Poor old FXPansion Geist and Tremor.

[pdxindy]

The step sequencing/sample player plug ins market is quite saturated, and then if you use Live Drum racks are so good it is difficult to consider other option.

What sets Geist apart for me is the ability to sample and re-sample. It is fast and fun to create my own kits from my own synth presets. Way easier than any other method I have tried. Then the effects are great and the results just come out sounding good and balanced without a lot of effort.

[T-CM11]

I tried out both Geist and Tremor in the Black Friday weekend. Not that I need more drum tools, but the price was really nice... Ended up buying SparkLE, and still don't regret it. It is/seems a lot more limited, but the workflow and hands-on interface is really great!
I just recorded this with it:
https://soundcloud.com/tt_cc/untitled1-1

[JoeCat]

The step sequencing/sample player plug ins market is quite saturated, and then if you use Live Drum racks are so good it is difficult to consider other option.

Operator can be an awesome drum synth in it's own right, and of course you can re-sample or just place it in a Drum Rack.
The (IMO) overlooked osc Phase adjustment is key - great for creating click attacks, etc. Then you have the selection of filters, pitch envelope, etc.

If I were in the market for an all-in-one with a sequencer, I think Tremor would be it though - tweak heaven and a great interface. Already have Drumspillage which is awesome, but very different sounding. I think they'd compliment each other well.

[foosnark]

I personally don't want a step sequencer in a drum plugin, since so often it just fights with the host. I just want some good drum synthesis.

After deoming Tremor... I'd get it if it was available at a HUGE discount. Browsing through presets, I see exactly what Theo was talking about. Overall it seemed like something to use to add flavor to a good solid existing kit, but not something to rely on. MicroTonic and Drumatic both do "solid" a lot better, I think.

[rpm]

How would you add flavor via Tremor? By layering, or by just dropping tremor sounds inbetween Drumatic? Btw, is this the freebie Drumatic?

[foosnark]

Either one, though more likely filling in space rather than layering.

And I was talking about the full Drumatic (I haven't bought it yet, but I demo'd it and have a favorable opinion.)

[EnGee]

What sets Geist apart for me is the ability to sample and re-sample. It is fast and fun to create my own kits from my own synth presets. Way easier than any other method I have tried. Then the effects are great and the results just come out sounding good and balanced without a lot of effort.

+1

I chose Geist over Tremor for the above reason.

I demoed Microtonic, Punch and Tremor. I liked Tremor the best of them for both, sound and programming. Microtonic was good old one but it can't be compared to Tremor's sound! On the other hand, I didn't like Punch at all! Well, the sound is very good but programming it is so awful! It can kill the best inspiration easily! (Sorry! This was my impression when demoing them).
If Geist wasn't in the list, I would choose Tremor of course although it has limitations, but the 'sound design + great sequencer' are the keys for its success. Hmmm, It is very possible I'm buying Tremor next sale! I think I can get very good result of it especially I'm getting into DCAM sound design/workflow now, so it would be easy to get nice noise from Tremor

[rpm]

I found Punch really cluttered too. Same with Microtonic though most people say it's really easy to use. While I actually liked the patterns of Microtonic (I think they are quite dynamic and unique), I didn't like the synthesis.

But I found Tremor super easy to navigate. I immediately understood what everything I can click on is for. And laying down beats was amazingly easy. I loved the synthesis as well (but it probably isn't suitable for a very wide range of genres). What genre(s) do you use Tremor for?

[UltimateOutsider]

I like Tremor for its weird sounds, and the modulation options open up some interesting possibilities. I used it for all the drums on one track and was very pleased with the results:

https://soundcloud.com/ultimateoutsider ... hedwig-and

The track uses two instances of Tremor. I designed half the sounds and the rest are factory sounds. I think I used Tremor's on-board mixing and compression through the main outs rather than splitting all the sounds to individual outs like I normally do with Battery. I used Tremor's sequencer to program all the patterns and triggered them from a MIDI track in Cubase.

Unfortunately, working with Tremor was the single most infuriating experience I've had with any plugin. Two thirds of the time one of the two Tremor instances in the project wouldn't generate audio, and I'd have to close then re-open the project until it worked. The step sequencer often ended up out of sync and I'd have to stop playing and restart from the beginning to get things working in time again. A couple of the sounds developed glitches where they would repeat weird squeaky artifacts infinitely. I was never able to identify an action or explanation for it. I'd just have to hit the panic button on the plugin and keep working.

When I was all done with the project, I just froze the Tremor parts so I wouldn't have to deal with Tremor's finickiness in the future.

Also, perhaps I'm missing something, but Tremor's on-board effects are generally pretty good, except there is only one reverb algorithm and it's really harsh sounding. Not something I'd have a use for.

I really love Tremor's sound and feature set... I just wish it worked more reliably.

[c_voltage]

In my opinion, Tremor the most interesting product of the entire FXpansion set. First of all because of their really great polysequencer with midiout presence. Also of course modulation system. The only drawback is a huge, sometimes abnormal CPU load.

For this reason, his dignity unfortunately significantly leveled in comparison with the mentioned drum plugs from other vendors.

Punch and Microtonic - both are unique (and must have), But even there can find the points for improvement - for example in Punch it somewhat atypical pattern edit workflow (IMO), but it is a trifle compared to the really interesting synth\sample Punch engine. Microtonic - such as "as is" - ideal in this sense, the simplicity divided by functionality with a unique sound (incl. midiout and perfect CPU lightness), but want more advanced synth abilitys\features .

In General, there is nothing perfect, you need to have it all.

[pdxindy]

Tremor needs multicore functionality... depending on the settings, sometimes I cannot even play 1 instance in realtime without getting some crackles due to cpu load. Besides that I find Tremor to be the most interesting drum synth I've tried.

[rpm]

My computer is a few years old. It's been doing pretty well and I've optimized it for audio but I can't take the risk of buying Tremor and it not working well, cause there's no way I'm buying another computer now. Almost everyone has mentioned the CPU-load problem with Tremor.

[UncleAge]

Microtonic - such as "as is" - ideal in this sense, the simplicity divided by functionality with a unique sound (incl. midiout and perfect CPU lightness), but want more advanced synth abilitys\features .

I enjoy Microtonic for much of the same reasons. I marry it with Live's drum racks (I'm not a fan of the M4L sequencer opptions) and it works pretty well. Microtonic drives the midi and I fill the drum racks with any synths I want. Usually lite-on-the-cpu synths.

With that said, if there was a version of Tremor that was just the sequencer, it would be a quick buy for me. I really liked that sequencer, just not enough to buy the plug. I just have enough options on the drum synth front already (Battery, Microtonic, Elecktroid, Live's drum racks, Guru, Drumaxx and a ton of synths). But if I didn't already own Live, MT and Elecktroid I would already have bought Tremor.

[c_voltage]

UncleAge I agree Tremor can buy even just for the sake of its sequencer, it is almost top of the drum sequencer thought, but I have a claim to the synth engine, for example i never got done clean & powerful "elastic\rubber" kick, just such a which is done in a few mouse movements in MTonic.

Tremor slope is complex, jingle, ripped sounds, this may sound dirty, loud, functionality includes a substantial funds to saturation\damage of sound, but as already said just clean "MT" kick get unreal, unfortunately.

At least i half day tried to make it - the result was only vaguely similar. If someone get this - will be grateful for preset. (Perhaps the main reason is the lack of sinewave in osc, but i not completely sure.)

But, it only if is to talk about his self-sufficiency. Otherwise, it's no problem but the character.

[4damind]

Everyone? I don't sell Geist

IMO there are some good and easy to use tools sometimes shipped with the DAW. I see it with Cubase with the excellent Groove Agent SE4/Groove Agent One, the Beat Designer etc. Maybe there are also some people who bought Battery or Komplete and like Battery more and so having no so much usage for Geist anymore and can live without such a specialised drum plug-in.
Geist is IMO compared to other drum plug-ins a beast and needs a bit more time to understand how things are working. Maybe it's for some people too complicated.