KVR Audio

ItsMikeE · Post by **ItsMikeE** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 9:35 pm

I have read reviews of Kontakt and Mach 5, etc.
A lot is written about what you can do with your samples.

For someone who is starting out from scratch, has anyone advice on which of the sample players comes with the best sample library.

Obviously this is subjective, but I am looking for good quality in all the main instruments, pianos, strings, basses, brass, etc.

keyman_sam · Post by **keyman_sam** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 9:39 pm

A library like MUSE has all of those things like brass, strings, and whatnot. GVI-formatted though. For kontakt, i'm sure there's something similar.

Alternatively, you could check out my link for some non-basic sounds for shortcircuit.

koolkeys · Post by **koolkeys** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 10:50 pm

The Kontakt library covers almost every bread and butter sound you could want. From pianos, guitars, bass, synth, drums, e-pianos, some great brass instruments, ethnic instruments, pads, organs, and an entire orchestra. All that and more straight out of the box.

I'm not familiar with MUSE, so I can't compare. But Kontakt's library is full of everything you mentioned and so much more. Plus it can load thousands of other available instruments that are created for Kontakt and other samplers.

I'm biased a bit, since I love Kontakt(best sampler IMO by far). But it really fits the bill for what you mentioned.

You could also try out libraries like Collosus, which Kontakt can also load, but comes with it's own player as well.

Brent

AtypicalAudio · Post by **AtypicalAudio** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 11:09 pm

A good entry into the sample player field is Independence Free by Yellow Tools. It covers a large selection of sounds. And it's free.

www.yellowtools.com

Peter

koolkeys · Post by **koolkeys** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 11:26 pm

AtypicalAudio wrote:A good entry into the sample player field is Independence Free by Yellow Tools. It covers a large selection of sounds. And it's free.

www.yellowtools.com

Peter

I agree that it's fantastic, however he would still have to supplement it because it doesn't contain pianos, strings, or brass.

So that as well as a couple other sources might do him good, who knows.

Brent

dougsyo · Post by **dougsyo** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 3:51 am

Your choices:
- DimPro - 7GB or so library, sample-based synth interface rather than sampler, RAM-based
- Kontakt 3 (or maybe 2nd-hand Kontakt 2) - streams. 33GB library for K3, 15GB for K2, very good 3rd-party library support, although Puremagnetik has already switched to K3 for sample distribution

- Sampletank 2XL, and/or Sonik Synth 2 and/or Philharmonik (or Total Workstation Bundle for all 3). RAM-based, sampler interface.

I have K2, DimPro and TWB. DimPro is my "goto", and TBH I could probably probably give up either the Kontakt2 or TWB and not miss too much in the big picture even if I'd miss some specifics.

With K2's library, GPO, Kompakt, and third-party sounds I probably have 40GB of Kontakt-format samples (four pianos alone are 13GB of that). Between the three IK products and some "expansion tanks" I probably have 25GB of Sampletank-format sounds.

You'll want at least 1GB of RAM with any of them, and more is better for ST2 and Kontakt.

Doug

ItsMikeE · Post by **ItsMikeE** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 5:45 pm

Thanks for your responses.
I have a copy of YellowTools.

I had the chance to play with NI Komplete in a store recently.
The B3 emulation sounded great, the pianos pretty good.
When it came to Kontakt I was disappointed.
It may have been the way it was set up in the shop, it may have been that I did not know what I was doing, but it did not sound good to me.

bioLogic · Post by **bioLogic** » Wed Feb 27, 2008 9:13 pm

koolkeys wrote:You could also try out libraries like Collosus, which Kontakt can also load, but comes with it's own player as well.

And right in the same vein (actually same company, just updated version), there's Goliath, which is the 32G Colossus + 8G more, including the East/West Bosendorfer piano.

A pretty impressive start, though it is expensive, at ~$600 with the PLAY engine. An advantage of K3 is definitely the 3rd party development it gives you access to...

ItsMikeE · Post by **ItsMikeE** » Wed Feb 27, 2008 10:08 pm

Digital Village in South London are having an expo in London tomorrow.
Native Instruments will be there demoing Komplete, so I should get to hear what Kontakt can really do.

kevvvvv · Post by **kevvvvv** » Wed Feb 27, 2008 10:25 pm

Colossus

Has all the usual suspects, but they generally sound more interesting and characterful than Kontakt or Halion.

Basic Sample Library