KVR Audio

mkdr · Post by **mkdr** » Wed Feb 04, 2015 8:17 pm

Doesn't sound like anything special at all to me. There are plenty of plugs that do better preamp saturation with maybe 100th of the cpu use.

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Wed Feb 04, 2015 9:23 pm

I think I can say one thing with certainty :

This plugs certainly "colors"

(ie. colors our impression of the plug, due to it's cpu usage. iirc, exactly as with Wave Arts Tube Saturator and with Slate's Studer Tape and UAD Studer Tape).

Its a great plug ONCE YOU UNDERSTAND HOW TO DRIVE IT. otherwise, one most certainly gets a false impression of it (for the better and for the worst).

camsr · Post by **camsr** » Thu Feb 05, 2015 3:28 am

The extra emphasis it gives...

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Thu Feb 05, 2015 4:30 am

DELETE

foo21345 · Post by **foo21345** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 1:56 am

These are my impressions of SGA1566 MkII after playing with it for a day; I have been using SGA1566 for couple of months and really like the sound. As far as the tube sound goes, SGA1566 MkII is the same as SGA1566.

Added oversampling filter nicely keeps high frequencies unattenuated, which works well for hi hats, white noise, etc.. I haven’t had a use for 8x oversampling, but it’s good to know that it is there.

The ability to switch EQ out of the signal path is nice. With the EQ out of the signal path I don’t have to worry about the phase shift it may cause.

SGA1566 MkII is definitely more performant than SGA1566 for, both, HIGH and LOW CPU selections. I really love the MID CPU mode. Soundwise, I could not tell the difference between the MID and HIGH CPU modes on the tracks I have tried. Having the MID cpu mode lets me free up plenty of CPU cycles for other plugs. In all fairness, MID cpu setting still puts a strain on the CPU, but substantially less than the HIGH setting.

All in all I am very happy I bought SGA1566 MkII.

Just wanted to add my 2c regarding the sound of SGA1566/SGA1566 MkII. To my ears SGA1566 (MkII) has the best tube emulation with Wave Arts’ Tube Saturator very close second. SGA1566 can even make a track totally destroyed by a bitcrusher sound warm. Some of the ways I use this plug is slightly overdriven to add bit of a compression to my drum tracks, completely “clean” on vocal and synth tracks for some added analog feel.

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 4:38 am

Just a lame question : what IS "the best tube emulation sound" ?

Although I make music for many years now, I still don't know "what" it is comprised of. I can read people raving about this and that plug, hailing it "the best".

IMO, SGA is worth a "thank you" (pay)pal-on-the-back.

VariKusBrainZ · Post by **VariKusBrainZ** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 8:10 am

Tp3 wrote:
IMO, SGA is worth a "thank you" (pay)pal-on-the-back.

Then you dont appreciate the research, knowledge and work that goes into creating circuit emulating software.

Or perhaps you need some decent headphones/monitors

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 9:30 am

VariKusBrainZ wrote:
Tp3 wrote:
IMO, SGA is worth a "thank you" (pay)pal-on-the-back.
Then you dont appreciate the research, knowledge and work that goes into creating circuit emulating software.

Or perhaps you need some decent headphones/monitors

Friend, I don't know what you just said but in plain English I meant that IMO it is worth saying a "thank you" to the dev in the form of buying the "bigger brother" (which I did).

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 9:59 am

SGA, I don't know what have you done (naughty naughty !

) but CPU has been reduced MASSIVELY in a freshly downloaded SGA1566MkII (which bares the same build date... am I right ? I assumed that MkII also benefited from code enhancements...seems it has)

Whatever it is, these are great news !

Cheers

foo21345 · Post by **foo21345** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 12:48 pm

Tp3 wrote:Just a lame question : what IS "the best tube emulation sound" ?

Although I make music for many years now, I still don't know "what" it is comprised of. I can read people raving about this and that plug, hailing it "the best".

IMO, SGA is worth a "thank you" (pay)pal-on-the-back.

I use tube gear (mic preamps, guitar amps, tube stomp boxes) all the time. I've even designed and built some tube guitar amps myself. Although that does not make me an expert, I would say that I have a fair amount of experience with tube gear and know what kind of sound I can expect to get from it.

Other than the obvious one "sounds warm when clean" (i.e. adds mainly 2nd and 3rd harmonics) I look for dynamics associated with tube (pre)amps. There is a kind of sponginess of the response that overdriven tube amp circuits exhibit. Overdriven sound becomes "thick" from added harmonics. I guess it's not just the tube emulation itself, but the whole circuit emulation.

Makes sense?

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 1:35 pm

foo21345 wrote:Makes sense?

For me, it makes sense... although I don't like using technical terms in order to describe another technical phenomenon (ie. "it generates 2nd and 3rd order harmonics". great ! now, how does these harmonics manifest themselves in context of sound ? - for example).

For ME, in this case, it seem that there is a gentle (or less gentle !) forwardness... and I can clearly see on my meters that the peaks are reduced, the lows becomes "meatier" and the overall experience is of "in-ya-face" sound - but although the peaks are reduced, there in no subjective loss of hi-end detail. bare in mind, though, that this (my subjective experience) COULD be due to me enthusing and gushing over the massively reduced CPU consumption (just as someone concluded that it sounds like $hit because of the CPU consumption that was monstrous). just my 0.02.

foo21345 · Post by **foo21345** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 6:09 pm

Tp3 wrote: For me, it makes sense... although I don't like using technical terms in order to describe another technical phenomenon (ie. "it generates 2nd and 3rd order harmonics". great ! now, how does these harmonics manifest themselves in context of sound ? - for example).

For ME, in this case, it seem that there is a gentle (or less gentle !) forwardness... and I can clearly see on my meters that the peaks are reduced, the lows becomes "meatier" and the overall experience is of "in-ya-face" sound - but although the peaks are reduced, there in no subjective loss of hi-end detail. bare in mind, though, that this (my subjective experience) COULD be due to me enthusing and gushing over the massively reduced CPU consumption (just as someone concluded that it sounds like $hit because of the CPU consumption that was monstrous). just my 0.02.

This plug has a pretty flat frequency response all the way down to ~20 Hz. This is good and bad. The good is that the bass can sound full and punchy/tight/bold because of the added harmonics that would add higher bass content and possibly lower mids. The bad is that you have to be careful when overdriving/distorting the bass. Too much of those added bass and lower mid frequencies can make the bass boomy, farty, muddy, and generally crappy sounding. Preventing the boomy/farty/muddy bass is the reason why most of high gain guitar amps control the bass amplification very carefully.

Squashing the peaks (i.e. compressing the peaks by virtue of overdrive) and in general non-linear signal processing generates additional harmonics. So, even though you have reduced dynamic range of the signal through compression, you have extended the harmonic content. That added, uncompressed, harmonic content is probably what gives you an impression that there is no loss of hi-end.

There you go, technical terms explaining what you experience perceptually.

Regarding the lower CPU load are you talking about the MID cpu setting on MkII? In my experience, other cpu settings on MkII do have lower CPU load than equivalent SGA1566 settings but it's nothing drastic. I have a quad i7 haswell CPU based machine.

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 6:54 pm

foo21345 wrote:There you go, technical terms explaining what you experience perceptually.

Hey, thanks !!

foo21345 wrote:Regarding the lower CPU load are you talking about the MID cpu setting on MkII? In my experience, other cpu settings on MkII do have lower CPU load than equivalent SGA1566 settings but it's nothing drastic. I have a quad i7 haswell CPU based machine.

No, even with default state (x1, low CPU), SGA was overwhelming my elderly CPU (Q9550). it was as high as 50-60%... for a single instance !
As of the new versions, its like 1/6 of that... or even 1/8. dunno what is going on in there... but me happy !

Tp3 · Post by **Tp3** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 7:05 pm

foo21345 wrote:The bad is that you have to be careful when overdriving/distorting the bass. Too much of those added bass and lower mid frequencies can make the bass boomy, farty, muddy, and generally crappy sounding. Preventing the boomy/farty/muddy bass is the reason why most of high gain guitar amps control the bass amplification very carefully.

Well, up until now I was testing it with extremely low content (bass and sub bass that comes from some programs in Microtoniq). I am very strict with driving analog emulations and I gain stage them carefully. but even so (and I haven't tried this yet), you can trim via the EQ, pre process (again, haven't tried this). well, that should be the logic behind it, no ?

foo21345 wrote:Squashing the peaks (i.e. compressing the peaks by virtue of overdrive) and in general non-linear signal processing generates additional harmonics. So, even though you have reduced dynamic range of the signal through compression, you have extended the harmonic content. That added, uncompressed, harmonic content is probably what gives you an impression that there is no loss of hi-end.

This seemed to have happened to me with a few more plugs (eg. with the tape emus from Toneboosters and u-He and FilterGrizzly and phil-L's Tube preamp). at least that was the impression I was getting (with knowing how to articulate in a technical manner).

audiosabre · Post by **audiosabre** » Sat Feb 07, 2015 9:02 pm

Tp3 wrote:Just properly gain stage it, and it WILL sing beautifully. simple as that

Tp3 wrote:Don't let misuse "color" your opinion. try to gain stage it with plugs like Perception, and differences would be night and day.

There you go with the assumption again. I don't have as positive experience as you, so I must be doing something wrong? That's rather rude

Seems like you're an "expert" on this stuff

Shattered Glass Audio releases SGA1566 - free, circuit simulation powered preamp plug-in