Synths you regret buying

[Ed A.]

Ok, but for someone like Ed A.: "I think it has a horrific GUI, the sound is quite boring IMO"

...don't buy the full version if you demo'ed it.

Oh yeah, absolutely. I'll never in a million years understand how somebody can demo something, hate it and buy it anyway.

Because I grew to hate it as I used it. My contempt for it wasn't apparent in the beginning. You make it sound like my hobby is wasting money.

[Ed A.]

For all of these you regret buying, was there a demo version?

Come to think of it, I don't remember there being a demo early on when I bought it.

You could have the same problem with a hardware synth. You can sit in a music store for a couple hours playing a synth, buy it, bring it home and find that it really wasn't very good when you use it for a month.
That's the major reason people sell things on the used market.

[Cinebient]

I begin to regret buying P900 since it has so much potential but sadly it is abandoned yet.
No secret i love the sound and GUI as well.
That‘s the thing. I like it much more than Repro or The Legend and all other analog/vintage synths but it has some nasty bugs and i‘m not sure when an OS update will break it finally.
Also i would love to have a windows and iOS version (it was planned once) if i decide to leave macOS one day.
So i regret that i bought it and love it so much and didn‘t like the sound of my other synths now anymore

[Halonmusic]

I begin to regret buying P900 since it has so much potential but sadly it is abandoned yet.
No secret i love the sound and GUI as well.
That‘s the thing. I like it much more than Repro or The Legend and all other analog/vintage synths but it has some nasty bugs and i‘m not sure when an OS update will break it finally.
Also i would love to have a windows and iOS version (it was planned once) if i decide to leave macOS one day.
So i regret that i bought it and love it so much and didn‘t like the sound of my other synths now anymore

He stopped developing P900? I want that for windows

[Cinebient]

I begin to regret buying P900 since it has so much potential but sadly it is abandoned yet.
No secret i love the sound and GUI as well.
That‘s the thing. I like it much more than Repro or The Legend and all other analog/vintage synths but it has some nasty bugs and i‘m not sure when an OS update will break it finally.
Also i would love to have a windows and iOS version (it was planned once) if i decide to leave macOS one day.
So i regret that i bought it and love it so much and didn‘t like the sound of my other synths now anymore

He stopped developing P900? I want that for windows

Not exactly but from what he said here and after i send some e-mails i wouldn´t wait for updates and a windows (or iOS) version anytime soon.
He has much to do in his real-time job (which i can understand) and i guess P900 wasn´t such a big success form a financial point as great as it sounds.
There are some really bad bugs like extreme loud bursts which seems to get not solved as well and sometimes it crash and kills the whole audio in Logic until i reload the synth again.
Normally i would rant about such bugs but P900 sound so good for me that i even can live with it so far but i always should remember that i never should use it without a limiter behind it.
Not that other synths are not great. But for me (and that might be of course just my flavor) it sounds so much better than most other synths and even a lot hardware that it was almost to good to be true.
There was a sampler module planned and some other things and i think this won´t happen as well sadly.
Beside Logic this is indeed THE thing which let me stay with macOS.
So i would say this will stay like it is. Love it or leave it.
But not the first time a single independent developer makes a great thing which is better (for me) than all stuff from the famous brands but fly under the radar and gets forgotten one day.
I mean i like N.I., U-he and other stuff but P900 is just better for me and i wish i could get this from famous brands since i can hope for a better future there. It´s kind of what i would expect from a U-he Berlin Modular which also will never exist i think....at least not in the next 10 years or so.
At least maybe it´s nice to have a synth not much people else have or use

[Niowiad]

Not sure how it was going to be a financial success being relatively undermarketed and available on Mac only

Anyone has an idea of how the market is split between VST, AU and AAX?
Probably only plugin developers know.

Obviously I'd love to have it on Windows

[Cinebient]

Not sure how it was going to be a financial success being relatively undermarketed and available on Mac only

Anyone has an idea of how the market is split between VST, AU and AAX?
Probably only plugin developers know.

Obviously I'd love to have it on Windows

I think it was more a love child and since it was planned for iOS as well and use Apple´s metal (and it works great...best and smooth GUI for a modular ever for me) a windows port might be a lot work maybe. Also a single unknown developer can´t compete with bigger brands.
Personally i would prefer it maybe even on iOS these days with multi-touch.
Maybe Apple could buy the developer
In a perfect world i could get all my tools across all platforms but of course i have to accept that some tools stay like they are and/or are just available on a specific platform. So i start to see them like versatile hardware tools.
There are other tools which i only have on iOS and like them more than everything available for windows or mac. That´s how things are if you are an independent developer.
That´s also the bad side of more famous brands. They always have to go save and don´t do much unique things. It´s more about just making money and spit out the next similar looking and sounding synth/FX.
And often (not always) i can achieve similar results with simpler and cheaper tools at the end with more fun as well.

[nichttuntun]

Karma FX Synth.
Very rarely use it, unable to sell it.

Haha, man...it´s so cheap, you want to resell? For 5 dollars or what.

By the way this thing is really good and the dev will bring an update this year he is already working on that. The FM will be improved and it will have new features. This thing is still improved after so many years. Thats totally awesome. Future updates will be free! Come on, give it a chance

[nichttuntun]

PPG Wave Generator. I think it has a horrific GUI, the sound is quite boring IMO, and PPG doesn't allow selling the license so I'm stuck with it.

Hi,
do you program this thing? I couldn´t find a boring sound (beside the most presets). It shines when programming that thing (like all synth - at least for me).

[nichttuntun]

deleted due to all the negativity in it

[wagtunes]

Ok, but for someone like Ed A.: "I think it has a horrific GUI, the sound is quite boring IMO"

...don't buy the full version if you demo'ed it.

Oh yeah, absolutely. I'll never in a million years understand how somebody can demo something, hate it and buy it anyway.

Because I grew to hate it as I used it. My contempt for it wasn't apparent in the beginning. You make it sound like my hobby is wasting money.

So again, please read what I said. I said demo it and hate it and buy it. Not demo it, like and then grow to hate it. They are not the same thing.

[Michael L]

To reduce regrets, I wonder if it would be good to share methods for demoing synths -- or if everyone is totally different in that area, too?
I like to start with a preset and modify it, to see if its easy to playfully explore ways the sounds can change toward chaos and back into something nice and tonal. I also like to imagine a sound and see how I can make it. If I can do that, then a synth is "my instrument"

[wagtunes]

To reduce regrets, I wonder if it would be good to share methods for demoing synths -- or if everyone is totally different in that area, too?
I like to start with a preset and modify it, to see if its easy to playfully explore ways the sounds can change toward chaos and back into something nice and tonal. I also like to imagine a sound and see how I can make it. If I can do that, then a synth is "my instrument"

Michael, I think everybody is totally different as you suggested. You and I are polar opposites. For me, if the synth has a decent size GUI and doesn't crash, I'm fine. As long as it doesn't sound thin as paper and have filters that barely do anything, I'll probably buy it.

IOW, I'm not very picky.

[nichttuntun]

To reduce regrets, I wonder if it would be good to share methods for demoing synths -- or if everyone is totally different in that area, too?
I like to start with a preset and modify it, to see if its easy to playfully explore ways the sounds can change toward chaos and back into something nice and tonal. I also like to imagine a sound and see how I can make it. If I can do that, then a synth is "my instrument"

I make a simple drone with a standard waveform like sine, pulse, saw, program the DAW for that so that I haven´t to press down the sustain pedal all the time. Then I check the filter types one by one with subtle LFO-sweeps. And then I simply go over each and every knob, sliders, parameters and modulation option I can find. Simple as that

[voidhead23]

To reduce regrets, I wonder if it would be good to share methods for demoing synths -- or if everyone is totally different in that area, too?

My one suggestion: don't buy anything during periods of inactivity. If you're in the swing of making music, and there's something you hear that would sound great in what you're making, buy it. If you're still sorting out what your next direction or sound is going to be and you're still demo'ing your own process...that's a terrible time to buy anything. That's how i ended up with most of my synth plugins.