Sonalksis Essentials Love

[todd_r]

"I agree. Let's add LFO + ENV
That would be very cool.
On TBK1 as well...

I feel a new plugin coming on "

from dave atsonalksis

[DaveSonalksis]

No picture yet, but they mentioned that they probably would this week. I hope it's got the same style as TBK which I think is awesome looking.

Dave also mentioned he would be dropping some news about TBK2 soon as well which sounds cool.

TBK2? Great. I hope that includes a price reduction. I mean, I can see the price tags for their other stuff (and don't get me wrong, I love the TBK GUI also, easiest-to-use filter plug out there) but $200 USD for something that simple...it was dissapointing, the price tag.

Hello! I signed up to KvR today!

Now I can join in these conversations, instead of very infrequently lurking!

You must be prewarned, however, that time I spend on forums = time I am not spending coding... and I REALLY DO like coding...

FreeG screenshots aren't up yet because we're still adjusting the shape of the fader.
Yes, I know that sounds insane, but it's true. You'll spend a lot of time clicking on it, so we need to get it right really...

You guys weren't the only ones disappointed with the price of TBK1... but I have a plan...

As for noncontinuous resonance with TBK... well... as it goes, a lot of the inspiration for TBK was having a filter where you didn't NEED to play with the resonance - I'd wasted SOOOO much time automating cutoff AND resonance, and just got bored with it all, and decided I needed a filter that just sounded good all day.
Still, I take the point - 4 options isn't quite enough. Personally, after about a year of using it, I've most longed for a setting between Med and High... and one between Low and Med... I can do an update which is continuous... or I can do a new plug, with the Env + LFO... I'm not 100% certain what I want to do right now... but I'm posting on a forum, so you can probably help me with this

Well, hello again, nice to be here and such.
I'm a bit forum-dumb, so be gentle with me

Dave.

[bmanic]

Hey! Wellcome Dave!

Nice to see sonalksis taking a more active role though I think you should code also instead of lurking in forums.

About your pricing policy: It worked fine during the time of your first plugins release, the essentials bundle, but only because they were of superior, unique quality at the time, compared to the competition (the compressor has stood the test of time very well and is still one of the best available but this is not the case of the EQ as there are free alternatives that have much less aliasing problems).

This is the main critique for the price of your TBK1 filter plugin, which IMHO is not very unique at all. Sure, it does sound quite good but no way is it superior to Frantic filter plugin nor the FabFilter Volcano plugin, all of which are much more flexible and cost much less. Other competitors are OhmForce Quadfrohmage, again, much more flexible and definately not inferior in quality, also, much cheaper than TBK. Finally people have the option of buying the Minimonster VSTi that can also be used as a filter effects plugin. Again, much more flexible and definately not inferior, costs about the same (and you get a very good VSTi to boot!). Oh, and then there is U-he Filterscape..

As you can see, the competition is furious in this category.

Cheers!
bManic

[rydan]

Hello there!

Funny this, seems to be quite a lot sonalksis-related happening at the moment. A friend of mine is beta testing and has spoken highly of the plugs, so I thought I'd try em...

First one I tried was the 315, and I must say I really like it! I have the UAD 1176 and LA-2A, and I think it complements them excellently! By the way, I have tried the new UAD Neve 33609, but to my ears, with my material and compressor usage, I actually prefer the 315. Will buy as soon as demo ends... =)

The 517, well, possibly veeery slightly better high end than UAD Cambridge but less flexible. And, well, I have the Pultec and Neve 1073 emulations as well. Nuf said...

Suggestion for the TBK. I would actually like an input gain that goes higher than +18. Don't know it it's intentional or not, but I found that you could get some very excellent dynamic sounding distortion out of that thing when fed with really dynamic material with high input gain...

Nice to see you here Dave, by the way... =)

[DaveSonalksis]

Hello there!

Funny this, seems to be quite a lot sonalksis-related happening at the moment. A friend of mine is beta testing and has spoken highly of the plugs, so I thought I'd try em...

Haha! It's because we're taking over the universe

First one I tried was the 315, and I must say I really like it! I have the UAD 1176 and LA-2A, and I think it complements them excellently! By the way, I have tried the new UAD Neve 33609, but to my ears, with my material and compressor usage, I actually prefer the 315. Will buy as soon as demo ends... =)

Yay

The 517, well, possibly veeery slightly better high end than UAD Cambridge but less flexible. And, well, I have the Pultec and Neve 1073 emulations as well. Nuf said...

When you say less flexible... ? What does it lack?

Suggestion for the TBK. I would actually like an input gain that goes higher than +18. Don't know it it's intentional or not, but I found that you could get some very excellent dynamic sounding distortion out of that thing when fed with really dynamic material with high input gain...

Me too The distortion mechanism in there rox

Nice to see you here Dave, by the way... =)

Nice to BE here Thanks!

Dave.

[rydan]

The 517, well, possibly veeery slightly better high end than UAD Cambridge but less flexible. And, well, I have the Pultec and Neve 1073 emulations as well. Nuf said...

When you say less flexible... ? What does it lack?

Cambridge is 5 band + LP & HP, 517 4 band + LP & HP. Cambridge also has more filter types for the LP and HP (some reeeealy steep ones).

Regards

/Patrik

[DaveSonalksis]

Cambridge is 5 band + LP & HP, 517 4 band + LP & HP. Cambridge also has more filter types for the LP and HP (some reeeealy steep ones).

Regards

/Patrik

Ah, ok cool... well, that's not impossible
LP and HP filter types are pretty easy to manage, and adding an extra band is just legwork....
Leave it with me

Dave.

[bmanic]

If you plan on updating the SV 517 EQ then I highly suggest you try to upgrade it's fidelity too (oversampling perhaps?). You could add an extra button for toggling between original mode (could be default) and oversampled mode so that it retains compatibility with old projects.

Btw, there is a thread somewhere at the sonalksis forum where I clearly demonstrate the benefits of oversampling the SV 517 EQ (audio examples and all).

Cheers!
bManic

[friteuse]

If you plan on updating the SV 517 EQ then I highly suggest you try to upgrade it's fidelity too (oversampling perhaps?).

I second that. As much as I like the 517, I always feel a lack in terms of high end quality feeling, where other EQs (like URS, or the Digidisgn's EQ) excel. Maybe oversampling will do the trick (the internal bit depth is already 64, isn't it?).

I also think it could be worth to improve the 315 in this terms, too. I always found that it works extremly well as one expect from a compressor, but it seems to flatten things a bit in the meaning of loosing depth or spatiality (not dynamics of course), like a slightly milky glass or so, hard to explain... a problem with most native digital compressors (those available on mac at least), not so much with the bombfactory on protools or real analog ones. Maybe it's just my incompetence in using compressors, but maybe others feel it same.

Beside all, both, the 517 and the 315, rock, I use and love them all day!

The first thing on my wishlist for new Sonalksis products would be a really good saturator/tape emulation plugin, like PSP MixSaturator or AnalogChannel on protools, only better . The second thing could be a transient designer that really smacks on drums etc.

[rydan]

Well, don't mean to sound rude, but I will probably not buy the 517 unless it is a lot improved, both in features and even more importantly, sound quality. It is very good even as it is, but as I said before, I have quite a few good eq:s to choose from, so if I am to buy yet another, it really has to provide something extra...

The 315, well, as I said, I really like it! It can probably be improved, as can everything, but I can't really find anything specific to blame. It could have more different characteristics to choose from, obviously, and it could have a more adjustable sidechain EQ. Also, something that would be cool if it had uppwards compression (like the CQ1. "Increase gain if level is below..."). But, all in all, I think it's pretty great as it is.

[DaveSonalksis]

If you plan on updating the SV 517 EQ then I highly suggest you try to upgrade it's fidelity too (oversampling perhaps?). You could add an extra button for toggling between original mode (could be default) and oversampled mode so that it retains compatibility with old projects.

Btw, there is a thread somewhere at the sonalksis forum where I clearly demonstrate the benefits of oversampling the SV 517 EQ (audio examples and all).

When you say oversampling, I'll wager you that you ran it at a different samplerate to simulate the 'oversampling'... if you resampled it down afterwards, i'll wager again that you used a good (and cpu INTENSE) resampler.

Alas, this is the problem with oversampling - either you do it badly and it makes the eq sound worse, or you do it properly, and you wave goodbye to cpu... and bad antialiasing will flatten the response... weird huh?

Oversampling is usually a good trick for people who use 'textbook' transform techniques to design the digital coefficients... [matched-z and bilinear transform]... but the Sonalksis EQ (and this was a MAJOR factor in me joining the company) use the most advanced transform technique that I'm aware of... Even now, nothing seems to have matched it... The 517 sounds more 'analogue' than most analogue units (a lot of which have an indigenous rolloff near 20khz).
As far as I know (and I certainly stand to be corrected), none of: Sonalksis, Sony Oxford, UAD Cambridge, Kjaerhus, Voxengo, Digidesign, SSL EQs use oversampling... and I'm pretty sure that those represent the best in the world. I've always found the top-end to be veeeeery smooth and analogue, so if it's not performing for you, can you send me some sample audio and a saved preset, and I'll investigate!

[DaveSonalksis]

I second that. As much as I like the 517, I always feel a lack in terms of high end quality feeling, where other EQs (like URS, or the Digidisgn's EQ) excel. Maybe oversampling will do the trick (the internal bit depth is already 64, isn't it?).

Well, a big part of the magic of the URS is that they have the same settings as the originals...
Not to give too much of the game away, but try the high shelf with a Q of 1.2, and then set gain/freq... and keep freq much higher than you normally would. Try both shelf modes, and see what it says to you... But 1.2 is a very magic number for Qs...

And yes, it's fully 64bit double precision float...
The new revision that I've put into testing an hour ago supports VST2.4 double-precision... and it's UB

The first thing on my wishlist for new Sonalksis products would be a really good saturator/tape emulation plugin, like PSP MixSaturator or AnalogChannel on protools, only better . The second thing could be a transient designer that really smacks on drums etc.

Oh yes. To both of those ideas... I'm sure I have a transient designer sat around here somewhere, as it goes...

[DaveSonalksis]

Well, don't mean to sound rude, but I will probably not buy the 517 unless it is a lot improved, both in features and even more importantly, sound quality. It is very good even as it is, but as I said before, I have quite a few good eq:s to choose from, so if I am to buy yet another, it really has to provide something extra...

Features I can do... ask away!
I have to be completely honest though... I'm blown away that you don't like the sound quality.
Even the filter structure it uses is state-of-the-art, off the charts stuff!!
I mean.. I know that everyone has different ears... 517 does have three different bell-types and two different shelf-types... maybe we could add some more shapes that sound better to you...?

Hmm... I mean, there's no pretense that it's an accurate model of some specific piece of analogue kit... in some ways it's a reaction to that. But, at the end of the day, it's a workhorse EQ that's competent for your master channel and your lead vocal...

[defjamm]

If you plan on updating the SV 517 EQ then I highly suggest you try to upgrade it's fidelity too (oversampling perhaps?). You could add an extra button for toggling between original mode (could be default) and oversampled mode so that it retains compatibility with old projects.

Btw, there is a thread somewhere at the sonalksis forum where I clearly demonstrate the benefits of oversampling the SV 517 EQ (audio examples and all).

When you say oversampling, I'll wager you that you ran it at a different samplerate to simulate the 'oversampling'... if you resampled it down afterwards, i'll wager again that you used a good (and cpu INTENSE) resampler.

Alas, this is the problem with oversampling - either you do it badly and it makes the eq sound worse, or you do it properly, and you wave goodbye to cpu... and bad antialiasing will flatten the response... weird huh?

Oversampling is usually a good trick for people who use 'textbook' transform techniques to design the digital coefficients... [matched-z and bilinear transform]... but the Sonalksis EQ (and this was a MAJOR factor in me joining the company) use the most advanced transform technique that I'm aware of... Even now, nothing seems to have matched it... The 517 sounds more 'analogue' than most analogue units (a lot of which have an indigenous rolloff near 20khz).
As far as I know (and I certainly stand to be corrected), none of: Sonalksis, Sony Oxford, UAD Cambridge, Kjaerhus, Voxengo, Digidesign, SSL EQs use oversampling... and I'm pretty sure that those represent the best in the world.

voxengo have oversampling in some of their eqs. algorithmix have it, universal audio (pultec eq, precision eq, neve eq), refined audiometrics, massenburg.
as far as advanced transform technique:
http://www.eliosound.com/amlt
imho this is closer to analogue units (more symmetrical) than the sonalksis eq at 44k, i compared them.

[sounddesigner]

I agree that the fidelity of the sonalksis eq needs to be upgraded, i plan to buy it and the compressor in the future, but the fidelity is what kept it from being a must have to me when i demo'd it.The demo struck me as something i'd buy later but if more fidelity was there i would have bought it then instead of going elsewhere.
The prices are to high as well when one looks at the rest of the market, but apart from this the plugs are nice and i plan to buy later in the future, hope some improvements come tho!