Please, by all means, go on as long as you like. I'm a big boy. I can take the heat.Robmobius wrote:Kettle black?wagtunes wrote:
Again with the assumptions. Please read my earlier post. I am very pleased with the synths that I have. I am just looking for something different to add to my tool box. Again I ask, do you all just have one or two synths? Some do but many don't. Your buying other synths has nothing to do with not being "pleased" with what you already own, correct?
People really need to stop making assumptions and actually read what I said in my initial post.
You've made some bizarre assumptions about synths that you've probably played with for 30 seconds. Dune II as one example, Xils (I could go on).
So when you stop making assumptions we will stop as well.
In my initial evaluation of Dune 2, I can only go by what I read and what I heard in the demos. They tell me I5 or I7, I believe them. They make sounds demos of nothing but EDM sounds, what am I supposed to think? If their synth does more than that, they need to market it better. Plain and simple. The demos are one dimensional.
As for XILS, I have no idea what you're talking about. I own XILS 4 and Oxium is on my list of possibilities right up there with Spectral.
Anyway, I downloaded Dune 2 and didn't need more than 30 minutes with it to make my evaluation. Yes, when you've been around synths for 36 years you don't need hours to play with something.
Here are my personal opinions of Dune 2. As they are opinions they cannot be wrong. They are what they are. However, I will point out a couple of facts about Dune 2 in my evaluation that can't be disputed. Where I mention facts, i will proceed them with the label FACT.
Anyway, here goes.
Dune 2 is a very clean sounding synth, at least to my ears. The interface is nice and compact and everything is pretty easy to find. It has a nice number of modulation slots which is important to me, so that's a big plus.
The filters, which are also very important to me, are good. I can't say they're great. I've heard better. But I don't think the filters are Dune 2's big selling point. I think it's the big, clean, fat detuned sound. The unison and detune essentially give this synth its signature sound.
The FX are nice. I particularly like the tape delay. I don't know of any other synth that has one and it's really cool sounding.
I also like the arp. Very flexible and easy to program.
About the demo. I am disappointed that they only give you 64 presets. Couldn't they let you hear all 400? Not that this matters because I do all my own programming. But it would be nice to hear what the synth can do before you start fiddling with it.
Anyway, after I went through all 64 presets (nice) I then dug into programming. This is what I found that I didn't like.
FACT: The VA oscillators are very basic. Saw, square, triangle, sine. This was kind of disappointing to me. But even more so were the other 2 synthesis type oscillators. The FM only has 2 algos. WTF? Really? The WT synthesis appears to have no way to create your own wavetables. It appears you are limited to the ones that come with Dune 2. If there is an import wave feature, I'm not seeing it.
So, IMO, Dune 2 in this area is trying to do too many things and as a result doesn't do any of them particularly well except maybe for the VA oscillator which is pretty standard. Also, that it only has 3 oscillators (2 really but I'll give them a pass on the 3rd limited one) which limits you to the sounds you can get as far as layering goes.
Dune 2, as I said, sounds great. It's nice and clean and with all the detune, can sound very big. There is no bottom end to this thing to speak of. At least nothing I call a bottom end. It's essentially another glassy synth like Electra 2, which I have.
Dune 2 reminds me of a really drop dead gorgeous fashion model. But then you sit down to talk to her and find out there's nothing between the ears. She's just another pretty face, which is what Dune 2 is. I can make some really nice sounds with it. But I can make some really nice sounds with the synths I already have. In comparison, Zebra 2 blows this synth out of the water.
So the question comes down to this.
Do I need another $169 synth that does stuff that I can already do and better? There is just nothing new here.
I can absolutely understand why people love Dune 2. Had this been 2013 when I first started doing PC recording, I probably would have gotten this synth. In fact, I used to have the Dune LE or whatever it was called. I liked it. It was okay, but it didn't blow me away once I started buying top name synths.
That's where I am with Dune 2. Given what I already have, and that I feel Spectral at $20 less actually does more (wave draw for osc and filters) why would I spend $20 more on a synth that does less?
One day, when I'm rolling in dough, I might actually get Dune 2. As I said, it's a nice sounding synth. It just doesn't wow me with what I already own.
In a 'special' way that's not a wrong statement.
What has glitz got to do with anything? I thought we were talking about capability here.
