I'm motivated in opening this discussion by the rating of this synth here at kvr, noticng that the last review for Tera has been written in 2006

I remember in the past time some elogious comments about it versatiliy, but i'm curious to know if it present rating still reflects it qualities honestly !

"its"
Well, nothing really compares to it. It's powerful. Can't really replace it if you use all its features.

+1
IMHO TERA and especially CUBE are "advanced" synths.
Require much time to master, but nothing really compare to them.

+2

You can grab Tera 2 on Market Place forum

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=4861991#486199 1

well, i'm not such busy, i'm mainly concerned to know if it would be worth the price as an addition in my arsenal

i own komplete 6, AAS modelling collection (including chromaphone), YT independence pro, diva, poly-ana, imposcar, alchemy, omnisphere, stylus RMX,EZ and superior drummer, moddart pianoteq, gladiator 2 and all the synths and instruments included in Logic pro


I cannot pretend to have seriously handled all of these, beeing more a tweaker than a preset freak,...by far !

but i'm still intersted in synthesis tech that might not be covered by what i already have

Have you checked out?:
http://www.virsyn.de/en/E_Products/E_TERA/e_tera.html
It's a good overview.
TERA can be very time-demanding, but IMHO is also very rewarding.
Check out the demo here:
http://www.virsyn.de/en/E_Demo/E_TERADemo/e_terademo.html
Cheers

Tera is not an easy synth to program unless you've got a good idea of what you are doing. It's not a "safe" synth either, it's sound can get really extreme quickly. It is also not a vintage analog modelling synth and sometimes sounds very digital, though I do believe iit can generate some really good analog tones.

It has a really solid bass end though. The presets I did not find all that good. As usual try the demo. I find it an attractive but expensive synth which I will probably own one day.

And the drums are HUGELY punchy

It's powerful but more of a jack of all trades rather than a master of any particular one. These days the VA aspect is weak compared to the likes of many modern plugins, and the FM and wavetable aspects are also covered better by more dedicated synths, although for some of the more exotic synthesis types such as spectrum and formant synthesis it's still pretty much on its own. The interface is rather frustrating - I don't really like the somewhat hidden models for example - would rather it was possible to just select them directly than have to access them via a preset or creating a new bank. I do like the layers - better implemented than in Synthix for example - and often when people complain about the presets being weak forget to try them with layers turned on in combo mode. The filters have good resonance and sweep well but are rather less juicy than in some more modern synths like Ace or Diva (but are still better than many).

The main problem by far though is the sad lack of engagement by the developer - he seems to have just lost interest in any of his synths which is a pity because Poseidon is one of my top favourites and Cube 2 is also really brilliant (eg a lot of stuff people rave about in Iris was already in Cube and Poseidon but could be better implemented). So zero updates for some time and no road map about a future. He was good enough to send me updated installers though for OS-X Lion as the old ones on my CD's would not even run (shows how old they are)

That you for the detailed and highly relevant answers, much appreciated



...the bright side of kvr !

I think so- it's an amazingly capable synth. It's still at the top of my desert island list along with Absynth and Reaktor. YMMV...

ew

It may not be as adept at making analog sounds as some of the newer synths (read Diva)... but I think it sounds great and a big plus imo is that it hardly needs any cpu at all on today's multi core computers. As ew said, it's amazingly capable. I would definitely check it out and if you can't afford it new then keep an eye out in the marketplace.

I downloaded the demo a few years ago and found it interesting, I especially like how you can specify altered chords in the sequencer. That said, the demo doesn't work properly on my XP SP# machine anymore--graphics rendering issues--and it seems to be abadonware.

I owned Tera 2 for a few years, back when it was one of the top synths. My studio was then broken into and everything stolen, including Tera 2. I didn't replace it.

Yes, I have missed it on occasion. ...On occasion. And not that much. But I do once in a while check back to see if they've discounted it deeply. They haven't. :)

I'd buy it again, if it were $100.

It's got, IMO, a very additive sound... kind of on the PPG spectrum in some cases (which is great). I didn't find the VA sound particularly compelling: the filter is relatively weak. (I owned a Yamaha EX5 at the time, which I preferred.) But for glassy sounds, bells, and raspy metallic tones, it's quite a good tool. I also didn't use it for "evolving pads," preferring Atmosphere and the EX5 at the time.

Still, it's neat, and there's a lot to fool around with, and I really cut my teeth on Tera 2 for learning patch-editing, for which it was quite good (in hindsight: perhaps a little too complex for one's first semi-modular).


Today? I would point you to Omnisphere or Reaktor or even Alchemy (which I don't even own) or the myriad modern semi-modulars out there. Or Largo, even, which does the kinds of sounds Tera did, but better.