Disappointed with KOMPLETE (??)

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

I think so too. NI's stuff is great quality, everything. Komplete would sheer slay me though. So much stuff, and i'd probably check out a mere 5 % of it, or so. But, that's a personal thing.

I'm thinking more about the separate engines, though. Even though they might present as edm in nature, someone with sound design chops could easily bend these synths to their will.

[chk071]

Sure. Actually, when i first tried Massive, i was quite surprised that it is THE wub wub machine for the respective genres. It's actually quite a deep synth, which rather lends itself to ambient genres, IMO. But, as you say, you can of course do anything with it.

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

Sure. Actually, when i first tried Massive, i was quite surprised that it is THE wub wub machine for the respective genres. It's actually quite a deep synth, which rather lends itself to ambient genres, IMO. But, as you say, you can of course do anything with it.

But I was also thinking about Razor, Rounds, and Form. And then there's Absynth, and all out-there Reaktor stuff. Massive seems quite 'pedestrian', in contrast

[3rdstone]

Grab the Xpand2 workstation while it’s free: http://store.dontcrack.com/product_info ... ts_id=2954

I agree, get Xpand to play around with the patches a bit. It's a very fun rompler. Also as suggested, take a look at Korg's own legacy collection. There are some beautiful instruments in there.

A few people said to explore Kontakt factory library but to me that entire library (maybe with a few exceptions) sounds quite bad and I have no idea why. Komplete on the other hand has better quality stuff but I can't be the judge of how much as I only own Kontakt and use it for 3rd party libraries. You can also go that route as there are very good libraries out there for Kontakt (kind of why most people end up buying Kontakt in the first place). I hope this helps

Hi sal,
Yes, I already own xpand/2 etc. because I own Pro Fools, so that base is covered.

I saw somewhere that the KORG stuff was functional for 30 days, so I downloaded the M1 and Wavestation trials.
I have to say that the people that prefer Wavestation over M1 are just plain ...umm... not hearing things the way that I do...(?)

I've spent the last few hours listening to the pres' of both, and must say that the M1 sounds 'authentic for it's time' while (a lot of) wavestation sounds 'fabricated, even cheap' by way of comparison.

Don't get me wrong, wavestation has some patches that don't sound that way, but on the whole, it's my opinion that M1 was more of a serious effort than wavestation ...

Call me crazy...
-Steve

[ghettosynth]

Grab the Xpand2 workstation while it’s free: http://store.dontcrack.com/product_info ... ts_id=2954

I agree, get Xpand to play around with the patches a bit. It's a very fun rompler. Also as suggested, take a look at Korg's own legacy collection. There are some beautiful instruments in there.

A few people said to explore Kontakt factory library but to me that entire library (maybe with a few exceptions) sounds quite bad and I have no idea why. Komplete on the other hand has better quality stuff but I can't be the judge of how much as I only own Kontakt and use it for 3rd party libraries. You can also go that route as there are very good libraries out there for Kontakt (kind of why most people end up buying Kontakt in the first place). I hope this helps

Hi sal,
Yes, I already own xpand/2 etc. because I own Pro Fools, so that base is covered.

I saw somewhere that the KORG stuff was functional for 30 days, so I downloaded the M1 and Wavestation trials.
I have to say that the people that prefer Wavestation over M1 are just plain ...umm... not hearing things the way that I do...(?)

Isn't that clear already given that you don't like Komplete?

Call my crazy...
-Steve

Wavestation is at least a somewhat interesting synthesizer. It sounds like you have some sort of unexplained attraction for the Korg rompler sound. There's nothing wrong with that, but you aren't going to convince other people that you have better taste in either synthesizer depth or sampling quality based on those observations.

[3rdstone]

Uh oh...

If you weren't watching, I have re-evaluated my stance on komplete, see my last few posts...

...and... I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything...just stating my opinion on what sounds better to me

[ghettosynth]

Uh oh...

If you weren't watching, I have re-evaluated my stance on komplete, see my last few posts...

Yes, but, you came into the thread with weak arguments about why you don't like it. You ought not be surprised that people aren't going to agree with you about sound. Your judgement strikes me as hasty.

...and... I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything...just stating my opinion on what sounds better to me

That's good because I don't think that you're going to succeed if you were. I'm trying to help you see what you like here.

[UltimateOutsider]

I am a heavy NI/Komplete user, and while I find Ultimate rather comprehensive, I do not think it's very easy/fast to audition the thousands of Komplete presets buried in the bundle. Komplete Kontrol was a huge step in the right direction (and I entered the game after Kore's heyday, so lack the frame of reference to compare), but it's nowhere near as fast to find and step through patches on KK as it is in, say Nexus2 or HALion Sonic. I understand it's a huge task for NI making it easy to do, considering that Komplete is a collection of multiple synths and samplers and libraries. I just find myself looking elsewhere when I need the kinds of sounds I think OP was looking for.

In terms of sounds available in Komplete Ultimate, regardless of how easy it is to locate them, two areas where I'd say the bundle falls short is in pro-level Symphonic instruments/choruses and multi-layered sounds (like you'd find in HALion, many Nexus libraries, and on many ROMplers of old).

[ghettosynth]

I am a heavy NI/Komplete user, and while I find Ultimate rather comprehensive, I do not think it's very easy/fast to audition the thousands of Komplete presets buried in the bundle. Komplete Kontrol was a huge step in the right direction (and I entered the game after Kore's heyday, so lack the frame of reference to compare), but it's nowhere near as fast to find and step through patches on KK as it is in, say Nexus2 or HALion Sonic. I understand it's a huge task for NI making it easy to do, considering that Komplete is a collection of multiple synths and samplers and libraries. I just find myself looking elsewhere when I need the kinds of sounds I think OP was looking for.

In terms of sounds available in Komplete Ultimate, regardless of how easy it is to locate them, two areas where I'd say the bundle falls short is in pro-level Symphonic instruments/choruses and multi-layered sounds (like you'd find in HALion, many Nexus libraries, and on many ROMplers of old).

Agreed, you kind of have to know what you're looking for. One thing that is pretty decent though is to just stick to a single VST or Reaktor ensemble when browsing patches. This speeds things up quite a bit.

[deastman]

I agree with others who suggest spending more time with the Kontakt libraries that you already have. I suspect that when some people say “factory library” (which is somewhat mediocre), they are actually referring to the huge number of high quality libraries that come with Komplete Ultimate. Between that and the M1 plugin, I think you’ll have all of your needs covered for quite a while. If you want to add other specialized third party Kontakt libraries in the future, at least you’ll already have Kontakt to host them.

[Shuffle34]

Very hard to not find many things useful in Komplete or Ultimate. There is so much stuff inside, so much quality and so much variety.

[festeringheap]

Komplete overkill.

No one needs this bloated suite other than studios.

NI should split Komplete into two segments - Kontakt based sampling and Reaktor playground synths.

[yellowmix]

NI should split Komplete into two segments - Kontakt based sampling and Reaktor playground synths.

What would you kall it now that it's half-komplete?

And why separate samplers from synths? Samplers are instruments! If you're limiting your productions based on soundsource you're only limiting yourself.

[pixel85]

I can tell you that you wrote this topic because you didnt spent enough time to check what's inside of Komplete.
Now go dive into Komplete (start with Kontakt) and back to us after few years (yes few years, no less) and tell us how you love this infinite source of sounds which is Komplete

[3rdstone]

Komplete overkill.

No one needs this bloated suite other than studios.

NI should split Komplete into two segments - Kontakt based sampling and Reaktor playground synths.

That's the main reason why I purchased it, is that I'm a project studio owner, and wanted to cover as many bases as possible. The sample library is very good, save a few generic-sounding orchestral sounds with the 'essential' series, but the 'pro' series of the same type is really authentic-sounding, I'm pretty pleased with those along with many other libraries...
(I also picked up K Hunter's latest $89 special on Virtuoso Ensembles to further cover that base.)

A few of the libraries (in my case) are redundant, (ex. drums) as I already own Superior Drummer 3 with 5 expansion packs, EZ2 and 7 EXs, Slate Platinum, BFD3, etc. ..but hey, the more drum kits/samples the better right?

But on the synthesizer front, I have 10 times more useful patches in the form of KORG's M1 and Wavestation than I do with any of the NI synths .. Sure, I could spend many hours programming something of use to me, but my time is too valuable, so I just opted for the Korg stuff...
However, I've not delved into Reaktor yet, so who knows...
If the Korg stuff proves too 'dated' sounding for a particular project, and I can't get what I want out of the NI stuff, I may add Avenger to the pool of VSTs, but until that happens, I think I'm set.

I can tell you that you wrote this topic because you didnt spent enough time to check what's inside of Komplete.
Now go dive into Komplete (start with Kontakt) and back to us after few years (yes few years, no less) and tell us how you love this infinite source of sounds which is Komplete

Haha, yes, I have to agree with you on this.. After installing everything and taking a look at all that's possible, well, it's almost infinite. I'm sure in time, that what you say will happen, is completely accurate.
I'll also agree with a poster up-thread who said that my judgement is hasty. As a studio owner and non-keyboard guy with clients wanting instant results? You can bet I'm as hasty as those clients paying for studio time... time is money...

Overall though, I think I did pretty well, being as I got komplete for $499 ...and kontakt for $124 ...not bad at all, considering all that's included...

Anyway, this thread has run it's course as far as I'm concerned, thanks to all who replied, it really helped to frame things and put them in perspective...

Cheers
-Steve