Hi everyone,
This link is a brief review I did on 32 free VST instruments.
The "contest" was simple: to play the same song, consisted of several instruments, using exclusively each of the synths, under a condition: I would have strictly up to 32 minutes to configure the synthesizers. 8 instruments were needed for the song, 8 instances therefore required for each synthesizer, and 4 minutes maximum to find my way and to synthesize each sound.
You may listen to the different versions of the song, as played by each synthesizer. I also discuss and rate my experience in the article. Through this, I had the chance to get to know better some of the synths. Hope is of value for others too.
I aimed to rate each of them on the easiness to learn (including existence of manual, tutorials, a good interface, etc.) as well as my perceived capability of the synth.
https://r-project-thanos.blogspot.com/2 ... ction.html
Comments are welcome.
Thanos
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HW: HP i5@2.50GHz 64 bit, 8GB RAM, Access Virus TI2, Clavia Nord Lead A1, Behringer DeepMind 12, Roland SH-201, Novation Peak, Roland SH-101, Yamaha TG-500, Roland JV-1080, Behringer Neutron, Yamaha Clavinova, Focusrite Scarlett 6x6, Behringer Xenyx 1002, Samson Graphite 49, E-MU Xboard 49, Omnitronic FAD-9, Doepfer Dark Link, SW: Cubase 9.5, Melodyne 9, Nora, Scaler, Magic A/B, jBridge
A short review on 32 free VSTis
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- KVRian
- 778 posts since 21 Apr, 2016
Extremely cool. Never seen anyone go this in depth with strictly free VSTs.
Nobody, Ever wrote:I have enough plugins.
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- KVRAF
- 8826 posts since 6 Jan, 2017 from Outer Space
Nice overview,
You could enhance the entry by embedding the soundcloud links, and adding links to the sources.
You informed us about 32/64 bit but not about platforms win/mac which is crucial for a lot of us.
Your rating had a span of 3 to 5 with most examples at 5 - don't be too friendly, I bet it could be more diverse...
Overall a nice idea in the spirit of OSC...
You could enhance the entry by embedding the soundcloud links, and adding links to the sources.
You informed us about 32/64 bit but not about platforms win/mac which is crucial for a lot of us.
Your rating had a span of 3 to 5 with most examples at 5 - don't be too friendly, I bet it could be more diverse...
Overall a nice idea in the spirit of OSC...
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- KVRer
- Topic Starter
- 20 posts since 19 Mar, 2018 from Netherlands
Hi TJ,
Thanks for the hints. The platform was Win10 (64bit). As I didn't run any test on 32bit Win or Mac, I cannot speak for these platforms.
True that there were several highly rated synths in the review, but to be fair, I did gave one 2/5 (Plastique). As I wrote, I intended to rate these synths in terms of the general freeware market. Most of the "1/5"s and "2/5"s of this market did not even qualify for the review. This concerns synths that were either very primitive/amateurish, weirdly designed or CPU-hungry (includes mostly SynthMaker synths), which is an information generally known (and therefore not much helpful). Furthemore, I preferred to avoid including a fine-grained rating (e.g. having a "7" vs. an "8", etc,), which could start a lot of discussions, given that each user applies eventually their own weighting/judging criteria (on efficiency, fidelity, presets, etc.). Trust me though, that such a rating exists for me (and it brought me some surprises, against my personal bias). Moreover, it was actually taken in respect for the "rounding" scores of this review, but as I wrote, I'd consider it highly subjective to share it in its details. Even in that scoring, I encountered several highly rated synths, which could mean otherwise that the task imposed was not that challenging for many synths of the "elite" group.
Thanks for the hints. The platform was Win10 (64bit). As I didn't run any test on 32bit Win or Mac, I cannot speak for these platforms.
True that there were several highly rated synths in the review, but to be fair, I did gave one 2/5 (Plastique). As I wrote, I intended to rate these synths in terms of the general freeware market. Most of the "1/5"s and "2/5"s of this market did not even qualify for the review. This concerns synths that were either very primitive/amateurish, weirdly designed or CPU-hungry (includes mostly SynthMaker synths), which is an information generally known (and therefore not much helpful). Furthemore, I preferred to avoid including a fine-grained rating (e.g. having a "7" vs. an "8", etc,), which could start a lot of discussions, given that each user applies eventually their own weighting/judging criteria (on efficiency, fidelity, presets, etc.). Trust me though, that such a rating exists for me (and it brought me some surprises, against my personal bias). Moreover, it was actually taken in respect for the "rounding" scores of this review, but as I wrote, I'd consider it highly subjective to share it in its details. Even in that scoring, I encountered several highly rated synths, which could mean otherwise that the task imposed was not that challenging for many synths of the "elite" group.
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- KVRAF
- 10588 posts since 13 Jun, 2004 from Alberto Balsam
Very cool, we need more involved community reviewing rather than the advertising in magazines.
To supplement the OP: https://www.dogsonacid.com/threads/the- ... 19.794262/zenophilix wrote:Extremely cool. Never seen anyone go this in depth with strictly free VSTs.
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- KVRAF
- 2265 posts since 30 Aug, 2004 from Lancaster, UK
Totally agree - let's say one reviewer says "the woodwinds of Xpand!2 are dull" and suddenly the product gets killed off, just because there are too few reviews online.The Chase wrote:Very cool, we need more involved community reviewing rather than the advertising in magazines.
To supplement the OP: https://www.dogsonacid.com/threads/the- ... 19.794262/zenophilix wrote:Extremely cool. Never seen anyone go this in depth with strictly free VSTs.
To the OP: Thanks a lot for putting this together!
Thu Oct 01, 2020 1:15 pm Passing Bye wrote:
"look at SparkySpark's post 4 posts up, let that sink in for a moment"
Go MuLab!
"look at SparkySpark's post 4 posts up, let that sink in for a moment"
Go MuLab!
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- KVRer
- Topic Starter
- 20 posts since 19 Mar, 2018 from Netherlands
Thanks, I intentionally uploaded all song versions, so to finally let the listener have their own opinion (on results from of an equal effort put for a song), beyond any comments of mine (and respectively, any possible personal bias).SparkySpark wrote:Totally agree - let's say one reviewer says "the woodwinds of Xpand!2 are dull" and suddenly the product gets killed off, just because there are too few reviews online.The Chase wrote:Very cool, we need more involved community reviewing rather than the advertising in magazines.
To supplement the OP: https://www.dogsonacid.com/threads/the- ... 19.794262/zenophilix wrote:Extremely cool. Never seen anyone go this in depth with strictly free VSTs.
To the OP: Thanks a lot for putting this together!
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- KVRist
- 197 posts since 23 Oct, 2005 from Australia
Really interesting list, thanks for sharing your findings!
