Hello!
I'm looking to buy one of this library, but it's a little hard to make a choice.
Can you help me please, with your opinions?
Thanks!
Cristian
East West Symphonic Gold Orchestra Vs. Vienna Essential Orchestra
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- KVRAF
- 26033 posts since 20 Oct, 2007 from gonesville
the sound of one vs the other is a matter of taste. in terms of bang for the buck, my opinion is compare the number of articulations and weigh cost there.
I know the VSL is recorded without extra processing and the soundstage is quite minimized or 'dry'. EWQL deals with that in a microphone distance paradigm. I only know from their Silver as far as orchestra. I think there's more to the VSL samples. I don't want EWQL rooms/halls etc in my music and the help they give their samples makes it unattractive to me. For some people 'out of the box' EWQL impresses but I'd rather mix it myself.
I know the VSL is recorded without extra processing and the soundstage is quite minimized or 'dry'. EWQL deals with that in a microphone distance paradigm. I only know from their Silver as far as orchestra. I think there's more to the VSL samples. I don't want EWQL rooms/halls etc in my music and the help they give their samples makes it unattractive to me. For some people 'out of the box' EWQL impresses but I'd rather mix it myself.
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- KVRAF
- 4420 posts since 7 Nov, 2005 from Florida
I own both.
EWQLSO is wet, but easy to play. Comes with lots of articulations and sounds really good. However, they recorded the room ambience, so they do sound wet. I own the Gold XP edition, so I do not have the ability to play with the 3 mics, but I get everything that the Platinum edition has at 16 bit. The strings, woodwinds and brass are good, the percussion is so/so. Add Storm Drum 1, 2 or 3 to fatten the percussive sound. Their stuff is always on sale every few months, so wait for one.
VSL Special Edition is more technical, more precise, very dry and takes some getting used to. The vsti that it comes with is functional and easy enough to use. The pro edition of the vsti adds nice features as well. VSL is more expensive than EWQLSO. It seems like a better orchestral collection and comes with everything you would need for MOST scores. You can always add on to it. The strings, brass, woodwinds, percussion and other instruments it comes with are all expertly sampled and sound very good in a mix. You will need to season to taste - these samples are 100% dry. Rarely on sale. Buy second hand if you can.
KHSO Virtuoso/Diamond is another player in the orchestral arena. Some of the best strings and brass you will ever hear. The solo violin is of special consideration - just AMAZING. The percussion is lacking. The woodwinds are completely useable. Overall, KHSO is a superb orchestral collection for a less expensive price (although not as inexpensive as it used to be) - look for sales and good deals from time to time on KVR.
There are plenty of others, like Project Sam, Albion, etc. Just do your due diligence and weigh all the options. The good news is that they are all good enough for hobbyist, semi-pro and pro composers, so no matter what you will probably love what you purchase.
Mike
EWQLSO is wet, but easy to play. Comes with lots of articulations and sounds really good. However, they recorded the room ambience, so they do sound wet. I own the Gold XP edition, so I do not have the ability to play with the 3 mics, but I get everything that the Platinum edition has at 16 bit. The strings, woodwinds and brass are good, the percussion is so/so. Add Storm Drum 1, 2 or 3 to fatten the percussive sound. Their stuff is always on sale every few months, so wait for one.
VSL Special Edition is more technical, more precise, very dry and takes some getting used to. The vsti that it comes with is functional and easy enough to use. The pro edition of the vsti adds nice features as well. VSL is more expensive than EWQLSO. It seems like a better orchestral collection and comes with everything you would need for MOST scores. You can always add on to it. The strings, brass, woodwinds, percussion and other instruments it comes with are all expertly sampled and sound very good in a mix. You will need to season to taste - these samples are 100% dry. Rarely on sale. Buy second hand if you can.
KHSO Virtuoso/Diamond is another player in the orchestral arena. Some of the best strings and brass you will ever hear. The solo violin is of special consideration - just AMAZING. The percussion is lacking. The woodwinds are completely useable. Overall, KHSO is a superb orchestral collection for a less expensive price (although not as inexpensive as it used to be) - look for sales and good deals from time to time on KVR.
There are plenty of others, like Project Sam, Albion, etc. Just do your due diligence and weigh all the options. The good news is that they are all good enough for hobbyist, semi-pro and pro composers, so no matter what you will probably love what you purchase.
Mike
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- KVRAF
- 4420 posts since 7 Nov, 2005 from Florida
NP. Also keep in mind that out of the three I mention, two (EWQL and VSL) require USB dongles (iLok, etc). If that's a sticking point, keep that in mind.saregardu wrote:Thank you very much for your post, Mike!
Cristian
There is also Project Sam and Albion and a few others. It's a good time to be looking for a orchestral collection because there are plenty of choices and most of them are quite good.
Mike
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- KVRAF
- 26033 posts since 20 Oct, 2007 from gonesville
These remarks kind of gloss over something that isn't trivial.Karmacomposer wrote:The vsti that [VSL] comes with is functional and easy enough to use. The pro edition of the vsti adds nice features as well.
The Vienna Instruments interface actually is far more powerful than anything out there (unless you have some very heavy scripting in Kontakt such as Orange Tree and using his Mind Control application).
On the left are matrices, which consist of the cells you see in the middle of the picture, which is an X/Y setup, L-R switched here by keys, and Top-Bottom additionally switched by CC. You can see the other options for switching I obtained R-clicking. So say you want performance trills articulation or 'legato fast', you can set it up to be switched by speed... There I have a matrix for various aspects of that library. I keyswitch those. The amount you can have loaded in one instance is enormous.
Also there are slots so you can load four patches; 1a/1b, 2a/2b. a-b uses a slot crossfade paradigm; so you can bring in a sus vibrato as your legato runs out of sample, and this type of thing.
You can see all your controllers there. This is all on the same page and it's just intuitive and obvious for the user. Play is really limited and clunky next to this.
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- KVRist
- 467 posts since 3 Jun, 2012
+1 for VSL here
nothing much to add as Mike and jancivil has explained it very good !
personal i'm in the middle to replace my EW Libraries with more VSL Libraries !
nothing against the quality of the Sound of EW Librarys , the Play 4 Update was a disaster for me personal it doesent have load my old projects correctly from my ssd's ! and to be honest i can't find any exiting news on Play 4 , except they have added an mixer Page and implement the SSL/FX Suite (they don't even offer even an demo version to try if it really works for older Librarys) ! the Customer Support isn't also that good on EW , and if you follow some threads you can see it ! and the point that any EW Software or Librarys you can't resell you stick with it !
VSL offers you a demo of any Software they have to try it out and have a look before you buy it (except Librarys) ! another thing VSL offers you upgrade or update pathes for existing customers towards bigger or different librarys and single instruments when you think someday you have the needs (EW don't , only from discontinued kontakt librarys and towards the same library for example silver to gold or Diamond)! VSL has also an good Support ! and also if someday anything will happen to you , that you needs to close your studio or you are not happy or something other , you can resell any of the VSL Software and Librarys !
said that are my personal opinion and experience
nothing much to add as Mike and jancivil has explained it very good !
personal i'm in the middle to replace my EW Libraries with more VSL Libraries !
nothing against the quality of the Sound of EW Librarys , the Play 4 Update was a disaster for me personal it doesent have load my old projects correctly from my ssd's ! and to be honest i can't find any exiting news on Play 4 , except they have added an mixer Page and implement the SSL/FX Suite (they don't even offer even an demo version to try if it really works for older Librarys) ! the Customer Support isn't also that good on EW , and if you follow some threads you can see it ! and the point that any EW Software or Librarys you can't resell you stick with it !
VSL offers you a demo of any Software they have to try it out and have a look before you buy it (except Librarys) ! another thing VSL offers you upgrade or update pathes for existing customers towards bigger or different librarys and single instruments when you think someday you have the needs (EW don't , only from discontinued kontakt librarys and towards the same library for example silver to gold or Diamond)! VSL has also an good Support ! and also if someday anything will happen to you , that you needs to close your studio or you are not happy or something other , you can resell any of the VSL Software and Librarys !
said that are my personal opinion and experience
Last edited by DrumAddict on Fri Aug 30, 2013 10:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 212 posts since 19 Aug, 2010
Thanks DrumAddict!
I didn't use Play but I saw in some video demo, that consumes a lot of memory in comparation with Vsl Player.
Is it that true?
Thanks.
Cristian
I didn't use Play but I saw in some video demo, that consumes a lot of memory in comparation with Vsl Player.
Is it that true?
Thanks.
Cristian
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- KVRAF
- 4420 posts since 7 Nov, 2005 from Florida
Very much so. Play is a HOG. I like that I can load instruments from my symphonic collection AND Storm Drum AND Symphonic Choirs, but by the time all those samples have loaded, you can barely play it.saregardu wrote:Thanks DrumAddict!
I didn't use Play but I saw in some video demo, that consumes a lot of memory in comparation with Vsl Player.
Is it that true?
Thanks.
Cristian
VSL's vsti is very lean and mean.
Mike
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- KVRAF
- 26033 posts since 20 Oct, 2007 from gonesville
yeah, more good points. NB: I don't work for VSL in any capacity.
The support is so good. I didn't have issues I needed support for with EWQL except I didn't understand iLok was causing me an installation issue, and they sorted me in a timely fashion. Their forum is treacherous though.
I made a post, just asking about the compatibility with VE Pro and it seemed to diappear, relegated to the Hardware sub-forum to die quietly, next to the hosting thing Rodgers never got off the ground which DID require hardware, a sound card in the old computer farm paradigm. But I digress.
At VSL the developers watch the forum. Sometimes they would rather see a support ticket, for something no one is replicating, but as a resource it's extremely good. It feels like a small dev, in the way they're attentive to the end user.
Play, I don't notice a performance issue so much but with a larger template it seems a little slow on the GUI side of things. Vienna Instruments seems very optimized for the job.
No, they won't give you a demo of a library as a new user. But they provided me one. Note that a Vienna Key holds a universal license with 180 starts. There was someone selling a hard drive to demo it all, using that. Some German vendor I believe.
The support is so good. I didn't have issues I needed support for with EWQL except I didn't understand iLok was causing me an installation issue, and they sorted me in a timely fashion. Their forum is treacherous though.
I made a post, just asking about the compatibility with VE Pro and it seemed to diappear, relegated to the Hardware sub-forum to die quietly, next to the hosting thing Rodgers never got off the ground which DID require hardware, a sound card in the old computer farm paradigm. But I digress.
At VSL the developers watch the forum. Sometimes they would rather see a support ticket, for something no one is replicating, but as a resource it's extremely good. It feels like a small dev, in the way they're attentive to the end user.
Play, I don't notice a performance issue so much but with a larger template it seems a little slow on the GUI side of things. Vienna Instruments seems very optimized for the job.
No, they won't give you a demo of a library as a new user. But they provided me one. Note that a Vienna Key holds a universal license with 180 starts. There was someone selling a hard drive to demo it all, using that. Some German vendor I believe.
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composingkeys3 composingkeys3 https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=207221
- KVRist
- 72 posts since 12 May, 2009 from ILIO
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composingkeys3 composingkeys3 https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=207221
- KVRist
- 72 posts since 12 May, 2009 from ILIO
VSL Keys no longer provide 180 Demo Starts. You can however obtain a 30 day demo license to tryout a specific library by contacting them first.
Also an Elicenser or Steinberg Key will work as well to use with VSL products as the Vienna Key is the same dongle which uses the eLicenser Control Center.
Also an Elicenser or Steinberg Key will work as well to use with VSL products as the Vienna Key is the same dongle which uses the eLicenser Control Center.
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- KVRer
- 1 posts since 15 Aug, 2018
Stay away from east west.....I have both EW and VSL and VSL is a joy to work with....EW is a continuing nightmare....I have a 2017 Imac with latest software and plenty of memory so my computer is not the problem....I have EW hollywood strings,brass and Plat Pianos....sounds are ok but are totally outdated....and there are constant updates because there are so many problems with the PLAY software....Just yesterday Logic crashed twice because of Play....Vsl works flawlessly