KVR Audio

Taurus · Post by **Taurus** » Sun Nov 06, 2016 7:48 pm

Whats your opinion about the two synths Serum and Rapid? I think they are fishing in the same pond.

wagtunes · Post by **wagtunes** » Sun Nov 06, 2016 7:55 pm

There is absolutely no comparison between the two. Rapid is almost a full blown workstation where Serum is a 2 OSC synth. Serum can import wavetables and create its own whereas Rapid cannot.

Combine the two and you have something.

xamido · Post by **xamido** » Sun Nov 06, 2016 8:14 pm

With Serum i don't feel like stabbing my eyes.

Synthman2000 · Post by **Synthman2000** » Sun Nov 06, 2016 9:13 pm

Different sound. Rapid a bit more solid a bit more beautiful. Serum a bit cold and hard and direct through the mix.. when you need cold and hard it does the job well.

Serum is very unnatural sounding, that sounds weird for a synth which is of course not natural but Serum is cold and hard. Rapid more of an all rounder I think.

Not conclusive, cause I have not gone deep in Rapid.

The fact of the matter is they are both very good synths. You have to listen very carefully to hear the strengths and weaknesses of synths and employ them for the right tasks. This is also relative to the genre of music you make.

Everything takes time to understand properly and it always gets expressed with a bit of a personal perspective.

Demo them. FWIW Rapid's interface is fine for me. I care more about what I hear than see when I am focusing on listening.

recursive one · Post by **recursive one** » Sun Nov 06, 2016 9:20 pm

Rapid currently doesn't import wavetables, but comes with large selection of them, more than serum iirc . Also it has 8 layers which serum doesn't have. Overall rapid sounds less precise but much more musical. Probably rapid has less features as regards wavetable editing, but much more sweet spots imo.

ZeePok · Post by **ZeePok** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 1:31 am

WRT the CPU use and 'musical feel' Rapid is an absolute winner for me.

(and I absolutely looove the GUI ! .

) .

surreal · Post by **surreal** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 4:29 am

The fair comparison would rather be Rapid vs Avenger.... Rapid and Serum featurewize are totally differant and would rather be complimentary in a setup!

Orbit-50 · Post by **Orbit-50** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 5:43 am

Bannana vs Cantaloupe

Kalamata Kid · Post by **Kalamata Kid** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 6:09 am

surreal wrote:The fair comparison would rather be Rapid vs Avenger.... Rapid and Serum featurewize are totally differant and would rather be complimentary in a setup!

I hope someone does a comparison of Rapid and Avenger and perhaps
Falcon, Icarus and Synthmaster. Is this comparing fruits and vegetables?

I am interested in all of these plugins and a comparison will help me
and others decide which one to get that will best help me make
music.

starflakeprj · Post by **starflakeprj** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 6:22 am

surreal wrote:The fair comparison would rather be Rapid vs Avenger.... Rapid and Serum featurewize are totally differant and would rather be complimentary in a setup!

I would say, featurewise, that Rapid (at the moment, when importing of wavetables and samples, as well well as editing of of wavetables are absent) is as far from Avenger as Serum is from Rapid.

lolilol1975 · Post by **lolilol1975** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 8:34 am

Kalamata Kid wrote:
surreal wrote:The fair comparison would rather be Rapid vs Avenger.... Rapid and Serum featurewize are totally differant and would rather be complimentary in a setup!
I hope someone does a comparison of Rapid and Avenger and perhaps
Falcon, Icarus and Synthmaster. Is this comparing fruits and vegetables?

Somewhat, yes.

Rapid, Avenger, and Dune 2 can create whole songs or parts of a song because they allow to layer many oscillators, each with its own arpeggiator/sequencer part. They are comparable to synth workstations like the Korg Kronos or the Yamaha Montage: push a key, and a whole preprogrammed song comes out. They could almost be used without a DAW. It's just more clunky in my opinion.

Synthmaster, otoh, is limited to 4 oscillators and 2 arpeggiators. It's more a sound designer's tool, as is Serum. They require a DAW or someone to actually play some music. In that way, they're more comparable to a traditional polyphonic synthesizer. To make a song, you will probably need several instances of SM where you would need only one instance of Avenger. Different way to work. I don't know Icarus, but from other Tone2 products, I suspect it's a bit the same.

recursive one · Post by **recursive one** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 8:58 am

Rapid and Dune can pretty much be operated as traditional 3 osc synths, you don't need to build whole tracks in them this is more a "by-product" or the layer architecture.

I think Rapid is well comparable to Serum as they both are wavetable synths having additional tools to shape the wavetables besides the traditional "wt position" control. Serum currently offers more such tools, but adding sample/wt import and further oscillator effects is planned for Rapid as well.

Taurus · Post by **Taurus** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 9:09 am

Layering a patch in a Vst or in a DAW makes no difference for me. More comparable is the synthesis, filter, fx, arp and so on.

Mirko R. · Post by **Mirko R.** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 9:37 am

Wavetable and Sampleimport will be available soon for RAPID. Serum has no multisamples, only two oscs with max 256 Wavetable position and no interpolation between it, less FX, more aliasing (it's hard to create aliasing in RAPID).
Look at this review and try to compare it again. For me there is no reason for a discussion. RAPID is not only the winner,... RAPID plays in another league.

ATS · Post by **ATS** » Mon Nov 07, 2016 9:58 am

I have bought both recently. I like Serum a lot but I LOVE Rapid.

Serum vs Rapid