Analog or digital ?

[longbongsilver]

I'll give it a whirl. Whatever, I'm bored:

Ok. Quick blind test.

http://www.u-he.com/music/DorA.wav

9 x the same non-distracting bass line.

Are there any analogue synths used?
Are there any digital synths used?
Are there any plugins used?
But most importantly: Which is which?

I think, at the least, that the first two, then the ones at 40 & 55 seconds are analog. The one at 1:04 is plugin, the rest are VA synths.

BTW: if the absolute FIRST one turns out to be plugin, I want to know which plugin.

[living sounds]

OK, here are my guesses:

0 probably analog

8 analog, probably more recent one

16 digital, ITB

24 probably analog with DCOs (Novation Bass Station etc.)

32 Plugin

40 analog

48 Plugin

56 VA synth, probably hardware

1,04 Plugin

Pretty good. 6.5 right guesses, one is only half right. One freeware synth isn't analogue and one analogue synth isn't digital.

Hm, the second one might be a plugin as well. Other than that all I'll say is that I'd be very surprised if the one at the beginning and the one at 40 turned out to be plugins.

[Kriminal]

didnt listen, but i bet the first one is Bazille

[zerocrossing]

Ok. Quick blind test.

http://www.u-he.com/music/DorA.wav

9 x the same non-distracting bass line.

Are there any analogue synths used?
Are there any digital synths used?
Are there any plugins used?
But most importantly: Which is which?

I'll throw my hat in the ring mostly because I love to see how I have no idea. I'm not even going to pretend that there's a difference between software and a hardware VA.

1 VA
2 analog
3 VA
4 VA
5 analog
6 analog
7 VA
8 analog
9 VA

[starla*]

my guess

1.analog
2.digital
3.digital
4.analog
5.digital
6.analog
7.digital
8.analog
9.digital

[todd_r]

This was alot harder with a relativly simple bass sounds, but here's my guess


1.analogue
2.digital
3.digital
4.analogue
5.digital
6.analogue
7.analogue
8.digital
9.digital

[Razoth]

1. Zebra 2.5
2. Zebra 2.5
3. Zebra 2.5
4. Zebra 2.5
5. Zebra 2.5
6. Zebra 2.5
7. Zebra 2.5
8. Zebra 2.5
9. Zebra 2.5

[tony tony chopper]

9. Anatal

What do I win?

too bad, they were all digilogue


(quick guess by looking at the noise: analog, digital, digital, analog, digital, analog, digital, analog, digital, and 3, 5 & 9 are the same)

[Urs]

1.analog
2.digital
3.digital
4.analog
5.digital
6.analog
7.digital
8.analog
9.digital

This is correct!

Cwejman VCO2RM -> MMF1 (24dB LP)
TAL Ekek7ro (My fav freeware synth on Mac)
Zebra2 Osc -> XMF
Cwejman VCO2RM -> MMF1 (12dB LP)
Zebra2 Osc -> XMF
Cwejman VCO2RM -> Livewire Frequensteiner
Zebra2 Osc -> XMF
Cwejman VCO2RM -> AS RS-95E
Zebra2 Osc -> VCF

In my sloppyness I put too much drive on the digital filters, and I forgot to switch too legato mode I also couldn't be bothered setting up any of the hardware synths (the modular is always set up, the rest rests in various corners and flight cases).

No DCO was used at all (my equipment list of course gives that away), but I spent a good 10 minutes tuning the Cwejman oscillators with Logic's built-in Tuner, by carefully tapping the knobs. 3 minutes later (example 8 ) they were out of tune again.

The interesting aspect IMHO is that living sounds could perfectly spot the Zebras as "Plugin" - I'm mildly depressed now, but I'll survive that.

Urs

[Kriminal]

The interesting aspect IMHO is that living sounds could perfectly spot the Zebras as "Plugin" - I'm mildly depressed now, but I'll survive that.

you may survive, but KvR will never hear the last of it....


they were of course all digital, being wav files

[living sounds]

Interesting.

It was pretty hard to judge since the Cwejman is so clean and the samples were so short. With a dirty vintage monster it would have been a lot easier. Also, the curious thing with analog is how it plays out over time. A synth line or a drum loop with a couple analog compressors on it stays a lot more interesting and less annyoing at repeated listening, probably because of the minute variations.


Here's another example of the synth I made the previous example with, this time no FX and a very boring phrase:
www.scherer.de/Download/CO2.wav
This is also a very modern and clean sounding synth, discrete analog though.

[Aroused by JarJar]

The interesting aspect IMHO is that living sounds could perfectly spot the Zebras as "Plugin" - I'm mildly depressed now, but I'll survive that.

Urs

Why depressed? Why shouldn't a plugin sound like a plugin?

I like number 7, Zebra, the best of those nine.

[Timfonie]

The interesting aspect IMHO is that living sounds could perfectly spot the Zebras as "Plugin" - I'm mildly depressed now, but I'll survive that.

Frustration is often the drive for improving things (even more).

But I guess 98% of people who listen to music made with plugins instead of hardware won't notice that fact at all, let alone care about it.

[penguinfromdeep]

Yes, nobody would probably care but it's really interesting that some people can hear the difference so clearly .. So obviously there IS a audible difference still but it makes developers work even harder! (poor developers) or then maybe not...

[Aroused by JarJar]

The interesting aspect IMHO is that living sounds could perfectly spot the Zebras as "Plugin" - I'm mildly depressed now, but I'll survive that.

Frustration is often the drive for improving things (even more).

But I guess 98% of people who listen to music made with plugins instead of hardware won't notice that fact at all, let alone care about it.

Do you think "improving" means making something sound more like something else rather than more like itself?

I would disagree. I would think that a higher ideal for a software developer would be to make something so badass that people would say, no analog can touch THAT!