Is the Sylenth 1 still good?

[fluffy_little_something]

@wag

Yes, ideally I only want to use one good synth. I have three, but at the end of the day I only use Sylenth because its sound and workflow are almost perfect for me.

Do the slight differences matter? Maybe not to some listener if I sold a record, but at least they matter to me. A good sound is almost like a drug, audio therapy

With Sylenth I often feel that wish to just keep playing, I haven't felt that with other synths so far.

I think the feature limitations are actually helpful as they keep me from wasting time on tweaking a zillion parameters on a pointless quest for the perfect sound.

[pdxindy]

What you may not get sometimes perhaps, like many others here - is that it's really just like this:

I LOVE the taste of avacados, and no one here on God's semi-green earth is going to change my mind. But there are also people on this planet who think that avacados absolutely suck, and would throw up if they were ever forced to eat one.

If only it were that... It's I love avocados (even though I secretly don't) because some famous person said they love avocados.

Well, that doesn't hold true for all the other famous persons who said they love avocados too.

Heh... You think famous people are immune to "Me Too-ism"?

Fads start all the time... and rich and poor people alike jump on them.

[fluffy_little_something]

I have always loved this Sylenth track, actually it was what got me interested in it in the first place. Without that short track I would not even have demoed it.

Pretty tune... I also like it... However, when I listen to it to judge the synths sounds, they sound kinda meh... like a 10 year old low cpu synth. The quality of new synths today has raised the bar considerably.

Yes, it is not even my kind of music, but I liked something about the sound character, hard to put my finger on it.

Age has nothing to do with it. why would people pay 10k for a Jupiter 8 if age meant inferior quality. Sound and physics haven't been reinvented during the past 8 years.

I also think VAZ synths sound very good to my ear, also ancient stuff, but maybe the developer was ahead of his time. Unfortunately he ceased to sell them.

[pdxindy]

I have always loved this Sylenth track, actually it was what got me interested in it in the first place. Without that short track I would not even have demoed it.

Pretty tune... I also like it... However, when I listen to it to judge the synths sounds, they sound kinda meh... like a 10 year old low cpu synth. The quality of new synths today has raised the bar considerably.

Yes, it is not even my kind of music, but I liked something about the sound character, hard to put my finger on it.

Age has nothing to do with it. why would people pay 10k for a Jupiter 8 if age meant inferior quality. Sound and physics haven't been reinvented during the past 8 years.

I also think VAZ synths sound very good to my ear, also ancient stuff, but maybe the developer was ahead of his time. Unfortunately he ceased to sell them.

Analog gear is different... and you are right - Sound and physics haven't been reinvented, but the digital algorithms which represent sound and physics have advanced a lot in that time.

It's the same thing with digital photography... the image quality has advanced tremendously.

[goldenanalog]

What you may not get sometimes perhaps, like many others here - is that it's really just like this:

I LOVE the taste of avacados, and no one here on God's semi-green earth is going to change my mind. But there are also people on this planet who think that avacados absolutely suck, and would throw up if they were ever forced to eat one.

If only it were that... It's I love avocados (even though I secretly don't) because some famous person said they love avocados.

Well, that doesn't hold true for all the other famous persons who said they love avocados too.

I could talk about those green f!ckers all day!

[chk071]

What you may not get sometimes perhaps, like many others here - is that it's really just like this:

I LOVE the taste of avacados, and no one here on God's semi-green earth is going to change my mind. But there are also people on this planet who think that avacados absolutely suck, and would throw up if they were ever forced to eat one.

If only it were that... It's I love avocados (even though I secretly don't) because some famous person said they love avocados.

Well, that doesn't hold true for all the other famous persons who said they love avocados too.

Heh... You think famous people are immune to "Me Too-ism"?

Fads start all the time... and rich and poor people alike jump on them.

Ok, but that's all hypothetically speaking. Fact is there's a holy lot people liking Sylenth1 on this board alone. The fact that you do not like it doesn't make everyone who does a celebrity wannabe.

[fluffy_little_something]

Analog gear is different... and you are right - Sound and physics haven't been reinvented, but the digital algorithms which represent sound and physics have advanced a lot in that time.

It's the same thing with digital photography... the image quality has advanced tremendously.

Some developers are better than others. I mean, there are developers today whose latest plugins don't sound as good as Sylenth or Vaz did 5+ years ago. I assume LD is simply more competent and intelligent than many other developers.

The progress in digital photography is also due to hardware, now based on physics, whereas old-skool photography was based on chemistry.

[goldenanalog]

OK: Let's try to be useful -

Hey there. Sylenth 1 is on sale at $99. I don't have it yet and I see many 3rd party sound libraries for it. I am wondering if it is still able to compete against newer synths and if I need it. I have all other synths available on the market. Is it really such a great synth for today? I compose EDM, trance, dubstep. Thank you.

I have all other synths available on the market.

ALL other synths!?! Really!

Nothing personal, but this smells a little like trolls - I'll pretend you're legit, tho -

Sylenth1 sounds very good to me, always has - it's a great tradeoff between sound/cpu - allows you to run multi instances on better 'teen machines' (2013 on up) and there are indeed many libraries out there for it.

$50 would be a no-brainer. 100 bucks? I dunno - you've gotten some expert opinions here, Astralv - I guess for me: it would ultimately come down to whether I would use it or not - if I had every other synth like you? Pass.

[braj]

Sylenth is the spawn of Satan. If you like it's sound, you have fallen into the grasp of the dark lord. But if you like it hot, by all means, enjoy

[pdxindy]

Heh... You think famous people are immune to "Me Too-ism"?

Fads start all the time... and rich and poor people alike jump on them.

Ok, but that's all hypothetically speaking. Fact is there's a holy lot people liking Sylenth1 on this board alone. The fact that you do not like it doesn't make everyone who does a celebrity wannabe.

I didn't say everyone... but a significant some? sure... plenty of analog synths have also been purchased because some well known song used a particular preset. That is equated with quality/success/coolness.

Like with fads in general, Sylenth was in the right place at the right time. It did the supersaw sound well which meant that people did not need to buy a Virus. Sylenth was much cheaper and easily available for free.

It was well made, had a smart choice of features vs ease of use and it deserves credit for that and for its place in history. However, soundwise, today it has been surpassed... and not by a tiny bit... it has been lapped.

[C-note]

The new Dune 2.5 sounds great and some key sound issues have been improved but it is still a notch below Sylenth1 in the sound category.

Bull......... DUNE 2 is several notches above Sylenth 1 and yes I've owned Sylenth 1 for years. It's a great synth and owning both makes perfect synth but no it's not a notch above DUNE 2 in the sound category unless you mean there are more patches available for Sylenth.

Ha Ha Tek, no wonder I haven't seen any Sylenth1 sound sets from you lately!

[chk071]

Heh... You think famous people are immune to "Me Too-ism"?

Fads start all the time... and rich and poor people alike jump on them.

Ok, but that's all hypothetically speaking. Fact is there's a holy lot people liking Sylenth1 on this board alone. The fact that you do not like it doesn't make everyone who does a celebrity wannabe.

I didn't say everyone... but a significant some? sure... plenty of analog synths have also been purchased because some well known song used a particular preset. That is equated with quality/success/coolness.

Like with fads in general, Sylenth was in the right place at the right time. It did the supersaw sound well which meant that people did not need to buy a Virus. Sylenth was much cheaper and easily available for free.

It was well made, had a smart choice of features vs ease of use and it deserves credit for that and for its place in history. However, soundwise, today it has been surpassed... and not by a tiny bit... it has been lapped.

You argue as if sound quality would be something final which everyone perceives or defines the same way. If that would be true, then we'd all consider the same synths as good or bad sounding, and we would all use the same stuff. But we don't. The other conclusion would be that you simply forgot to add "in my opinion" to your post, which seems much more likely to me.

[wagtunes]

Heh... You think famous people are immune to "Me Too-ism"?

Fads start all the time... and rich and poor people alike jump on them.

Ok, but that's all hypothetically speaking. Fact is there's a holy lot people liking Sylenth1 on this board alone. The fact that you do not like it doesn't make everyone who does a celebrity wannabe.

I didn't say everyone... but a significant some? sure... plenty of analog synths have also been purchased because some well known song used a particular preset. That is equated with quality/success/coolness.

Like with fads in general, Sylenth was in the right place at the right time. It did the supersaw sound well which meant that people did not need to buy a Virus. Sylenth was much cheaper and easily available for free.

It was well made, had a smart choice of features vs ease of use and it deserves credit for that and for its place in history. However, soundwise, today it has been surpassed... and not by a tiny bit... it has been lapped.

You argue as if sound quality would be something final which everyone perceives or defines the same way. If that would be true, then we'd all consider the same synths as good or bad sounding, and we would all use the same stuff. But we don't. The other conclusion would be that you simply forgot to add "in my opinion" to your post, which seems much more likely to me.

And this is pretty much true with everything including music in general. The public ultimately determines what's "popular" even if we don't either like what is or prefer music that isn't.

My whole life it seemed that if I liked a song, it wasn't a big hit. Sure there were exceptions, but for the most part, if I really loved a song it wasn't going to top the charts. Conversely, I can't tell you how many chart toppers I hated.

In that respect, I'm probably the last person to judge a synth as to being "good" or "bad". I just know what I like and don't like. And as much as I concede that, to my ears anyway, Sylenth1 actually sounds very good, I don't hear something that makes me go "Damn, I don't have anything in my arsenal that can make those sounds so I have to go out and get this."

I am quite sure, given the popularity of the synth, that I am probably in the minority.

[Dúnedain]

Example: With Sylenth you can set the number of unison voices for one osc at 4 and for another osc at 7. With dune2 this is not possible. Not within the same layer at least.

And it doesn't matter that much if a synth is multi layered. Because I can run as many instances of a synth as my DAW allows me. Creating my own layers.

[fluffy_little_something]

Seems they finally updated the Dune 2 demo version. Am comparing it to Sylenth at the moment.
The envelopes still feel very different, with or without that new analog mode. I prefer Sylenth's.

Strange that on Dune the osc phase is by default set to 180°, which gives it that wobbly attack.

There is some nasal, hollow character to Sylenth's filter in comparison, some people probably think it is negative, but I like it because it sounds legacy, it add's an 80's touch

On Dune, when sweeping through the osc's internal stereo spread, the volume goes down as the pan gets wider, on Sylenth it is the other way round, the volume increases with wider stereo spread.