I was pretty disappointed in Diva

[Gonga]

There are lots of soft synths that could sound "better" than analog. Thats not the real test, is it?!

There's not much use in these tests anyway, as exciting as they can be.
I agree. They're not even exciting.

The point is, many people found synth A to sound better in this test and thus voted for A to be the analogue synth. Some of those people have deep knowledge of analogue sound (as can be seen on Gearslutz, where the everyone's vote was revealed).
But regardless of perception or deep knowledge, it's the analog synth in that test that sounds analog. Not Diva.


I personally have moved on. I'm not interested in "nailing" analogue sound. I'm interested in making synthesizers that sound great. We never made a secret about this, we always said that we had vintage synthesizers to compare Diva to and we tweaked her to sound better for our taste than those.
Well, then you should change up your marketing for Diva, as your homepage reads "authentic, unrivaled analogue sound", and "what sets DIVA apart is the sheer authenticity of the analogue sound."
Even in this thread people are jizzing their pant on how analog it sounds. So they're wrong too.
Maybe "Just better" would fit today.

I also don't really think this is relevant. The sonic differences are very subtle, often beyond perception. In addition, there are sonic properties of analogue synths that are not desirable, e.g. such that people would perceive them as bugs. With this in mind it's impossible to create a successful software product that sounds absolutely analogue - it would truely disappoint.
Anything that makes the "magical" analog sound of a synth should be considered, if authentic analog is the goal. But you and Diva has moved on, so great. Diva doesn't sound analog.

Really? One of the most professionally lauded synths in recent years is so bad, that they need to change their marketing because it's too kind to their own product? Are you sure you disembarked on the correct planet?

Well, since I am one of the multitudes of "wrong" (thanks for enlightening me - I'll set about completely discarding my entire 40-year synth experience and start over now), then let me just counter by saying that you're obviously "jizzing your pant" just by saying "doesn't sound analog" over and over again. Since it is an entirely subjective, and technically meaningless, statement, you too then must be "wrong" according to your own "logic," over and over again! The repetitive nature of your continual restatement makes sense when we consider that it's necessary for you to repeat "doesn't sound analog" over and over again for you to achieve orgasm.

But this brings two questions to mind: does being wrong also make you "jizz your pant," and, what's it like to jizz only one pant? Or perhaps always being "right" does it for you? You know, like beating people over the head with "I am right and you are wrong" over and over, until they submit, and you achieve orgasm?

By the way, we all get that you don't like DIVA and we're fine with it. But please allow me my opinion: my love (it's really the only word that fits) for all my U-He synths is anything but "wrong."

[rod_zero]

Diva, heating debates since 2012.

[Garzita]

I cant believe I am agreeing in some way with the OP but I am...

I too am disappointed with Diva, dont get me wrong, I love ALL my other U-He products, all the way from Zoyd to Bazille, my favourite being Filterscape VA, I truly love that one; that morphing EQ is heaven.
But going back to Diva, well, it DOES sound amazing, you owe it to yourself to play it through a professional soundcard in a real studio, I have shown the demo to a bunch of other musicians in the studio and jaws just drop.

Yet I just cant get INTO programming it, I dont know why. I have had the demo for a while and I just dont have as much fun with it as I do with Bazille, ACE or Zebra. And I cant put my finger on it, is it the UI? or the really limited Modulation capabilities? the "vanilla" Effect section?

Take Bazille for example, I have yet to use Bazille in ANY song, but I love loading it and literally spend hours patching that thing. With ACE is almost a similar story, but there is a great balance where I have just enough experimentation possibilities without distracting me. I have used it in songs, even in my DJ set and also playing it through a professional setup is amazing.

But I take no pleasure in trying to patch Diva, I mean the sounds are there already, I can just tweak them but in the end, the OSC section is still emulating a Moog, kicking ass sounding like a Moog, but I didnt do anything to get there. I didnt learn anything new about synthesis, it didnt challenge me as old analog hw used to do, I just played a great emulator.

I would also like to point out the UI factor, I saw someone posting their own skin in another thread and the XY mod alterations seem very interesting and promising, I understand the big hit on CPU that Modulation brings specially to an already CPU heavy synth like DIVA, but XY mods of certain parameters seems to be a great idea. I dont want Midi Mappers or Ramps, but maybe some MSEGs?

Case in point, it was the same for MFM2 and that Spaced Out theme that really put in perspective the capabilities of such plugin, to the point that I almost hated myself for not being able to squeeze as much production from it before the UI change.

Does that make sense?

[murnau]

Does that make sense?

Not really, how you can agree with the OP like you wrote when your point isn't the sound? Do you actually at least read what the troll is talking about before you decide to jump in? When you read the manual the same way like you obviously read this thread then it's no wonder you didn't get into programming the synth.

[sqigls]

when the readout of all parameters goes from 0-100, it can be offputting. The 0-100 thing is not so handy. [yes, use your ears, but still, should be Hz and ms etc!?]
Also, just modulating an oscillator pitch with an envelope, it should be fairly obvious how to go about doing it, but… how the feck?
Shouldn't really need to RTFM to jump into some basic programming.
As far as enticing me to program, it just doesn't. but it's cheaper than a room full of hardware.

[murnau]

Nahh.. scratch the last part about the manual. I tried to be funny. As usual I failed. No wonder as German.

[Garzita]

Wow, thanks for making an assumption about my programming skills and my usual deficiency at reading manuals...

I agree in the point of being disappointed with Diva. I was trying to have a fair conversation on using certain instrument that you know it does the job but at the same time you are not 100% happy with.

... I will also keep in mind that there are sycophants online not willing to hear another perspective on a product they love.

[pdxindy]

It shows again how various people have different responses to different synths. I find Diva a real pleasure to program. It is easy and Diva has a wide sweet spot. Pretty much every time I sit down to design some sounds I get satisfying results. And the sound quality when doing PWM and cross modulation or filter FM is lovely.

[braj]

just modulating an oscillator pitch with an envelope, it should be fairly obvious how to go about doing it, but… how the feck?

How is that not obvious? If you know what "modulating an oscillator pitch with an envelope" even is, IMO you are half-way there and Diva is not that complex or different than other synth with stuff like this.

[Urs]

should be Hz and ms etc!?

Well, any tuning in any of our synths is in semitones and cents, such as oscillator tune or filter cutoff. Scales in semitones have the advantage over Hz that they're linear to our perception of pitch. Some of our gains are linear, others are in dB. As a rule of thumb, any gain or volume that needs to go to zero is linear, e.g. 0-100 while any gain that's amplifies or attenuated a signal over a bounded range is in dB.

Anything that relates to musical timing information (delays, LFOs) is either directly laid out in note lengths or multiplies a base timing (often 1/16th notes) by a factor, such that e.g. a dotted quarter would be dialed in as 6 x sixteenth.

So, yeah, hehe, we try to keep parameter values in meaningful units, but...

With envelopes it's a bit more difficult. Exponential envelopes technically decay forever. The point where sustain level is "reached" depends on the perception of the listener, and muchly to sustain level itself. Same for release time. Being able to adjust decay/release rates in milliseconds would be misleading. The numbers printed on certain vintage synths were, well, not necessarily exact.

As one can see in our stuff, I prefer a linear correspondence between knob angle or fader range and perceived change. We actually spend a whole lot of time on tweaking parameters so that they feel that way. Can't always get there, but for most parts we do. And then, if a parameter has no meaningful unit name, I prefer to think of them in percentages, from 0 to 100.

Lastly, making somewhat modular layouts such as Diva's interchangeable modules adds further difficulty to setting up nice parameter ranges. One can either keep parameters true to originals or one can map the same parameter to corresponding modules - but one can't do both. We preferred to preserve the setting of e.g. the Ladder filter when switched to the Multimode and vice versa. So we had to find a parameter range that unifies the range of all different models.

Finding the right balance is a challenge.

[drakmaniso]

I too was put off initially by the lack of units, but I agree that once you understand the underlying logic, it's very pleasant to work with.

Well, any tuning in any of our synths is in semitones and cents, such as oscillator tune or filter cutoff.

One thing that may be could be improved, is a more explicit exposure of this underlying logic. E.g. for filter cutoff, the corresponding musical note could be displayed beside the number : "81.0 (A4)". For gain, it could be the ratio: "6.0 (x2)"...

[Urs]

I too was put off initially by the lack of units, but I agree that once you understand the underlying logic, it's very pleasant to work with.

Well, any tuning in any of our synths is in semitones and cents, such as oscillator tune or filter cutoff.

One thing that may be could be improved, is a more explicit exposure of this underlying logic. E.g. for filter cutoff, the corresponding musical note could be displayed beside the number : "81.0 (A4)". For gain, it could be the ratio: "6.0 (x2)"...

Yep, we're working on that as well. We've introduced some of it in Presswerk and I'm sure we'll do more like this in future.

[2ZrgE]

It shows again how various people have different responses to different synths. I find Diva a real pleasure to program. It is easy and Diva has a wide sweet spot. Pretty much every time I sit down to design some sounds I get satisfying results. And the sound quality when doing PWM and cross modulation or filter FM is lovely.

I bought Diva just for the sound of the resonating ladder filter and I never regretted it.

(Still waiting to upgrade my machine to be able to fully use it).

[mutantdog]

In all seriousness, I've never been convinced to buy Diva myself. It's not that i think its anything less than impressive, i just don't feel a need for it in my setup. As far as analogue style synths, I'm actually quite happy with TyrellN6, TAL Noisemaker and AIR Vacuum Pro. While i have no doubt that Diva wipes the floor with these three, they kinda fill that area of synthesis quite adequately for my uses.

Having said that, I've also never demoed Diva for fear of being sold on it as soon as i start playing with it.

[2ZrgE]

Anything that relates to musical timing information (delays, LFOs) is either directly laid out in note lengths or multiplies a base timing (often 1/16th notes) by a factor, such that e.g. a dotted quarter would be dialed in as 6 x sixteenth.

That's already too much math for me, instead of calculating figures I just want to make music.