Waves Platinum or Voxengo Plugs and a computer upgrade?

[joachime]

For every Waves plugin there's a better and far cheaper alternative.

What's a better and far cheaper alternative to Ren de-esser?

[chagzuki]

The cheaper alternative is learning not to gob all over the microphone. Difficult for welsh people.

Actually, I don't know about that one. I forgot about de-essers.

[Stairsteps]

As I said earlier Rbass, Rdesser and Rverb can't be matched or beat and I have a big interest in what sounds good as its how I make my living, I do own the Voxengo stuff as well but I find that there crunchessor, analogue suite and pristine space are things I avoid, as they have a certian character that colors the music to a degree that my clients dont like, Most of the groups I record at my studio want Waves plugs, not because they SOUND WAY better or are more or less expensive but because they dont COLOR your sound and have a very natural sound quality. As most ppl who produce know its the subtle effect that professionals look for when recording for others not the one that stands out and sounds so obvious, However thinking like a musician doing my own project before taking it to get mixed down I would gladly use alot of the Vox stuff or anything else that brings character to my style, but to a PRO recording musician who is primary function is to work for the client the Waves stuff is the only way to go.

[bugs]

As I said earlier Rbass, Rdesser and Rverb can't be matched or beat and I have a big interest in what sounds good as its how I make my living, I do own the Voxengo stuff as well but I find that there crunchessor, analogue suite and pristine space are things I avoid, as they have a certian character that colors the music to a degree that my clients dont like, Most of the groups I record at my studio want Waves plugs, not because they SOUND WAY better or are more or less expensive but because they dont COLOR your sound and have a very natural sound quality. As most ppl who produce know its the subtle effect that professionals look for when recording for others not the one that stands out and sounds so obvious, However thinking like a musician doing my own project before taking it to get mixed down I would gladly use alot of the Vox stuff or anything else that brings character to my style, but to a PRO recording musician who is primary function is to work for the client the Waves stuff is the only way to go.

I think the Voxengo plugs you mention are designed to colour the sound, aren't they?

[chagzuki]

Rverb ? ? ?

Try Polysquasher for transparent.

For EQ, Elemental Audio's Eqium.

[Innominandum]

Pristine Space's convolution effect is a reversible mathematical function. Maybe you should feed it better impulses?

[james0tucson]

The original post suggested a user who plans on brand loyalty. He is either buying ALL the Waves stuff or ALL Voxengo stuff.

dunno where you get this idea from...

brand-loyality doesn't really make sense anyway...

It makes sense in at least one area: Contractual obligations between shops.

If you can specify what tools are used, you can require tweak-by-tweak documentation of the project. It can be handed off between engineers or between studios, a project can be put on ice and then revived, you can turn a contractor loose on the production and be assured that you'll be able to use the results. This is where the de-facto standard of PT, all the nice and expensive PT-compatable hardware, TDM lock-in, certain plugins and their corresponding DSP devices, all that stuff starts to make sense.

It's amusing that people express a desire to chase this state of the art on a budget, for their home studios, in situations where they *don't* have contracts that require it and they *don't* have management above them telling them how things will be. They seem to want to this impossibly expensive avenue (come ON! Waves TDM?? For a home studio where you have a *choice?*), and they post on KVR looking for advice and I presume, seeking support as they make this horribly misguided opinion.

Don't get me wrong; I'm sure the Waves plugins are superb. But that doesn't mean you *must* have them in order to do high quality work. Maybe if they truly are as great as the sales literature claims, then at some point, your FX will be the weakest thing in your signal path. Maybe then it will make a lot of sense. Or maybe your aspirations actually do lead you into a level of production standards where your output needs to be ready for a post by a film score specialist, but I guarantee you Danny Elfman and Hans Zimmer don't need to come on KVR and ask whether they should stretch their budgets to buy a specific FX plugin. So get real.

Buy these expensive things if your ears actually tell you you need them, or if your contracts say you must use them, or if your manager has just dropped the box on your desk and said "use this."

But it's foolish to assume that, just because people with high budgets happen to use a specific product, it will benefit you to do the same. Down that path lies only bankruptcy.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe every reverb and compressor plugin out ther is "total crap" compared to Waves. Hardly seems likely to me.

[fizbin]

Waves plugins are great. PACE and the Waves upgrade protection plan thing fairly suck. IMO the Waves UIs are quite a bit better than the Voxengo UIs. Still, the Voxengo plugs are very effective, do not require repeated upgrade spending and are affordable individually and not as a package. I own Waves Platinum and a few of the Voxengo plugs. I'm addicted to my Waves plug-ins - they go on nearly every track. There are reasons, I suppose why they are so expensive. I got Waves Platinum for a little over $1200. I think you could get the entire Voxengo line for around $1000. In my estimation Waves comes out a little ahead in this regard for my purposes.

...just some semi-objective observations outside the matter of which set sounds best - an argument no one is likely to "win" in this thread.

Best,
fizbin

[bmanic]

.. but to a PRO recording musician who is primary function is to work for the client the Waves stuff is the only way to go.

[james0tucson]

I got Waves Platinum for a little over $1200.

My understanding is that's about one-fourth of the going rate. If that's not the case, I've been seriously misled.

[fizbin]

I have Waves Platinum Native bundle, not the more expensive TDM bundle. Waves Diamond TDM bundle would definitely be in the ballpark of 4 times the price of Waves Platinum Native bundle.

I called and emailed around to several online retailers getting them to bid against each other a bit, basically saying "retailer x" quoted me $1300 and so on. I bought mine at www.jacksmusicstore.com , but it looks like they no longer sell Waves stuff.

fizbin

[etherdesign]

I got Waves Platinum for a little over $1200.

My understanding is that's about one-fourth of the going rate. If that's not the case, I've been seriously misled.

No, that's about right, maybe a bit low for the Native version. The TDM Platinum bundle does cost about 3x that much though. Which is a joke.

[james0tucson]

For grins, I looked at the KVR listing on the Waves Ren Compressor. I'm sure it's a fine compressor, in the category of "compressors you can't hear". Might even be a good deal at $200, compared to the $200 offerings from certain other vendors. But the first feature on the list was this:

* Opto-compression-mode - emulates opto-coupled hardware compressors.

This is making me laugh. The purpose of optocouplers in a (hardware) audio device is to avoid noise in the signal path caused by EM/RF interference. So, is this feature actually a switch that puts *in* a simulated noisy circuit?

[fizbin]

Oh - I forgot to mention. Probably the best deal on effects lately was the Cakewalk Sonitus bundle for $150. Great UIs and great sounding plug-ins. Anyone needing a complete basic set of full-featured plugs that didn't grab those really missed out. I bought em even though I had the Waves Platinum package. That Sonitus bundle is really a steal.

fizbin

[jens]

* Opto-compression-mode - emulates opto-coupled hardware compressors.

This is making me laugh. The purpose of optocouplers in a (hardware) audio device is to avoid noise in the signal path caused by EM/RF interference. So, is this feature actually a switch that puts *in* a simulated noisy circuit?

you surely know that depending on the physical way they function they have a distinctive envelope?

There are a lot of compressors besides Ren Comp atempting to model this envelope (e.g. Blockfish and GCO-1 to name two of them)