Splice rent to own Serum plan, what do you think?

[EnGee]

In these few days, Serum has given me a hard lesson! Which is "Never, ever, judge a synth from it's presets!".

This is so true, goes for Serum, Largo, the PPG synths etc. as well. And Splice is a very cool way to pay for Serum. I just...I'm still working with it and just not finding anything I can do with it that I can't do with my abovementioned synths, and in my case with better sound (Nave and Zebra HZ being the best examples I can come up with for the latter).

However, it would be a super great first buy for a wave synth, that I'm positive of.

It does, ultimately, depend upon your individual workflow and vision for your music. It works for tons of people so, more power to them.

I have several wavetable synths and I like them all, but with Serum, it was the fastest way to reach what I want. This is what I miss in my synth collection, a fast way to do my own presets. It takes about 1/4 the time or less compared to others (and with better results!). I don't know, it just clicked with me

[Apostate]

I have several wavetable synths and I like them all, but with Serum, it was the fastest way to reach what I want. This is what I miss in my synth collection, a fast way to do my own presets. It takes about 1/4 the time or less compared to others (and with better results!). I don't know, it just clicked with me

As much as I love the Nave vst it's true, Serum has some staggering modulation options. And let's face it, Steve never exactly advertised Serum as a character synth (which Nave most certainly is).

However, I just plain far prefer the sound of the Waldorf synths and Zebra/HZ. The sounds more than suit my own musical vision, and the workflow is awesome for me. And let's be completely real: Zebra certainly is no slouch in the modulation department.

Paucis verbis, for people wanting to dive right in and just buy Serum outright, I think Splice is the better way to go, as Zebra 3 will be out (at least I hope sooner than later), and if you don't have HZ you're going to actually pay more for that. And 3 is looking to be a monster. Might want to wait until that comes out to pay $189 for a synth that you might just not like as much.

Or do what you really need to do, follow your own goals and sound-vision to a synth you really like programming....then study the be-JEEZ-us out of it.

[musikmachine]

In these few days, Serum has given me a hard lesson! Which is "Never, ever, judge a synth from it's presets!".

This is so true, goes for Serum, Largo, the PPG synths etc. as well. And Splice is a very cool way to pay for Serum. I just...I'm still working with it and just not finding anything I can do with it that I can't do with my abovementioned synths, and in my case with better sound (Nave and Zebra HZ being the best examples I can come up with for the latter).

However, it would be a super great first buy for a wave synth, that I'm positive of.

It does, ultimately, depend upon your individual workflow and vision for your music. It works for tons of people so, more power to them.

It does sound like you've got the bases well and truly covered. I've got Massive and Loom and i've had a similar experience as EnGee with ease of use and quick results, it's very comfortable to work with.

I'm gonna try and write a song only using Serum, that'll a good test.

Yeah i'm still in research mode on this, excited by the possibilities and want to find the sweet spot. Anyone recommend some good free wavetables?

[Apostate]

In these few days, Serum has given me a hard lesson! Which is "Never, ever, judge a synth from it's presets!".

This is so true, goes for Serum, Largo, the PPG synths etc. as well. And Splice is a very cool way to pay for Serum. I just...I'm still working with it and just not finding anything I can do with it that I can't do with my abovementioned synths, and in my case with better sound (Nave and Zebra HZ being the best examples I can come up with for the latter).

However, it would be a super great first buy for a wave synth, that I'm positive of.

It does, ultimately, depend upon your individual workflow and vision for your music. It works for tons of people so, more power to them.

It does sound like you've got the bases well and truly covered. I've got Massive and Loom and i've had a similar experience as EnGee with ease of use and quick results, it's very comfortable to work with.

I'm gonna try and write a song only using Serum, that'll a good test.

Yeah i'm still in research mode on this, excited by the possibilities and want to find the sweet spot. Anyone recommend some good free wavetables?

You might contact Ingo Weidner, whom is one of the wavetable experts around here in my opinion (please forgive me, as I forgot his user name). Way back he shot me some great stuff...I'm so sorry I don't have more on this. Serum actually has some great stuff in itself.

As far as Massive, I personally think it's terrific synth with all the presence and punch you could ask for. I'm not as wild about the actual programming (hard to compare with Serum in that dept, but you could say that about one heck of a LOT of synths besides Serum, Zebra, and Largo).

I can't go without giving huge props to Blue II as well, terrific synth imo!

[musikmachine]

Found this slightly older thread. viewtopic.php?uid=122199&f=251&t=424070&start=0

I actually posted a link a few pages back to loads of wavetable resources, i'm a slow today!

Anyway digressed slightly from the thread topic lol but seems many are in favor of this system so may as well talk about the synth now.

I think the unison mode is great, see what people are saying now about that. It definitely fills a spot other synths don't and i think with a bit of processing it can really shine. Oh yeah hadn't tried the hall reverb when i mentioned the fx, that's really nice.

Text to speech kinda makes me wanna get my kraftwerk on.

[Compyfox]

Couldn't Serum load images as well and convert them into Waveforms or am I mixing this up with another synth?

[Nocturnal909]

Couldn't Serum load images as well and convert them into Waveforms or am I mixing this up with another synth?

Do you mean Wavetable?

[EnGee]

I think the unison mode is great, see what people are saying now about that. It definitely fills a spot other synths don't and i think with a bit of processing it can really shine. Oh yeah hadn't tried the hall reverb when i mentioned the fx, that's really nice.

I agree with you. The unison (looks similar to Dune 2) and the reverb are great really. I think the reverb is from TAL, right?

Well, about Serum, I like it more and more. There are some great presets, but they are few really. I begin to like it more even than Dune 2!. I was carefully comparing my own presets (doing the same steps mostly) in the two synths, and in the end, the overall sound that I like is almost always from Serum.

I can't say that Serum can replace all my synths, of course not! But together with LuSH 101, I think they can make a perfect team. I'm investing my time to learn them well and doing what I need from presets with them, as those are the most I like from my collection now.
They are very different of course, so that they can complement each other IMO. I wish I can restrict myself to those two, because the projects in the future would be much easier to manage. Looking at my old projects now, there is always one or two synths missing now (I need to stop selling/buying synths!).

Only one thing I need to know is how to use the LFO like the stepper in Massive. Mostly like a step sequencer modulating the semitones, as Serum has no ARP or Sequencer.

[ere2learn]

Echo Sound Works did a video on the LFO arp

[bungle]

Does this come with a sample library or something, 153 meg seems rather large for a synth.

[ere2learn]

The tables are about 70mb & the presets about 20mb,then you also have the noise oscillators which are another 70mb

[Apostate]

The tables are about 70mb & the presets about 20mb,then you also have the noise oscillators which are another 70mb

I'm tempted to say just take advantage of the three days for free option in Splice. Serum is worth giving a shot, period, and you have nothing to lose. It's become computer friendly over the years, I wouldn't worry too much about that.

[bungle]

While i think this synth is massively overpriced (Pun fully intended) it is the most fun i have had with a synth for a long long time, there are some annoying little UI things like some of the controls being horizontal drag instead of vertical drag, and some of the controls just have a mind of their own in the way they work.
If it was half the price i would say instabuy for anybody wanting to smash Brostep/Reese/Neurobass/EDM sounds out, but at $200 it is competing with Massive that is pretty much free nowadays if you look around for a cheap select or whatever, and while this thing is easier to achieve results, Massive still works fine for anybody on a budget, a shame really, because at $100 this would need to be in everybody's set up.

I can see why the $10 a month is needed, because this thing should simply put, just be cheaper, it would have a whole slew of extra users, maybe this rent to buy will work out, but even then it is still $200 that in todays world, most people don't have.

Absolutely great synth though if you can afford it

[Apostate]

One thing curious to me is how Serum doesn't have MSEGs. I doubt that hasn't been brought up before. It would make things even more interesting imo.

[Compyfox]

Couldn't Serum load images as well and convert them into Waveforms or am I mixing this up with another synth?

Do you mean Wavetable?

An image turning into a Wavetable - yes!

Though I was thinking more along the lines of "Photosounder" (standalone)


To create something along the lines of the subtle "FX" in the background of Mick Gordon's DOOM OST


But I take what I can get.