What freeware do you still consistently use?

[Zexila]

Synth1 is "superior" for me,because I have grown attatched to it and love it.

Glad we established that, all the best.

[metamorphosis]

Glaceverb
NastyDLA

[Vertion]

Generators:
Super-7
MinimogueVA
M-Phasewave
Phazac
Claw (Backs Vanguard/Plasticz)
Superwave P80
Art Pyrite
Charlatan
Arminator
Dexed
SPDP (Random Loop Selector)
Grace Sampler
Oberon (with unfilter in chain)

[kinwie]

Turned into a long argumenting discussion LOL

And oopps, I still use sforzando

[Auplant]

Voxengo and Full Bucket plugins

[dellboy]

EMU- Proteus fx vst ......sample playback player.

Its hard To believe that the truly great sounds that this vst gives out are based on just 64 meg of samples.

Those who were back there in the late 1980s when the original Proteus sound module was released will remember all the hype about EMU z-plane filters and how great this made everything sound. Well this little gem proves it is true for once. It is based on its elder brother the EMU Proteus X2 (later X3) and is well worth the space in any vst folder.

The main caveat is that it does not like 64 bit daws,or even bridging for that matter,so if any one has found a way to make it behave on windows 10 please let us know.

[dellboy]

All the little MDA instrument plugins.

MDA JX10

MDA Piano

MDA Electric Piano

MDA DX10

Still have them in my vst folder, even though I have far better paid for vsts.Very handy for sketching out ideas,take up no space,and hardly any cpu.

[sjm]

I use absolutely loads. Some favourites off the top of my head are:

• GGate: Takes about 2 seconds to set up and does the job
• Ambience: I like this for epic reverbs that are for effect. I don't use this for room-like reverbs
• BlueCat FreqAnalyst: You want some kind of spectrum analyzer, and this one is pretty great and free
• Synth1: Really quick to dial in most basic sounds.
• AraldFX StormGate1: The interface is a bit iffy, but it gets the job done
• Bionic Delay: Best delay of its type and relatively recently updated
• VOS stuff: sounds great, don't care that it's just 32-bit
• HG Fortune stuff, though I bought a fair number of his synths too
• CA-2A: I have a number of emus and I sometimes pick this one
• dblue.TapeStop: I own Glitch 2, but sometimes you just want this effect on its own
• Code Red Free: Got this recommended as a vintage style EQ and ended up using it on a lot of stuff since then

I did a massive weeding out of freeware a few years ago. It's true that there's a lot of crud out there, but that applies to paid stuff as well TBH. I'm sure there's more free stuff I haven't thought of that I use pretty often.

I don't get the attitude "I wouldn't ever use free stuff". Particularly when it comes to utility plugins, there's no reason to pay money for something simple you can get for free. And some of the quirkier free plugins don't have payware equivalents. Delay Lama obviously comes to mind (admittedly a bit of an outlier), though it's obviously not the only one.

[ENV1]

It's true that there's a lot of crud out there, but that applies to paid stuff as well TBH.

Of course it does.

After all a pricetag doesnt make a product good, nor does the lack of one make a product bad.

(Some seem to believe that but thats just not the case.)

I don't get the attitude "I wouldn't ever use free stuff".

Yeah, thats pretty dumb hard to comprehend. Its like saying 'I wouldnt ever eat a free meal'. (Why the hell not?) I mean if someone says 'I wont use this because its bad', sure, that makes sense. But to say 'I wont use it because it doesnt involve the transfer of money to the creator', well, thats just gaga. After all price says nothing about quality, but only quality says something about quality.


Anyway, to answer the actual question: Im using lots of freeware. Too much to list it all off the top of my head. The only important criteria to me are stability and usefulness, so as long as a plugin doesnt keep crashing my sessions and sounds good im grateful for the free treat and the plugin is more than welcome.

(BTW i also couldnt care less if a plugin were 32bit if i ran a 64bit OS. Wouldnt matter to me at all because what difference does it make as long as it works properly and sounds good. And even though ive been known to pimp up a UI or two myself i would also rather use the hosts generic UI than pass on a good plugin only because it doesnt look 'fancy' enough. As long as a plugin is stable and i find it useful, i will use it.)

[kinwie]

(BTW i also couldnt care less if a plugin were 32bit if i ran a 64bit OS. Wouldnt matter to me at all because what difference does it make as long as it works properly and sounds good. And even though ive been known to pimp up a UI or two myself i would also rather use the hosts generic UI than pass on a good plugin only because it doesnt look 'fancy' enough. As long as a plugin is stable and i find it useful, i will use it.)

Well said!

[chk071]

(BTW i also couldnt care less if a plugin were 32bit if i ran a 64bit OS. Wouldnt matter to me at all because what difference does it make as long as it works properly and sounds good.

You don't run a 64-bit only DAW without internal bridge, do you? And bridging does produce issues. So, yes, it does matter, unless you run a 32-bit and 64-bit DAW side by side, and have to switch the whole time, to work on projects.

[wagtunes]

It's true that there's a lot of crud out there, but that applies to paid stuff as well TBH.

Of course it does.

After all a pricetag doesnt make a product good, nor does the lack of one make a product bad.

(Some seem to believe that but thats just not the case.)

I don't get the attitude "I wouldn't ever use free stuff".

Yeah, thats pretty dumb hard to comprehend. Its like saying 'I wouldnt ever eat a free meal'. (Why the hell not?) I mean if someone says 'I wont use this because its bad', sure, that makes sense. But to say 'I wont use it because it doesnt involve the transfer of money to the creator', well, thats just gaga. After all price says nothing about quality, but only quality says something about quality.


Anyway, to answer the actual question: Im using lots of freeware. Too much to list it all off the top of my head. The only important criteria to me are stability and usefulness, so as long as a plugin doesnt keep crashing my sessions and sounds good im grateful for the free treat and the plugin is more than welcome.

(BTW i also couldnt care less if a plugin were 32bit if i ran a 64bit OS. Wouldnt matter to me at all because what difference does it make as long as it works properly and sounds good. And even though ive been known to pimp up a UI or two myself i would also rather use the hosts generic UI than pass on a good plugin only because it doesnt look 'fancy' enough. As long as a plugin is stable and i find it useful, i will use it.)

I want to address this because I think it's important.

When I first got into PC recording, after selling my analog studio, the first thing I did was go to the KVR database and download every free synth I could get my hands on. I didn't even know about paid synths or what they sounded like.

And at first, these were good enough for me. Some (the HG Fortune stuff) actually sounded really cool.

But then I stumbled onto my first paid synth. It was U-he's ACE. I demo'd it and was blown away by the sound. It wasn't thin and dull like most of those Synthedit things.

And that's how it began.

Now I'm not saying that every free synth sounds thin and dull. There are a few that I think sound excellent, like Sonigen Modular, Synth1, Scroo (nothing sounds like it) and a few others.

But for the most part, I have found that there is a reason most of these synths are free. They just don't sound all that great. Not in comparison to something like ACE or Diva. The filters are weak. That's the area where most free synths suffer the most. Yes, there are exceptions. But not a lot of them.

So yeah, you pretty much get what you pay for when it comes to free stuff. You have to wade through a lot of meh stuff to find the gold.

Conversely, I have found very few paid synths that I really thought sounded bad. In fact, almost all the paid synths that I didn't buy was simply because the GUIs were train wreck. That is definitely one area where a lot of paid synths have some major problems.

And the reason I don't use a lot of free stuff often, even the few free things I've kept, is because the top of the line paid for stuff that I have is just better. Yeah, I like Sonigen Modular. But Softube Modular sounds better. So while I used to use Sonigen Modular a lot, I hardly touch it anymore.

Having said all this, there is enough quality free stuff out there that you can put together an excellent sounding song without spending a dime outside of your DAW. And even there you can probably get a decent DAW for free as well.

Not all free stuff is junk. But a lot of it is. Not everybody is HG Fortune. And the only reason I stopped using his synths is because they don't play nicely with my DAW even with bridging. I miss his stuff. It was unique. I wish somebody would make a 64 bit Altair 4 or a WoF.

[layzer]

with so much great free stuff out there, the thread title should be "what payware do you still consistently use?"

M1
WS
RMiV
Surge
CRX4

and thats about it.

[ENV1]

You don't run a 64-bit only DAW without internal bridge, do you? And bridging does produce issues. So, yes, it does matter, unless you run a 32-bit and 64-bit DAW side by side, and have to switch the whole time, to work on projects.

Im on 32bit.

And i said 'as long as it works properly', i.e. it wouldnt matter to me as long as there are no problems.

(I said that because ive read it so often here that some people dont use 32bit plugins as a matter of principle, thereby deliberately depriving themselves of even those plugins that might run without any trouble. And thats what i mean i wouldnt do, i would always at least check whether or not there ARE problems and if there arent any then i certainly wouldnt care what the plugins bitness is. (I mean why should i, the sound is the same so why deprive myself of a good tool?))

[kinwie]

with so much great free stuff out there, the thread title should be "what payware do you still consistently use?"

M1
WS
RMiV
Surge
CRX4

and thats about it.

Hahaha, LOL
my answer is : Toxic Biohazard