeling plugin.

So, does anyone know any good sounding relatively cheap analogue synth plugins?

I have a limited budget, so preferable below or around $300

I've been considering Native Instrument's Massive, which also is desirable because of it's Dubstep capabilities.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A mod is gonna move this to the Production section, welcome to ocr. :)

If you're looking at Massive, you might as well get all of Komplete, it's more expensive, but you get Massive, FM8 and Absynth (and a lot of other instruments and effects, incl Reaktor where you can build whatever synths you want). Dunno how close to an actual analog sound you can get (or what the difference is, really, besides a vague notion of a "warmer" sound), but Massive is a pretty good choice for a synth overall.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't think Massive is an analog synth sim. :P

Also, you may or may not misunderstand synths (I'm just judging from your post), so I'm going to clear this up just in case.

A synthesizer makes sounds.

An analog synth uses wires and electricity signals and all that cool stuff. It's hardware.

A digital synth uses values and programming. (i.e. software)

An analog synth simulator simulates hardware analog synths and is for people who don't like the sound of digital (really it's not that much of a difference) synthesizers. Massive is not analog sim (at least, Native Instruments doesn't say that anywhere).

If you just want a synth to make sounds this is so worth it. It's ridiculously simple to make complex sounds, but it doesn't sacrifice uber control ability.

Also, Rozovian, you're really stretching the Komplete thing. It's one thing to recommend it to a guy who wants Kontakt (only $100 more), but for a guy who wants Massive (and is on a $300 budget) it's not really practical advice to say he should pay more than double the price of Massive. He wants a synthesizer, not a musical smorgasbord.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Also, Rozovian, you're really stretching the Komplete thing. It's one thing to recommend it to a guy who wants Kontakt (only $100 more), but for a guy who wants Massive (and is on a $300 budget) it's not really practical advice to say he should pay more than double the price of Massive. He wants a synthesizer, not a musical smorgasbord.

K then.

Wherewolf, get Reaktor. A bit of a learning curve, but it does everything. :tomatoface:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't think Massive is an analog synth sim. :P

Also, you may or may not misunderstand synths (I'm just judging from your post), so I'm going to clear this up just in case.

A synthesizer makes sounds.

An analog synth uses wires and electricity signals and all that cool stuff. It's hardware.

A digital synth uses values and programming. (i.e. software)

An analog synth simulator simulates hardware analog synths and is for people who don't like the sound of digital (really it's not that much of a difference) synthesizers. Massive is not analog sim (at least, Native Instruments doesn't say that anywhere).

If you just want a synth to make sounds this is so worth it. It's ridiculously simple to make complex sounds, but it doesn't sacrifice uber control ability.

Also, Rozovian, you're really stretching the Komplete thing. It's one thing to recommend it to a guy who wants Kontakt (only $100 more), but for a guy who wants Massive (and is on a $300 budget) it's not really practical advice to say he should pay more than double the price of Massive. He wants a synthesizer, not a musical smorgasbord.

Thanks for clearing that up, I was a bit confused exactly how to state that - I know synthesizers create sound, so that pretty much sums up any sort of virtual instrument plugin, but as to how to distinguish between something that provides the interface of like say a Moog synthesizer that allows you to tweak the sound from scratch from something like a Virtual Orchestra which instead is more limited in the parameters that you can adjust.

----BTW----

Yes, I get it - it shows up as anal on the front page - it's funny, but it's not that funny that it needs restating over and over again.

Also I'm running Windows 7 (probably should've mentioned this earlier)

Seems Zebra doesn't come in RTAS for windows unfortunately

Also sorry for posting in the wrong section, I don't know how I missed the production forums......

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks for clearing that up, I was a bit confused exactly how to state that - I know synthesizers create sound, so that pretty much sums up any sort of virtual instrument plugin, but as to how to distinguish between something that provides the interface of like say a Moog synthesizer that allows you to tweak the sound from scratch from something like a Virtual Orchestra which instead is more limited in the parameters that you can adjust.

Synthesizers and samplers are two totally different things.

A virtual orchestra is (almost always) not a synthesizer. It is a sampler, or to be more accurate, it comes with one to use it (the VST/RTAS/AU is the sampler). Let's use this as an example.

A sampler takes MIDI input and returns audio from recordings of notes, or "samples". When you get a sample library, you will get a huge amount of samples (individual wav files for every note and articulations for more in depth ones) and "patches". The patches are what you open in the sampler, and it tells the sampler how to behave and what samples to play back. These samplers are really in depth nowadays, with keyswitching so you can set the instrument to a different articulation. In other words, it switches the instruments into different modes. There are plug ins that are fusion of samples and synthesis, but I've never heard of any good virtual orchestras that were synthesized completely.

That symphonic orchestra (i linked earlier) is a sample library and comes bundled with the PLAY sampler, which I believe East West developed so they would have their own to give with the libraries. They used to use Kompakt, which was a crippled (more old than crippled) version of Kontakt, which is believed by a huge lot to be the most powerful sampler out there (because it gives you all the controls you need to make your own sample libraries, and a whole lot of controls). I own this, and can say it lives up to the hype. B)

tl;dr Synthesizers do not sum up "any sort" of virtual instrument plugin. Acoustic instruments (usually) are in sample libraries, and synthesizers are, well, synthesizers. People sample synths, but that's just stupid unless it's the crazy cool synths you can find in Omnisphere, which is one of the sampler synth fusion plugins I mentioned.

EDIT: also if you really want the title on front page commotion to stop, just edit the title so the position of the word analogue is different.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm a huge fan of Ultra Analog by AAS. I was lucky to catch it when AudoMidi had it as one of their no brainer deals. It really does sound quite nice and has a very intuitive layout when compared to a real analog synth. Other than that, I'm a big Reason fan. Most of the time I'm using that or a hardware synth.

If you plan on spending a good bit of cash, though, you might as well plunk down for a real piece of hardware. A Dave Smith Instruments Mopho is $400 and it's totally worth it if you're wanting a nice mono synth. If you need poly, though, you're better off going with a plugin.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...