KVR Audio

pummel · Post by **pummel** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 3:23 pm

What are the advantages / disadvantages of the various modular hosts? Are there others, besides the three in the title? I am about to explore the this side of hosting, and would appreciate any comparisons people would be willing to offer.

What I am looking for is something that works well with / instead of frooty. I like frooty's workflow, but find it somewhat limited in its routing options.

Hermetech Mastering · Post by **Hermetech Mastering** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 3:30 pm

the only host i've ever used has been audiomulch, i've been using it for about 5 years now. all i can say is that i love it, and give it a try!

www.audiomulch.com

pummel · Post by **pummel** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 3:43 pm

Thanks for the tip, darkflame. I never heard of AudioMulch

dougsyo · Post by **dougsyo** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 5:00 pm

A standalone modular host (AudioMulch, Bidule, etc) doesn't do much for me.

On the other hand, EnergyXT as a VSTI in FLStudio substantially augments what I can do in FLS - if for example I want a step sequencer or arp on a synth that doesn't have one, EXT can do it for me... if I want to layer two synths without messing with the Fruity layer support, EXT can do it for me... etc. EXT also works the same for me in both FLStudio and Sonar, as I have a bit invested or developed in each one.

To me the EXT standalone is a bonus, but some folks find it useful... this is as opposed to Bidule & Audiomulch which are standalone but not VST/VSTI (Bidule also does ReWire, although I avoid that when I can).

Doug

Borogove · Post by **Borogove** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 5:32 pm

Audiomulch is lovely, it's my host of choice, but I feel compelled to mention that it has no note-sequencing ability whatsoever.

Lunch Money · Post by **Lunch Money** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 5:59 pm

Gotta be Tracktion.

Behaves even more simply than a 'traditional' sequencer. Everything is streamlined. And yet within that elegance, you can use modular routing of effects and instruments in a left-to-right way that can leave no doubt about the signal path.

Brilliant.

r2101 · Post by **r2101** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 6:04 pm

what about psycle and buzz...both r modular. whilst psycle is more like a traditional tracker with an added modular vsti/fx component, buzz is more like a experimental thing... the peermachine concept, new scriptin languages makes it extremly powerful, also extremly complicated at times :)
reason is modular too... but doesn´t host anything besides it´s own modules... still it can archive quite a lot...sadly most ppl use it for trance (imho) ;)

shamann · Post by **shamann** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 6:53 pm

A big part of it depends on your needs.

Some of the fundamental differences:

Bidule
- has explicit MIDI paths and processing
- has modular synth building blocks
- allows for macro collections of building blocks (called groups)
- has explicit FFT processing
- no automation
- has Rewire
- has VST bridge (plugin in another host can route audio to and from Bidule)

Audiomulch
- has great internal sound generators, but they are macro modules, so no low level construction
- Linear VST automation tracks, possibly its greatest strength
- Most mature development. Been around a lot of years, most bugs have been weeded out
- Metasurface, which allows you to morph between machine states.
- Very gracefully handles plugin crashes
- no explicit midi paths

EnergyXT
- no internal sound generators/effects/processors
- has a piano roll style sequencer (two flavours, sequencer module and midi part, which is like a MIDI phrase sampler)
- explicit MIDI paths, with chord and arpeggio modules
- has built-in traditional sampler, as well as audio phrase sampler
- Gets a new feature every day
- runs as standalone and VST (both instrument and effect)
-MIDI LFOs

I use all three. I've not used Bidule in a while, as my poor old computer really starts to show its age with it (I have a very old computer).

I use Mulch every day, wouldn't be without it, and use eXT as a plugin most days inside Mulch for traditional MIDI stuff (sequencing).

It depends on which aspect you want to go. EXT has the most utility, Mulch is the most self-contained/instrument-like, Bidule has the most DSP construction. All are great and worth delving into.

Cheers,
Steve

duncanparsons · Post by **duncanparsons** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 9:06 pm

My non-"Cubase-Sucks" host of choice is Console. Largely since it does what I need with very little fuss..

DSP

pummel · Post by **pummel** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 7:21 pm

Thanks for the info everyone. Sounds like EXT might be a good place to get my feet wet in this sort of thing.

dystonia_ek · Post by **dystonia_ek** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 1:58 pm

Borogove wrote:Audiomulch is lovely, it's my host of choice, but I feel compelled to mention that it has no note-sequencing ability whatsoever.

Bah! Who needs notes anyway.

jens · Post by **jens** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 2:05 pm

shamann wrote:
EnergyXT
- no internal sound generators/effects/processors
- has a piano roll style sequencer (two flavours, sequencer module and midi part, which is like a MIDI phrase sampler)
- explicit MIDI paths, with chord and arpeggio modules
- has built-in traditional sampler, as well as audio phrase sampler
- Gets a new feature every day
- runs as standalone and VST (both instrument and effect)
-MIDI LFOs[/list]

doesn't the feature-ladden sampler count as a sound-generator? - Soon there will also a fm-synth be included.

And what you forgot to mention is that eXT includes a complete full-blown sequencer in the style of Cubase, Sonar or Tracktion with many advanced features...

(folder tracks, ghosted clips, mutable clips, highly-flexible freezing&rendering, pattern sequencing etc.)

The modular hosts: Audix vs Bidule vs EnergyXT, etc, etc