KVR Audio

4damind · Post by **4damind** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 9:40 am

I'm confused at finding out that most of the plugins like that from sonalksis or the t-racks, blue tubes, tritone and other vintage emulations listens so fantastic.

This time I save money for a UAD1 studio pak. But more and more I'm unshure if this could be am mistake?
Surely, every plugin has its own style and own "sound" but 900€ is not cheap.

I hope to find a tube compressor, and a good brickwall limiter and a good reverb on the UAD. I think that this emulations there are much better then others?
Could it be better for me to buy a Project Pak? Or could it be today a mistake to buy a UAD?

snooky · Post by **snooky** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:22 am

stay away from blue tubes

offaxis · Post by **offaxis** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:45 am

buy a UAD-1....you won't be disappointed

I would recommend the Studio Pack as a minimum. The Project pack misses out too many of the best UA plugins.

the compression / eq plugs in this pack are amazing...built-in reverbs are pretty good - the additional Plate140 verb is well worth a look as an add-on.

if u need a top-class limiter then you should really consider purchasing the Precision Limiter plugin in addition to the pack...

The UA system allows you to run unlimited 14-day demos of the plug-ins you don't own so you can properly evaluate each one prior to purchase.

A word of warning though - take a look at the UAD forum (Here: http://www.chrismilne.com/uadforums/) to make sure that your system will be compatible with the UAD card - some PC & Mac machines have incompatible chipsets / motherboards etc...

oh... and TriTone's excellent Hydratone EQ is worth a look too!

elwood · Post by **elwood** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 9:07 pm

I have to share my happy experience. I made an impulse purchase last week - I bought a 2nd hand UAD project pak (+LA2A and Fairchild included). Absolutely my best (impulsive behaviour based) purchase ever!

IMHO, you can't go wrong with any of the PAKs.
BTW, I'm running the card on MSI Neo4 Platinum (nfroce4), with 6600gt pci-e gfx card and Emu 1820m.

Jaeson Merrill · Post by **Jaeson Merrill** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 9:16 pm

i would like to hear audio examples why to stay away from blue tubes...

AndrewSimon · Post by **AndrewSimon** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 9:25 pm

Jaeson Merrill wrote:i would like to hear audio examples why to stay away from blue tubes...

I think Blue Tubes is pretty cool.
I especially love the Chorus..... but I love the UAD more.

Jaeson Merrill · Post by **Jaeson Merrill** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 9:36 pm

well, i keep hearing bad things about blue tubes, and never really see any proof, i was thinking of gettings these plugs not too long ago..

4damind · Post by **4damind** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:02 pm

Jaeson Merrill wrote:well, i keep hearing bad things about blue tubes, and never really see any proof, i was thinking of gettings these plugs not too long ago..

Yes, many people say not the best about the "blue tubes". But nobody can say whats wrong with this plugins. My experience with t-racks and blue tubes(2) says that both are at a very high level.

But I have no idea if the level of the UAD1 plugins is much higher.

stag · Post by **stag** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:08 pm

UAD??? i sell 4 of them, or trade for regular software or proper hardware.

bmanic · Post by **bmanic** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:14 pm

4damind wrote:
Jaeson Merrill wrote:well, i keep hearing bad things about blue tubes, and never really see any proof, i was thinking of gettings these plugs not too long ago..
Yes, many people say not the best about the "blue tubes". But nobody can say whats wrong with this plugins. My experience with t-racks and blue tubes(2) says that both are at a very high level.

But I have no idea if the level of the UAD1 plugins is much higher.

Just register for a bluetubes demo and decide for yourself. IMHO Bluetubes products in general are always much more talk and nice graphics than sound. For instance the EQs are extremely harsh and grainy and the compressors sound the exact opposite to what I've come to like in high quality digital compressors, that is, smoothnes and a release stage that seems to be just 'right' in nearly all situationts. This is not true for the bluetubes compressors which tend to pump 'wrong' most of the time.

The only bluetubes plugin that I took a fancy to was the oilcan delay.

Cheers!
bManic

grotman · Post by **grotman** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:28 pm

Jaeson Merrill wrote:i would like to hear audio examples why to stay away from blue tubes...

Bought em . Used them . Sold them.

Why? Cause everything i approached them with came out sounding hollow. Could be just personal preference though. Would like to of kept the oilcan delay though, it was my pick of the bunch. Try the demo see what you think,you might just like them.

Its funny that you ask for audio samples....i might just have a couple lurking about, i'll check it out and get back to you.

Lately i have been porting everything through hardware effects and then out a speaker usually an guitar amp and then micing the speaker back into my soundcard, but i have to then delay some of the tracks i double up this way so phase stays in control. It sounds to me just so much better than a lot of plugs i used to use exclusively over hardware.

Saying that... the most used plugs and softsynths i have are actually free ones that sit in the mix just right and one of them the fabulous tempo delay by dB
is now 4 or 5 years old, but just is fantastic as a send.

I really want Blue though, that is one of the coolest synths i have heard to date.

Frippertronix · Post by **Frippertronix** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 12:59 am

Try everything from WWAYM, all the Kjaerhus Golden series plugs, Posihfopit, everything from TbT that is still available (particularly pocket limiter), before going for UAD-1 or Sonalkis's (IMO) overpriced native plugs.

That leaves you still looking for a great native reverb and there I think the water gets muddier simply because price vs. performance doesn't leave any clear winners, IMO, compared with UAD's plate reverb. I have Princeton but I'm not crazy about it. You might try Spin Audio, PSP, and Arts Acoustic reverbs, all of which are reasonably priced. For free stuff, you might try Kjaerhus Classic and Ambience from Smart Electronix (donation requested).

fgimian · Post by **fgimian** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 5:15 am

could I also add Voxengo to the list ? www.voxengo.com Very impressive and very cheap !

honestly, I have heard so many bad things about BlueTubes & T-Racks so I think you may want to stay away from em. although I can't personally say I've tried them SO much, I just found that the BlueTubes stuff sounded extremely average, if that ... they claim things that they don't actually deliver.

The best sounding analog non-UAD1 based native VST plugins i think are ... Sonalksis, URS & Tritone. Voxengo fill the digital gap nicely, very tranpsarent sounding stuff. Kjaerhus to me, is something in between analog & digital, analogue character, digital clarity

Cheers
Fots

AndrewSimon · Post by **AndrewSimon** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 5:48 am

Jaeson Merrill wrote:i would like to hear audio examples why to stay away from blue tubes...

I have small sound bites of the Blue Tube Chorus that I liked and even comparison to others at:

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic ... 20#1378420

dc12 · Post by **dc12** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 5:48 am

one more vote for UAD

UAD1 or sonalksis, t-racks, blue tubes...?