Hello,does anyone compared a Tc Finalizer to Izotope Ozone or to any other VST plugin like T-racks,waves,voxengo chain etc.wich one gives similar results/ emulation? if you are using a individual chain of plugins to achieve similar results,please post it below.
VST only ,please.

anyone has any idea?

TC Finalizer checkout the Sound on Sound magazine review :

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/mar00/articles/tcfinalizer.h tm
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1996_articles/dec96/tcfinali zer.html

As far as I can see the finalizer is not an easy piece of kit to use and more over users mess up their mixes,

I have no comparissons however, have you looked at and demoed any of the available mastering plugins around nowadays?

KVR DNR Collaboration has a multiband currently on sale @ $49 usually $129 http://www.teamdnr.net/mixcontrol/

Others to consider is waves, Slate Digital fgx, Sonalksis and the list goes on.

I don't use or like Izotope products but that's just me.

I do mainly electronic (not very good) music and use a combination of compressors across different channels, a mixture of console emus (Waves NLS, SkNote Strip/Bus, Slate Digitals VCC and Slates FGx.

As far as a finalizer comparisson Ive never used it, did tinker with the idea of one a decade ago and never bothered as I went more in the box and reduced synth hardware.

Best of luck

Addum : My suggeestion is if you are not a mastering engineer for the money you are spending, you can get some great deals and quality mstering done online nowadays....do consider leaving your mixes to be mastered by the pro's. You wont regret it.

Simply look at the VST plugin offerings of equivalent types of processors. You don't necessarily need an all-in-one plugin. There are enough that are more than fine replacements.


It's very simple to use, as straightforward as it gets. If the user doesn't understand the concept of compressor, expander, limiter, eq, etc., then that's their problem.

I really love the idea of having a all-in-one like the Tc Finalizer,because it saves a lot of time.i know it was used by famous artists like ATB in trance music in the 90's,the only vst that i know to have similar features is Izotope Ozone.unfortunately i don't have a finalizer to compare to Ozone.
i'ved tried other plugins like vintagewarmer, ive'd tried Waves linMb (C4 successor)it have a speacial feature that i love,sounds amazing well called "adaptive threshold"...

(from waves) ADAPTIVE THRESHOLDS AND DE-MASKING
When a soft sound and a loud sound happen at the same time, the loud
sound has some Masking effect over the softer sound. The research of
Masking, articulated the Upward spread Masking, where loud low frequency
sounds mask higher frequency sounds. The Linear MultiBand provides a way
for each band to be sensitive to the energy in its "Masker" band. When the
energy in the Masker band is high the band's threshold will rise to introduce
less attenuation and compensate for the masking, letting the sound in each
band come out as loud and as clear as possible. The Linear MultiBand is the
first processor to introduce this de-masking behavior

...this feature makes all the instruments and vocals to be clear,i couldn't found any similar plugin that does this.

can you share similar vst's that sounds amazing,i want to know what chains are you guys using?
i want to make my own mastering,and learn from the experience.

I don't think it saves much time, especially if you use a sane host that allows you to reorder plugins in the chain. What can save much time and frustration are processors that have a good amount of flexibility and quality. That said, you should invest a -lot- of time, regardless, if you still have much to learn.

It may sound annoying, but the truth is that before you even think of what processors to use, the most important thing you should know is to never use more than necessary and to start with a good sound, be it from the mic/recording location, a virtual instrument, or whatever. If you don't have that, everything just became 20 times harder, especially if your sound monitoring setup is not accurate as well. If you find yourself "fixing" things too often, that's a problem. Secondly, whoever tells you that "tools are not important" or any variation of that, if you listen to them, good luck to you.

It's impossible to write some document about what you should know so that you'll be able to mix and 'master' properly here and then include personal recommendations and expect that you'll know why I recommend what I recommend and how to use it and get the best from it. That's why threads like this are kind of frustrating. Not because of you, but because it's impossible for me to pass on experience I've gained for years. But I'm always willing to answer any specific question about what I use and how I use it. Important advice: be careful of "mastering engineers" in general, it's almost always a bunch of bullshit (yes, it is), and don't take anyone's compellingly written "rules" easily, never make up your mind before trying things yourself and even then don't hurry to think you've found a "rule" when it comes to mixing or finalizing a mix.

Without knowing anything about your workflow, budget or anything really, it's even harder to recommend stuff. I can say what I use: Algorithmix PEQ Blue and SplitComp, Klanghelm DC8C, Waves API 2500. I always check to see if any new plugin offers something better than these, and still nothing does as far as I'm concerned. Instead of using tens of redundant plugins, I'm satisfied with 4 extremely powerful, flexible and good sounding plugins. Someone who knows how to "master" (and I do it well and get paid for it when I do) doesn't have to have an army of processors. There's no "magic" either, just flexible, powerful tools that limit you as little as possible, that's the key.

I don't just use plugins, because without the suitable tools (which unfortunately are not all available as plugins), it's impossible to get the results I want. Again, anyone who repeats some variation of "the tool is not (as) important", don't think that everyone lives in the same bubble as you. I use PL-2 for its 100% "pumping"-free brick wall limiting (I'd use the plugin FG-X otherwise, but PL-2 sounds better), KSP8's compressors/expanders, multi-band "enhancers", EQs and de-esser, a tube preamp (HVTP2) for the unique frequency balancing and smoothness that only a real tube preamp can give, and some other preamps if needed, but in most cases I keep it as "clean" as possible.

It's important to learn every processor you use extensively. It's important to know how to use each properly, how to combine them properly, and how to fit them for the specific kind of audio source as well as possible. For example how much to let the compressor do the work and how much to let the limiter do the work, seemingly simple but in reality pretty complex and very important. As a note, my preference is to use very little or no compression on a final mix, just transparent limiting, but that depends on the mix so on my own mix it would work perfectly because I set it up for it, and someone else's mix may need some kind of compressor treatment to sound nicer.

What else? This post is too long. Finalizer? It's "decent", but not great at all, the plugins I mentioned have much better sound quality and versatility. That said, I don't use them, but other good plugins that are better for EQ and compression are DMG Audio's EQuality and Compassion.

My biased vote is for Specter.
I did it for myself, after all, no surprise it is the best for me