How many compressors is enough?

[ariston]

Is another compressor really going to change your music for the better? Or should you be focusing/spending your money on other things?

[TheKid]

Compressors don't change music, only the sound.
My suggestion: spend more time, not more money.
While I am only starting to scratch the surface of different compressors now after learning the fundamentals of compression, I'm convinced that a really good sound engineer can produce a variety of great sounding mixes with low budget plugins and a bad engineer will fail miserably even with perfect equipment. I started with the stock compressors of Ableton Live (the glue in v9 is so awesome) and Klanghelm's DC8C (very cool). Then came the NI Supercharger freebie which rocks hard on drums. Now I'd like to test an LA-A2 compressor which seems a lot simpler than the DC8C expert view. I'm on my way to achieve a good sound and I listened to my first stuff from time to time and hear the progress. Learning and experience helps me a lot. Way more than buying a shitload of plugins I can't use.
I would only purchase new stuff as soon as the current setup limits the sound I'd like to achieve. I also suffer from GAS. So be perfectly honest to yourself. That's what keeps me from buying a lot of stuff although I'd like to hit that buy now button so often.

[jrides]

4 more....
for the price of 1
http://www.ikmultimedia.com/trgb/

[Lotuzia]

Compressors don't change music, only the sound.

They can even destroy it

I'm no expert on compressors, but the small dozen I use give different results on critical signals, like voices or drums. If I were mainly a sound engineer, I would certainly collect more compressors. But I prefer to collect synths. And .... one compressor from time to time

I agree that spending time with the stuff you have is always a good idea. But if you think that you master more or less what you already have, and want something new, fresh well ..... why not

[Turello]

Ariston, TheKid and Lotuzia are almost right, some time ago I've rec an acoustic rock cover project, the sound was so good and perfect to me that I've put just a little\subtle EQ & limiter on master...

[Katelyn]

Honestly I don't see the point in having that many compressors. It seems that a lot of people are obsessed with compression even though it can only help so much in the production of a song.

Is another compressor really going to change your music for the better? Or should you be focusing/spending your money on other things?

I agree with this, if you have money try spending it on either a good instrument you want or even just save it and dedicate time to working on the music.

It isn't the tools you have, it's what you can do with them.

[Aiynzahev]

Personally I'd be inclined to sell one or two of those from your list and have presswork. It's very good and very versatile.

[hibidy]

What does this mean, "enough?"

[djscorb]

Don't forget that something special is coming soon from Tokyo Dawn Labs

Might render a Black Friday purchase a bit redundant!

Cheers

Scorb

[stardustmedia]

A couple of different flavors is way enough. If you still cannot make it sound good, another compressor will not solve your issue then.

So I'd go 4 different types
1 FET/VCA
1 VariMu
1 Optical
1 Limiter (not really another flavor )

[fese]

A couple of different flavors is way enough.

Not if your ambition is to test compressors .
For mixing, maybe.

So I'd go 4 different types
1 FET/VCA
1 VariMu
1 Optical
1 Limiter (not really another flavor )

FET and VCA are very different types imho, so you have five here unless you deduct the limiter
Then of course there's also the diode based compressor and the favorite of mine, the belief based compressor ("if I buy this compressor, I believe my mixes will improve significantly!")

[stardustmedia]

A couple of different flavors is way enough.

Not if your ambition is to test compressors .
For mixing, maybe.

So I'd go 4 different types
1 FET/VCA
1 VariMu
1 Optical
1 Limiter (not really another flavor )

FET and VCA are very different types imho, so you have five here unless you deduct the limiter
Then of course there's also the diode based compressor and the favorite of mine, the belief based compressor ("if I buy this compressor, I believe my mixes will improve significantly!")

True, FET and VCA are different. If I had to choose for only 4, I'd group them like this and then choose one between FET and VCA. But if you can afford 5, then go for one VCA and one FET

For testing, you need them ALL

[kenobi77]

At the OP, if I ask myself that question then a recent reply in another thread comes to my mind. In this thread someone claimed they couldn't really hear much difference between different emulated EQ's on offer, to which the reply was "If you can't hear the difference then you don't need to buy them". BTW is your question posed in relation to picking up something in the good Friday sales?

[Fritze]

There can be good reasons to want more or different stuff (What a sentence!)
What I mean by this is that sometimes you are looking for something that you can't put your finger on. You just know that you don't have it yet. Then something new comes along and bamm!!! There you have a big automatic grinn in your faces that you hardly can get rid of. I had this with Diva. For compressors I had a similar experience with DC8C2. Now Presswerk is taking shape and it can do things I like and want to add to my compression arsenal.
If you can moneywise I suggest to use the season and buy some rediculously low priced stuff today, black fryday...
I didn't do so and later wished to have done so. I'm interested in the IK sale right now...

[darsho]

you can get by fine just by using the standard compressor of your DAW.

The rest is just a matter of impulse control regarding your GAS.