looking for a multitimbral softsynth...

VST, AU, AAX, CLAP, etc. Plugin Virtual Instruments Discussion
RELATED
PRODUCTS

Post

the mighty vaz modular

http://www.software-technology.com/

actually, i believe the whole vaz line is multi-timbral

Post

juffi wrote:Try 16 instances of Albino 2 and look your CPU Usage and RAM Usage (!) growing. I could buy more ram and CPU, but why? If you could load 1 instance with multitimbrality i would have more headroom of resources.
It's not so much the instance that takes CPU (well of course some), but mainly how many notes and stuff you're playing.. You think a multitimbral synth consumes the same amount of CPU regardless of using one channel or 16, or one note as opposed to a chord of 30 notes?

EDIT:

Ok, I did this test with Superwave P8:

1 instance playing 8 notes at once: 16% CPU

8 instances playing 1 note each: 20% CPU

RAM on the other hand, is another story (20MB vs 50MB).. But the Superwave isn't multitimbral, so I'll have to test it later.. :)
Last edited by fred-hal on Mon May 22, 2006 5:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Post

Uhm, there are some plugs which take 100 mb and more per instance. Another thing is, now you want to freeze a plugin in a sequencer. I have Cubase SX. Now how do i freeze 16 instances with 1 mouseclick? As it would be multitimbral , i would be able to.

Post

Well, ok.. multitimbrality does have some benefits if you're low on RAM I suppose, or wish to freeze 16 parts down to one audiotrack.. Point taken.. ;)

Post

juffi wrote:Uhm, there are some plugs which take 100 mb and more per instance. Another thing is, now you want to freeze a plugin in a sequencer. I have Cubase SX. Now how do i freeze 16 instances with 1 mouseclick? As it would be multitimbral , i would be able to.
You use Chainer to put all the instances and use Chainer as one VST. One mouse-click to freeze many non-multi-timbral synths.

I haven't actually tried it, so I'm not sure how RAM/CPU would end up.

Features:
* VST(i) and ASIO host.
* Standalone application and VST(i) plugin.
* Turns your PC into:
o Realtime multi-effect device.
o Multi-timbral sound generator.
* Streams the ASIO/VST input signal through up to 10 chains of VST effects.
* Several VST instruments playable simultaneously.
* VST instruments playable on different MIDI channels.
* 100 slots for VST(i) plugins per instance of Chainer.
* Chainer and VST plugin parameters controllable through MIDI control change messages and VST automation.
* Creates 16/24/32bit multi-samples from your VST instruments (WAV, SF2).
* Loads/saves Chainer preset files for fast access to your complex effect and instrument presets.
* Wet, dry, panning and transpose parameters per slot.
* Volume, panning, routing and MIDI channel parameters per channel.
* No clicks during volume and panning changes (volume ramping).
* FXP/FXB import/export with browse functionality:
o Loads preset files directly without closing the open dialog.
o Loads single presets from FXB files.
o Opens the VST plugin belonging to the preset file automatically.
* Copy/paste for plugin presets.
* Captures the sound output to a 16/24/32bit stereo WAV file.
* PC keyboard usable as virtual midi keyboard.
* Random function for VST plugin parameters.

Post

If you already have energyXT then this would be easy. Just use the included MIDI channel filter plugin to split incoming MIDI, and route them to each instance.

With its modular nature, you can just save this setup as a patch, and load them inside another host (or inside itself). It should now behave like a multitrimbal synth. :)

Post

eXT!!
My other host is Bruce Forsyth

Post

Delta3 by LinPlug is multitimbral.
and i like it very much.
resistors are futile you will be simulated
Soundcloud
T4M

Post

Actually multitimbrality has a lot of advantages, not only save VST-Slots. Even if i have infinite amount of vst-slots, there is one thing to be considered: as long a VST is multitimbral , and even better, has a gui that can be considered as a Workstation, it would be cool as anything. Best example is Tera3.

A workstation is very helpful: you fire it up , you can work very quick as you have all synthesis in one (lets say analog, wavetable or spectrum, sampling), you often have many presets to choose from and when you have an idea, it works like charm. Now try to open 16 instances of a monotimbral synth and look at your screen. :-o

Now lets have a look, how many VA Workstation do we have? Not many. There is Tera3, there is Hypersonic, there is D'cota. D'cota was quite nice, but too expensive at first.

So every VA could have a workstation option. But they havent. It would be so easy: a single mode and a multi mode.

I dont get it why nearly every VA is monotimbral. Or why there are nearly no Workstations like Tera between 100 and 200 Euro.

Post

Also Steinberg's Hypersonic is multitimbral instrument ..
Image

Post

juffi wrote:Actually multitimbrality has a lot of advantages, not only save VST-Slots. Even if i have infinite amount of vst-slots, there is one thing to be considered: as long a VST is multitimbral , and even better, has a gui that can be considered as a Workstation, it would be cool as anything. Best example is Tera3.

A workstation is very helpful: you fire it up , you can work very quick as you have all synthesis in one (lets say analog, wavetable or spectrum, sampling), you often have many presets to choose from and when you have an idea, it works like charm. Now try to open 16 instances of a monotimbral synth and look at your screen. :-o

Now lets have a look, how many VA Workstation do we have? Not many. There is Tera3, there is Hypersonic, there is D'cota. D'cota was quite nice, but too expensive at first.

So every VA could have a workstation option. But they havent. It would be so easy: a single mode and a multi mode.

I dont get it why nearly every VA is monotimbral. Or why there are nearly no Workstations like Tera between 100 and 200 Euro.

There are some drawbacks to a mult-timbral synth.

Suppose you got 2 channels of your multi-timbral synth playing and you need to freeze one or two of them to play a third?

How do you organize your tracks and route them to the synth?

What do you do if you want to put a vst or hardware effect on one channel?

I would say the drawbacks outweigh the advantages.

Post

The whole idea, for me, to use a multitimbral synth is so I don't have to freeze anything. In fact, with sfz, VSC and Hyper Canvas loaded, I never have had to bounce anything and I have a lot of sounds to work with. When I want to add an effect to something, I just bounce it to audio when the song's completed.
Mizutaphile.

Post

Oh yeah, and if you REALLY need to freeze a track, you can solo the track, bounce it to audio, then mute the track and you'll be fine. I did that with my Proteus X, which has been the only multitimbral synth I've run into that's forced me to do that, and I've played with most of them except Hypersonic.
Mizutaphile.

Post

pdxindy wrote:
juffi wrote:Actually multitimbrality has a lot of advantages, not only save VST-Slots. Even if i have infinite amount of vst-slots, there is one thing to be considered: as long a VST is multitimbral , and even better, has a gui that can be considered as a Workstation, it would be cool as anything. Best example is Tera3.

A workstation is very helpful: you fire it up , you can work very quick as you have all synthesis in one (lets say analog, wavetable or spectrum, sampling), you often have many presets to choose from and when you have an idea, it works like charm. Now try to open 16 instances of a monotimbral synth and look at your screen. :-o

Now lets have a look, how many VA Workstation do we have? Not many. There is Tera3, there is Hypersonic, there is D'cota. D'cota was quite nice, but too expensive at first.

So every VA could have a workstation option. But they havent. It would be so easy: a single mode and a multi mode.

I dont get it why nearly every VA is monotimbral. Or why there are nearly no Workstations like Tera between 100 and 200 Euro.

There are some drawbacks to a mult-timbral synth.

Suppose you got 2 channels of your multi-timbral synth playing and you need to freeze one or two of them to play a third?

How do you organize your tracks and route them to the synth?

What do you do if you want to put a vst or hardware effect on one channel?

I would say the drawbacks outweigh the advantages.
For this reason i said: it should have single mode and multi mode. For those who are working in that monotimbral way, there is single mode. For those who want to work the workstation mode, there is multi mode.

EmulatorX has this sort of mode switching, unfortunatley it is a sampler/sample player only.

A perfect candidate would be Chronox3, as it has multiple synthesis. Quite interesting that DeltaIII had multitimbrality, and all following synths not.

I forgot to mention these here: ProteusX, Sonik Synth2, SampleTank 2. All of them are 16 way multitimbral. Quite "funny", many multitimbral synths are sample-based. D'cota, Tera3 and Hypersonic2 are hybrid.

I saw Tera3 for 222 $ at Audiomidi. Pretty good price i think.
Last edited by juffi on Thu Jul 06, 2006 8:20 am, edited 1 time in total.

Post

juffi wrote:
For this reason i said: it should have single mode and multi mode. For those who are working in that monotimbral way, there is single mode. For those who want to work the workstation mode, there is multi mode.

EmulatorX has this sort of mode switching, unfortunatley it is a sampler/sample player only.

A perfect candidate would be Chronox3, as it has multiple synthesis. Quite interesting that DeltaIII had multitimbrality, and all following synths not.

You said you didn't understand why more synths aren't multitimbral and i offered some reasons... Multiple instances is so easy that multitimbral capability is simply not a feature that interests me and in fact I would rather a couple of my synths not have it for simplicity...

Kontakt is a multitimbral workstation and that is part of the reason i prefer a monotimbral synth... ease of use and straightforward GUI. My host is the workstation. A multitimbral synth is duplicating functionality I prefer to keep in the host.

I would not like it if Zebra2 added more GUI complexity in order to be multitimbral. I want it to stay monotimbral as it is.

Post Reply

Return to “Instruments”