reverb test - 5 plugins and 1 hardware

[ericzang]

With all the talk about reverbs recently, I put some to a quick test. Please keep in mind:

Tested was only one desired sound - a big wash.

I only spent a short time trying to make them sound the same. This was a good test of the user friendliness of the UI.

It is only solo voice (the exact same clip for each of course). Perhaps on a whole mix things could be different.

I did not test any convolutions.

The hardware unit is on my digital send/return on the computer's interface.

I did a quick mixdown from 24/44.1 to 16/44.1 without dithering. MP3 files are at 320.

No negative criticism of my voice is necessary.

Answers will be posted later this week when there is enough response in this thread.

The reverbs tested are:

eventide eclipse "reverb 16"
sonitus reverb (from cakewalk sonar)
ambience reverb
lexicon pantheon reverb (sonar)
Kjaerhus Classic Reverb
cakewalk fxreverb (sonar)

With my quick test format (userfriendliness/realworld indicator?)
some other reverbs didn't make the list because: in a short amount of time I couldn't get them to sound close enough and/or the sound quality was obviously inferior (metallicness and/or too much pitchshifting warbliness). The reverbs (demos) that fell under this were: R66, prosoniq rayverb, timeworks 4080L, Roomverb M2, princeton 2016.

Go to http://www.ericzang.com/reverb_test/
for the files.

Post your ratings/impressions. Thanks!

[snooky]

are the mp3's in the order that you put those reverbs? in that case, the sonitus reverb sounds most like the eventide..ambience sounds the worst, like it always has...I can't stand the reverb from ambience but in a mix it can spice up a lead vox or something.

[snooky]

wait, I take that back..the sonitus reverb sound kinda metallic now that I listen to it once more...the classic reverb has a really smooth tail.

[speccyteccy]

You've done a great job of getting the same settings on all six - so good in fact, that I can't easily discern between them let alone pick a favourite (mind you, I don't claim to have the best ears / hardware).

You've just reinforced what I already believe - that sound quality for me is less important than musical quality.

Thanks!

[ericzang]

the order of the reverbs are not in order as I put in the message, so as to take away any bias. When referring to them, simply use the number.

Snooky's comments should read: #2 sounds metallic, #5 has a really smooth tail.

Thanks for checking these out!

[Sicklecell666]

1 to 10(10 is best)

#1 = 5 (distortion present)crappy, can hear warbling in tail
#2 = 7 (distortion present)2nd best
#3 = 4 much less diffusion than 1,2 sounds thin & crappy
#4 = 8 sounds best so far, but has distortion as well, still best so far after several listens, could be more diffuse though
#5 = ? pronounced delay effect can be heard; not enough diffusion, too lush for a mix
#6 = ? diffusion is way stronger than all others, but still has the same kind of pronounced repeating as #5; too lush for a mix

My vote's with #4, seems the least offensive, but what do I know?



Hey gimme the clean sample & I'll add a few to the test

[AndrewSimon]

Not sure what is the purpose of this test.
Reverb is very program dependent.
These are also very long tails that I would never use normaly.
#6 has a very long tail #4 and #5 have a shorter tail.
Why?
Did you set the decay to the same lenght?

#4 and #5 are my favorites.
#2 and #3 two thumbs down.

Of course with different material and decay times I might choose differently.

Do you have the dry sample?
I would like to do a few samples of my own reverbs for reference.
What are the settings you have used? Reverb time?

[Kim Lajoie]

Why don't you just tell us which reverb was used for each audio example? Otherwise this is not educational.

Forever,




Kim.

[bduffy]

{EDIT} crap. I posted to the wrong thread, sorry.

While I'm here, I gotta say, I can barely tell the difference between any of these reverbs. But my listening setup is probably a little less than ideal. Good job on programming the verbs!

[Lunch Money]

They all had weird high-pitched artifacts. Must've been from the non-dithering and then mp3 encoding, no?

Other than that, they all sounded pretty similar. I'm with speccyteccy.

Greg

[Torben]

I like to test reverbs with conga / bonga's. It realy shows how good the echo density are and how fast "attack" the reverb has.

Torben

P.S. Why don't you put up a vote?

[ericzang]

Thanks again for all your responses. And thank you for your suggestions on how to make this a better test. I'll try a conga/bongo test sometime.

Tweaking the diffusion was perhaps something I didn't give enough attention to. Thanks for bringing it up!

The long tails of these worked pretty well in context of the solo voice over a drone.

The inspiration for this test is because I am considering on whether my hardware eventide eclipse (a $1700 unit! got this when I had full time work) is really that much better than a plugin? I'm thinking perhaps not. This is such a limited test though, so I am still quite hesitant to let it go. I'm looking forward to trying the upcoming Arts Acoustic reverb.

I tried to make all the reverbs imitate the eclipse. I'll check the settings and post them, along with the dry sample. Thanks for your interest to contribute!

I have now posted the answers in a file on my web page. I guess just don't post the answers here till later in case some want to be completely unbiased.

Answers: http://www.ericzang.com/reverb_test/reverb_answers.txt

Thanks,
Eric

[bduffy]

I swear, that ancient Cakewalk FX Verb...I always thought that had a nice sound, haven't heard it in awhile. Interesting.

[713 TSB]

So I listened and listened cause it was neat being part of a blind test.

Ah the real gear versus the virtual gear comparison.
I agree with the long tails that other folks mentioned, it made the nice voice seem somewhat artificial on its own so I think for me it would be a situation of less color or a lot more colour to kind of overemphasize, but that’s an individual preference. I think this method of testing will be somewhat flawed due to the file compression, different listening environments and limited samples. It would have been helpful to have heard the original sample in its simplicity to compare as well. So on to the samples.

I burned them onto cd actually and listened to them on both of my stereos.

1 seemed pushed, or hurried and over the top.

2 seemed to carry more artefacts. warbled and seemed to keep getting bigger in the end with the drones taking over. I though this one was the coolest sounding as it seemed to do so much I noticed this one the most as being coloured without being annoying.

3 was cool and natural, the least intrusive

4 seemed pushed, kind of like I could hear the technology working, and droney lets call it mild distortion

5 not as clear, almost restrained

6 too loud, distorted

I have heard that a grand piano is the most difficult sound to accurately record.
It seems evident in my listening too, a good piano recording is hard to find. So if you do it again I would suggest a good quality sample piano sound if you are looking for quality comparison.

Drums tend to be easy to record as they are a more simple sound.

Also, I think different reverbs will do different things with different sounds. I would be willing to let you lend me that hardware reverb of yours to see if I can hear a difference….

[AudioWhore]

Someone should try the 'Steinberg RoomWorks VST' that comes with SX3. Its really quite nice Bit like the Sonitus one