ok, this is my first review ever, so don't kill the pianist, thanks. tested with my P4, 2.28Ghz, 768RAM
User Interface the GUI is a bit large for my taste, but there are lots of parameters and everything is well arranged, easy to understand, rather pretty looking. The multi/layers system is particularly well designed IMHO.
Sound This is its main quality and it's the most important one, isn't it? Gorgious sounding. I have nothing to complain about. Very realistic, with several playing styles for each instrument.
Features one trick poney? eerrr... if you are looking for analogue synth sounds or a resynthesising robot, this mighty horse is not for you. But in case you are looking for vast range of percussion instruments, everything you'll ever need is in this beast. You can manipulate the sound and other parameters in several ways: velocity, key ranges, polyphony, pitch, playback modes, envelopes, etc. The only complain i have is the time needed to load the instruments. Several seconds by layers, which means that if you have built a multi (up to 8 layers) for a song, it will take sometimes more than one minute to load it each time you open your poject file. (and my computer is rather speedy i think)
Documentation An average manual, simple and clear, nothing special to say about it. The authorisation system, which involves an USB dongle and an online registration was a real pain for me, and the instructions on the web site were maybe not absolutely correct (refer to Customer Support for more about this issue).
Presets As stated above, there are all the percu instruments you’ll ever need. 61 sorts, if i can count. And not only “cultural” ones. All the main orchestral percussions, and – as they call them – “industrial” ones are in the box. Each instruments is provided in several flavours with different sounds and playing styles. Example: Tablas: tablas; tablas alternate; tablas fx; tablas off; tablas alternate A+6; tablas alternate P+2; tablas alternate PD+8; tablas P-2... don’t ask me what are the difference between them, i haven’t tried everything yet.
Customer Support I had problems during the registration/authorisation system. You have to download files from their web sites, and then with a flash engine, your USB dongle is filled with some codes that free your copy from demo mode. I don’t really know what i did wrong. I suspect i didn’t install the files in the right order. So i needed help from customer support (by email). And i can say that the customer support is great, ladies and gentlemen. They are very responsive, they understand your problems, they give you the right info and good pieces of advice. You can call them if needed.
Value for money. The prog is excellent. But you feel the void in your wallet when purchasing the product... I don’t regret my choice, though. It’s a marvelous instrument.
