Newbie Q - Used Receptor 1 - good deal? good for my application?

[lchender]

Hi Everyone,

I'm a newbie here and have been considering the jump from hardware synths to software synths for a while. I recently heard about Receptor from a salesperson at my local music store whom I trust almost implicitly and I'm very interested.

I have an opportunity to pick up a Receptor v1.00 Rev B (1GB ram, not sure how to check how big the hard drive is) for $700 Canadian, which seemed like a pretty decent deal to me. From what I understand, it would be fairly easy for me to bump the RAM up to 2GB and put a bigger hard drive into the unit, but I'm not sure if it would have enough hardware 'oomph' to do what I would like.

I want to use the unit for live performance in an R&B band where I play primarily Piano and B3 with a bit of Clavinet and Rhodes sprinkled in occassionally. My idea is that I could have a really great Piano (Synthogy Ivory) and a good B3 softsynth (B4II perhaps?) along with maybe Lounge Lizard 3 for Rhodes and a Clavinet softsynth. I'd like to have 4-5 sounds loaded up and ready to go, but I would only actually be playing a maximum of 2 sounds at once (typically multi-keyboarding with Piano + B3). I'd like to be able to run 64 note polyphony on Ivory, likely with the Yamaha C7 sample set, with respectable latency settings for live performance.

For those who are experienced in these matters, would the Receptor I with the specs mentioned above be zippy enough to do what I've described? I know I can upgrade to Receptor II, and I would probably consider that in the near future, but it would be nice to be able to use it out of the box for a while. Opinions?

Thanks!

[UltraJv]

Receptor is not considered to be a PC so you cant just replace the HDD yourself as the OS (Modified Linux)isnt easy to just copy across.

Ivory 1.7 not supported :

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=249875

[lchender]

The post on Ivory 1.7 not being supported is from April. 9 months later, is it still unsupported?

[UltraJv]

I did a search on KVR and can only see 1.7 working on Receptor 2. Ivory 1.65 seemed to work on Receptor 1. Maybe someone else has better info.

[richwhite9]

Ivory 1.6x runs well on Receptor. Great in fact.

Ivory 1.7x uses iLok and isn't suppported on Rev B and Cs. That requires OS 1.8 which is just now being released for Rev B and Cs and requires a factory Hard Drive swap. See the threads on 1.8 upgrades.

[richwhite9]

As a side note, Ivory has accomodated a few people running Receptor B and Cs with a 'dowmgrade' copy of Ivory 1.6.

[fedde]

Hi lchender,

I use my Receptor B in about the same way as you plan to do. I installed 2GB memory (investigate the right type before buying!) but kept the 40 GB drive.

I use the following plugins (and more):
- Ivory 1.6 with Yamaha C7
- Mr Ray73 Rhodes (sounds great and is free, check
http://www.genuinesoundware.com/)
- VB3 Hammond organ (sounds great too, available for under 50 euro at the same place)
- Mr Tramp wurlitzer
- ZD6 Clavinet

All those plugins run fine on a Receptor B and are great for R&B, soul and funk. When you add some samplers+samples you can even have more fun. I think I used Ivory at 24 or 32 polyphony (enough for me), but at full quality settings. I don't know if 64 polyphony works ok. If not you could reduce the quality settings, e.g. by reducing the number of samples per key. Note that on the 40GB drive only one of the three grands of Ivory will fit.

Seems to be a good price too.

Best regards,

Fedde Bouwman

[lchender]

Thanks to everyone for all the replies! I'm leaning towards picking the unit up. I suspect I'll eventually end up upgrading the unit to Receptor II anyhow, but probably not right away. Is it possible to upgrade only to Receptor II specs rather than Pro or Pro Max? I only see upgrade prices listed on the website for the 2 latter options.

Cheers!