u-he

hyperscientist · Post by **hyperscientist** » Wed May 20, 2015 10:27 am

Just fishing for opinions here. I own ACE and love it. Patches it comes with are top notch and there's plenty of them. It is also quite straightforward to use. But at the end of the day... All people talk about is Diva, Zebra and also more and more about Bazille.

What is that people like about those 3 that ACE does not have?

I own only ACE, but I demoed all of them and just don't get it. Maybe I should put more time and demo some more. But maybe your opinions will shed some light and I will realise some hidden potential of those alternatives that I haven't noticed on my own…

What do you people think?

lotus2035 · Post by **lotus2035** » Wed May 20, 2015 10:38 am

I focus on sound quality and not features when I purchase softsynths, I find a lot of them "thin" sounding. In that regard I think A.C.E. is one of the best sounding softsynths on the market. Not thin at all but "warm" and "analog" and I generally hate using terms like that but in this case it's true. A.C.E. is something special soundwise.

lofty · Post by **lofty** » Wed May 20, 2015 10:49 am

2ZrgE · Post by **2ZrgE** » Wed May 20, 2015 11:34 am

hyperscientist wrote:Just fishing for opinions here. I own ACE and love it. Patches it comes with are top notch and there's plenty of them. It is also quite straightforward to use. But at the end of the day... All people talk about is Diva, Zebra and also more and more about Bazille.

What is that people like about those 3 that ACE does not have?

I own only ACE, but I demoed all of them and just don't get it. Maybe I should put more time and demo some more. But maybe your opinions will shed some light and I will realise some hidden potential of those alternatives that I haven't noticed on my own…

What do you people think?

I find ACE hard to patch, especially when I haven't used it for some time. And it takes quite some CPU. So does Bazille, but I rather tend to learn patching Bazille which is more attractive to me, especially with that awesome looking gearporn skin with the whole layout on one page.

Apostate · Post by **Apostate** » Wed May 20, 2015 11:38 am

ACE is excellent, and often a lot more fun to program than other, modularesque synths. I was going to buy it, but then I demo'd Bazille and decided to spend the extra.

Nothing wrong with ACE at all, it just didn't fit into my agenda(s) like Bazille, and at this point I can't justify buying it on top of...

Dasheesh · Post by **Dasheesh** » Wed May 20, 2015 1:54 pm

I absolutely adore ace and my one big regret going in the box was that I didn't pick up ace in the early days. It's been around a while now and it was very popular in the early days. A lot of hardware guys I Knew where picking it up and tooling around with it early on. It's just this new generation of pop festival kids that haven't picked it up. They want the latest gear. The thing I love about ace is it's so playable as a musician. It feels like a real instrument and sits in my rack beautiful. I have heard rumors of an update and I think that the filters could use an update to be brought in line with the rest of the U-he offerings. The signal to noise and clarity on these new filters has surpassed aces current ones. I also think that the graphics of the sliders and such could use a touch up.

shroom81 · Post by **shroom81** » Wed May 20, 2015 2:31 pm

I love the sound of the synth but don't like programming it since I don't really know modular synths... Read the manual a few times watched some tutorials and yet I just plain suck at programming it :/

Shiek927 · Post by **Shiek927** » Wed May 20, 2015 2:41 pm

shroom81 wrote:I love the sound of the synth but don't like programming it since I don't really know modular synths... Read the manual a few times watched some tutorials and yet I just plain suck at programming it :/

I agree with you

.

I used to use Zebra for a very long time before I just stopped. While the workflow truly was easy for what it was, I just couldn't find myself able to wrap my ahead around it. I was once told that you don't need all the bells and whistles in a synth and that's exactly what ended up happening.

Which is why Hive is so appealing to me. Because not only do I personally find it to be u-he's best sounding synth yet, it's deliberately Sylenth-simple. It doesn't have every type of synthesis under the sun, but that doesn't stop it from sounding deep and rich. More importantly, it's low on CPU and actually easy to use.

For some people however with much MUCH more experience and interest in modular synthesis, they prefer the latter. It's all about what you're personally into

.

Dasheesh · Post by **Dasheesh** » Wed May 20, 2015 2:47 pm

Peoples perceptions of what sounds good has changed DRAMATICALLY over the years as well. What I think sounds good is NOT what the iPhone generation thinks sounds good. I realize I have to adapt or die at this point. I have to learn what the millennials think sounds good.

UncleAge · Post by **UncleAge** » Wed May 20, 2015 3:50 pm

I love ACE. It's one of my top 3 most used synths. However I have no idea how popular it is.

But if it's not a popular synth it may be because of number of things. One, if you were not already a modular fan or had a better than elementary understanding of synthesis the method of using those virtual patch cables might have made learning the synth harder than normal for most of us.

Second is the price. Quite often people associate cost with quality. I personally feel ACE is priced well below what it could get. And I am thankful it was/is so. But that may lead a lot of new users to think it's not as "awesome" as some other synth.

Also, the buzz around any synth drives a lot of the sales, no? So as the fanbase/userbase for u-he synths grows so does the hype and anticipation for any new product. At least it seems that way to me. And that's why I think the extended betas for u-he synths is a small stroke of genius. The last few have had really long beta periods where users could really get to know the product. Thus the product benefits from more word of mouth.

And lastly, as I understood it, ACE was supposed to be a part of a larger modular system. I think quite a few folk took a wait and see approach instead of jumping onboard right away. I think a lot of the anticipation for Bazille was in fact because a lot of folk had finally wrapped their heads around Zebra and ACE and felt more at home in this semi-modular environment.

Just a few thoughts...

FastTriggerFish · Post by **FastTriggerFish** » Wed May 20, 2015 4:12 pm

ACE is great but I also feel like the filter is not quite as interesting as say Diva's selection or Bazille's
I'd love for it to be upgraded a little bit.

Howard · Post by **Howard** » Wed May 20, 2015 7:52 pm

I love ACE, totally underrated...
I agree with FastTriggerFish that an upgrade to the filter (plus some new effects?) wouldn't go amiss, though!

ksandvik · Post by **ksandvik** » Wed May 20, 2015 8:18 pm

I would get ACE but with Zebra + Diva + Bazille + Hive I'm saturated with finding new sounds just now...

Dasheesh · Post by **Dasheesh** » Wed May 20, 2015 8:23 pm

edit. nvrmind I just found them.

Numanoid · Post by **Numanoid** » Wed May 20, 2015 8:26 pm

2ZrgE wrote:And it takes quite some CPU.

+1 One of the reason why I don't use it more.

u-he

KVR Audio

Why is ACE so much less popular than others?