New hardware toy, advice please!

[theriver]

I'd really like to get a new hardware synth to play around with, I'm making electro house/tech house/techno/minimal and that sort of flavor of music, so I need something that lends itself to useable sounds for those genres of music.

Current kit-
Laptop running-
Live6
Reason3
Guru
NI's Massive
Arturia's Minimoog vst


Only hardware I have is a Redsound darkstar XP2, which I got dead cheap.


I have a budget of about £450-500.

Current shortlist is

Dave Smith Evolver (£370 new)
Access Virus second hand (£400-450)
Nord Lead 2 second hand (£250-400)


The evolver has a nice analogue sound, but from what I hear i'm not sure it'll be as 'do it all' as a virus or nord, but i'm not sure i'll be able to get the real Phat dancefloor-moving bass goodness out of a Nord/Virus. Can they do really nice basses, or are they more lead-synths? A lot of my tracks dont have much of a lead to them, its not a sound I ever find myself struggling to get.


Any advice or other suggestions would be a great help

[Shy]

Lead and Virus are good, and the Nord Lead is the ultimate lead synth, naturally. It can make amazing bass, including that well known synthesized bass drum kick sound, and it sounds generally warmer/fatter than a Virus. It can make a very vast amount of sounds, far from only lead sounds, and It's much more fun to play with/tweak than a Virus. This is all my opinions of course, and I suggest that you check it out and compare yourself if you can.
Evolver is indeed not at all a good choice as a general purpose synth.

[thecontrolcentre]

You might want to consider a second hand Nord Modular ... I have the Micro Modular, and it has a great sound. Good for the styles you mentioned ...

[theriver]

Yeah the fact the evolver is so limited compared to something from Nord or a Virus does put me off, but then with reason and massive I have a lot of scope for more general sounds. I do find they struggle with huge electro analogue type basses though. Maybe an evolver for those types of sounds and leaving the rest to software would be a good way to go.

I did consider the Nord Modular, but I've tried modular type synths in the past and I never really got along with them. I think for me having some rules to work in is a good thing, a blank space in a modular synth just seems to suck loads of time and I end up not getting anything really done with it in the end!

[jupiter8]

I did consider the Nord Modular, but I've tried modular type synths in the past and I never really got along with them. I think for me having some rules to work in is a good thing, a blank space in a modular synth just seems to suck loads of time and I end up not getting anything really done with it in the end!

Well there's still plenty of presets to tweak. You don't have to start from scratch. I've only briefly played a Nord Modular G2X and it sounded spectacular!

[Shy]

No doubt a Nord Modular is a great synth, but for people who want to build sounds (and not use others' presets) without very much non hands on tweaking and tons of technical programming, it's a bad choice. I personally don't have much trouble with it as I'm very familiar with synths, but even though I am, I still find it much more compelling to create sounds with a uniform, non modular architercure synth. What sets a Nord Lead apart from other synths other than its unique sound is the fact that you can tweak everything hands on, right away, and that tweaking can result in a vast variety of sounds without having to use different methods and modules for specific tasks.

[theriver]

No doubt a Nord Modular is a great synth, but for people who want to build sounds (and not use others' presets) without very much non hands on tweaking and tons of technical programming, it's a bad choice. I personally don't have much trouble with it as I'm very familiar with synths, but even though I am, I still find it much more compelling to create sounds with a uniform, non modular architercure synth. What sets a Nord Lead apart from other synths other than its unique sound is the fact that you can tweak everything hands on, right away, and that tweaking can result in a vast variety of sounds without having to use different methods and modules for specific tasks.

Really leaning towards a Nord lead 2x at the moment, only thing holding me back is the sound. I can listen to some presets and clips online, but they aren't very relevant to the sort of music (Techy-electro-housey) that I make, so its hard to judge if it'll produce the huge basslines and modulated squeals/clips that I'd like from whatever I end up getting.

The instant hands on tweakablity is a huge plus, I love to tweak and record the outcomes.

[Chuck E. Jesus]

from the various virtual modulars i've tried, the Nord Mod is by far the easiest to get around...if you want to do midiclocked modulations easily, it's a great choice, and you can stack a bunch of oscs easily as well...i've seen the Micro Mod going for 300-400 US as of late...

[Shy]

theriver: get a copy of Infected Mushroom's "Converting Vegeterians", and for more aggressiveness, their "IM The Supervisor". Both albums are filled almost entirely with Nord Lead sounds and are an excellent demonstration of its capabilities.

[jupiter8]

No doubt a Nord Modular is a great synth, but for people who want to build sounds (and not use others' presets) without very much non hands on tweaking and tons of technical programming, it's a bad choice. I personally don't have much trouble with it as I'm very familiar with synths, but even though I am, I still find it much more compelling to create sounds with a uniform, non modular architercure synth. What sets a Nord Lead apart from other synths other than its unique sound is the fact that you can tweak everything hands on, right away, and that tweaking can result in a vast variety of sounds without having to use different methods and modules for specific tasks.

I was thinking more in the line of:you don't have to start with an empty canvas everytime.You could just load a NL2 model and start from there.And if that's all you ever do it'll still be a fine synth surpassing the NL2 in some areas (the endless knobs) and not in other areas (NL2 has one knob per function logically laid out). Even if you have a NL2 you have to start somewhere,right ?
And maybe some day you feel experimental and would want to add another oscillator it can be done with relative ease.