Now Hive is here, is it RIP Sylenth?

[pdxindy]

Hive does have some extra flexibility for sound shaping... For example:

You can modulate individual envelope stages, including changing the curve per stage (big influence on sound)
Envelopes can be looped by either LFO
FX re-ordered
More Mod Slots
Via option on each Mod Slot (sweet function!)
More Mod targets including
FX parameters can be modulated (which is rather powerful)
Arp speed can be modulated for some cool fx and syncopated sounds
Sequencer Attack, Decay and Gate can be modulated

Arp and sequencer more capable in general

Also, the drag-n-drop modulation on the one window interface is so fast to try stuff that it is like a feature in itself

That's something to consider, thanks. The mod matrix in Sylenth is indeed severily lacking, sometimes drawing automation in a daw helps but it's not the same thing as using internal modulation sources, ofc.

I only have Hive's demo so I don't know all the ins and outs of it.

Welcome...

I felt prejudiced against Hive initially cause I wanted to see Zebra 3 more than a synth that seemed like a subset. But I found I liked it because it is so fast to create sounds. And it has better 'supersaw' than Zebra does. The ease of modulation makes it fun to try various things out.

I still use Diva, Bazille and Zebra more...

[Vectorman]

I felt prejudiced against Hive initially cause I wanted to see Zebra 3 more than a synth that seemed like a subset. But I found I liked it because it is so fast to create sounds. And it has better 'supersaw' than Zebra does. The ease of modulation makes it fun to try various things out.

I still use Diva, Bazille and Zebra more...

I guess I should give Hive a proper go at some point. That was pretty much me too...I've been anticipating Zebra 3 for years and it was hard for me not to see Hive as another delay in getting Z3 (granted, Urs has pointed out that the work done on these other products will play into making Z3 a better synth).

I bought Sylenth way back when and still find it useful from time to time. It has sort of a "shiny" sound that can push out front in a way that I don't usually find harsh. It's a bit like a Roland Juno in that it's limited but has an agreeable basic sound. I like the way its top end sounds on highpass filter stuff. Spire of course does so much more than Sylenth and has WAY better effects, but it's one of those synths that doesn't seem to sound as smooth by default (like Zebra, Dune 2 or the Virus tend to) and needs slightly more careful handling to tame it if you don't want the more edgy and aggressive types of sounds the presets are full of. Demoing Spire, I found myself putting Cytomic's The Drop after it with a 2-pole lowpass at varying cutoffs to smooth out the top end a bit on some sounds.

[aumordia]

I think practically any decent synths these days can be made to get That Sylenth1 Sound (or close enough to work in a mix, which is all that matters really), the question is how much do you want to work for it. Back when I used Sytrus on FL Studio all the time, I could explain to you each and every nuance of the synth -- you had to know it all in order to make it work. With Sylenth1, I'm not sure I could tell you more than the very basics of how it's even laid out -- it's just not necessary.

I don't know how to use Sylenth1, I know how to do subtractive synthesis -- and I do this with Sylenth1, and it sounds great, gets out of my way, doesn't strain my CPU, etc. That's what makes it so killer. I wish there was something that provided that same type of gratification while also providing an expanded palette -- a little FM, RM, and Wavetable, in particular, but when I try other synths I find I have to "learn" them and I really don't want to (I'm old and cranky, whatever). I keep eyeballing Omnisphere 2 because it seems to "get it," but I'm concerned about the CPU usage, and the 60gigs of samples and 10k presets that I'll probably never use, well, it just seems wasteful.

Anybody have any recommendations?

[EnGee]

I prefer Dune 2 than Sylenth or Hive. It has a small FM oscillators besides the classic ones and a nice collection of wavetables. It has 8 layers for more complex sounds and the detune function is fantastic. IMO it has a great sound with reasonable low cpu usage. I just wished the GUI design better for showing more parameters at once. It is annoying to keep clicking on tabs

[mcnoone]

the problem, besides you being sure you are right, is that your argument is totally subjective and no one know wtf the plastic fork teeth is. Plus you seem to be invested in HIVE which clouds your judgement. I own both so just being honest. BTW I am far from the only one who thinks Sylenth is something special.

Don't take my criticisms I made of Sylenth seriously.
It's more for stirring some dust up, and kill the boredom that these this versus that threads tend to evolve toward.
It's a good synth and I have the demo installed, but I don't want it because of money difficulties make buying a new synth difficult now, and there are too many soundsets for it, as I only buy synths to do soundsets for them, and not for making music, except for some noodling audio examples.

I did find it odd how me posting that Hive is the best synth in the universe got a serious reply, though my plastic fork teeth is a solid description of a specific sound that all synths are capable of doing.
It's also a good kind of sound.

[mcnoone]

I prefer Dune 2 than Sylenth or Hive. It has a small FM oscillators besides the classic ones and a nice collection of wavetables. It has 8 layers for more complex sounds and the detune function is fantastic. IMO it has a great sound with reasonable low cpu usage. I just wished the GUI design better for showing more parameters at once. It is annoying to keep clicking on tabs

Dune2 is one of my favorites as well.
It gets even more tricky when you want to have different settings for each voice, and you have to click on the numbers to the right, change those settings then go to the next voice number button, and continue doing that. Yet the extra work involved in using it is worth it imo.
You can get more diversity with the sounds with Dune2.
It is also not as simplified as Hive or Sylenth though. Dune2 is a very complex synth when you get deeper into it.
I have a free set of 77 sounds for it if you want to check them out here.
https://app.box.com/files/0/f/0/1/f_18755380600

[mcnoone]

This is a few recordings of three sounds I did for Hive.
The first two bass sounds are the sounds I posted links to before.
There is a third sound at the end which is a a good example of a sound that I think is unique to Hive.
Note that both basses only use one oscillator and one filter each.
No sound altering effects either. Can Sylenth do these basses with one oscillator and one filter only with no over driven distortion or sound altering effects?
This just means that if you turn off the effects you still have the main sound almost exactly as it with effects on.
https://app.box.com/s/yjbly77gb5ling04s8ogp9kk7x9h9tcd

[aumordia]

I prefer Dune 2 than Sylenth or Hive. It has a small FM oscillators besides the classic ones and a nice collection of wavetables. It has 8 layers for more complex sounds and the detune function is fantastic. IMO it has a great sound with reasonable low cpu usage. I just wished the GUI design better for showing more parameters at once. It is annoying to keep clicking on tabs

Agreed, I keep looking at Dune 2, but it doesn't come near the Sylenth1 ergonomics. I'm perpetually on the verge of getting it though.

Serum is another one I look at, but it has the opposite problem -- phenomenal ergonomics, but lol there goes your CPU bro (and then I'm playing synth tech trying to tame it or constantly bouncing to audio, which is annoying).

Omnisphere isn't exactly an obvious alternative, but it looks like Eric Persing really deeply understands instrument ergonomics. As a guitarist, dropping $500 on an instrument is not at all shocking, and I'd really rather have one, enduring go-to synth that lets me dial in a sound and get on with my life, rather than a dogs breakfast of toys that, while fun to play with, don't actually get me to my destination any quicker.

[Elektronisch]

Since this synth topic discussion is subjective and its very inacurate because Sylenth1 is not the best synth nor quality wise best but all features in one makes a good go to package wich made it to be the killer in comparison with others. Alot of time has passed, technology advanced and CPU isnt big of a issue.

I rephrase the topic: "Hive is here, is it a killer synth like Sylenth? Can it be a substitute for Sylenth1?"

Answer is Yes
Also you can say that about Spire, Dune 1/2, Massive, Zebra 2.

[pdxindy]

I prefer Dune 2 than Sylenth or Hive. It has a small FM oscillators besides the classic ones and a nice collection of wavetables. It has 8 layers for more complex sounds and the detune function is fantastic. IMO it has a great sound with reasonable low cpu usage. I just wished the GUI design better for showing more parameters at once. It is annoying to keep clicking on tabs

I like Dune2 and almost purchased it ... just a bit to obscure in workflow... too many tabs and I wish there were an easier way to work with the per voice modulation settings... it's a bit finicky. I find Zebra significantly easier to work when considering a complex synth.

[db3]

I rephrase the topic: "Hive is here, is it a killer synth like Sylenth? Can it be a substitute for Sylenth1?"

[Cinebient]

Dune 2 is my favourite by a country mile from all those mentioned here.
But i even prefer Logic's ES2 over most of them. The GUI is terrible but it can create some really punchy and lush sonds. One of the most underrated subtractive synths.
I also prefer Sunrizer over Sylenth and Hive. The only "true" supersaw emulation.
Oh, i missed the theme....but i'm not alone

[4damind]

I prefer Dune 2 than Sylenth or Hive. It has a small FM oscillators besides the classic ones and a nice collection of wavetables. It has 8 layers for more complex sounds and the detune function is fantastic. IMO it has a great sound with reasonable low cpu usage. I just wished the GUI design better for showing more parameters at once. It is annoying to keep clicking on tabs

Dune2 is great. But Sylenth or Spire can complement Dune2 very well.
RIP Hive and let's wait for Zebra3

[fluffy_little_something]

This is a few recordings of three sounds I did for Hive.
The first two bass sounds are the sounds I posted links to before.
There is a third sound at the end which is a a good example of a sound that I think is unique to Hive.
Note that both basses only use one oscillator and one filter each.
No sound altering effects either. Can Sylenth do these basses with one oscillator and one filter only with no over driven distortion or sound altering effects?
This just means that if you turn off the effects you still have the main sound almost exactly as it with effects on.
https://app.box.com/s/yjbly77gb5ling04s8ogp9kk7x9h9tcd

That approach is odd because the two synths are not identical in terms of architecture etc. So it should be up to the user how they achieve a similar or even identical sound. For instance for pwm you have to use two osc's in Sylenth, in Hive not.

Not sure whether you used a sub on the first bass. Sounds like it.

The second type of sound can definitely be done in Sylenth, I had one myself, not sure whether it is in the patches I had uploaded some time ago.

Why do you have that ugly attack psiu psiu on every patch? It ruins the patches as that kind of sound does not fit in most music.

[Urs]

RIP Hive? Nope, just did a quick look at our sales:

Bestsellers this year so far in numbers currently are Diva, followed by Zebra, Hive, ACE, Satin, Bazille, Presswerk, others in that order, where Hive sells about almost as often as Zebra and a bit more than half of Diva. Hive also sells about twice as often as ACE, so we can safely say it has become our third flagship product.

Hive and Bazille don't appear in those "Top 10" lists simply because they haven't (yet) reached the market share. While it's unlikely with Bazille, I think it's inevitable for Hive to get there. I think Hive has already drawn even with ACE, and ACE regularly makes it into "Top 40". Give it a year or two, Hive might just arrive in a really good spot.

OTOH the reason why NI and u-he often miss out on the absolute top spots is because we have multiple products. If you take votes for Musicradar's "Top Synth" lists for instance, someone who's into NI our u-he as a brand can always only vote for one product even though they might vote for two or three. So they have to decide, which splits votes. If such elections were open for multiple votes, NI and u-he products would rank much higher. And so would Arturia ones I guess, which might have an even much larger dispersion. What I'm saying however is that "product rankings" often distort the notion of actual market share in favour of brands with single products.

- U