Access Virus snow VST replacement.

[chk071]

I'd be curious in knowing how much of the Virus people really want to be replaced, when they ask for software alternatives. My guess is that the requirements don't match 10% of the actual features of the synth, but rather apply to replacing the sound, and basic features.

[Elektronisch]

You can load same downloaded wavetables in viper...

You mean wavetables or single cycle wavetofms?

ok single cycle waveform from those virus ti wavetables you can download, but does it matter that much? virus ti strenght isnt in the wavetables, at least i never heard of this but just few people (including you) talking about that, because wavetables there are no better then in most of other synths. Its personal but i find those existing ripped wavetables from virus just sound crap no matter where you are using serum or ominisphere (havent tried in parawave) in comparison how they sound in virus ti. Grain complex feature is something worth mentioning tho, but again its not the main selling point as we all know, just a cool extra feature. any wavetable synth can cover that "virus wavetable part", but really who buys virus just for that is a mystery

I got virus certainly not for the wavetables, neither my colegues who praise virus. And as far as i remember hype for virus was always about the supersaw, punchy sound and distortions

[chk071]

What i always hear is a organic sound i usually only hear from analog synths.

xbitz posted a nice example of that in another thread:



There's some movement in that sound that is really hard to get in a soft synth. Many soft synths just sound bland and lifeless compared. I guess it has to do with - saturation, oscillator drift, and surely also with phase, and detune/spread laws. Not sure why it's still, 20 years after the first Virus, so hard for soft synth devs to get a similar sound.

Not to talk about punch, and aggressive sound. It's almost pitiful how soft synths often lack in that department... it's like many soft synth devs deliberately take the "juice" out of their synths.

BTW, i'm sure you guys with a Virus can compare that well better, but, i also think Viper lacks a bit in that department. I'm sure it's the closest to the Virus sound, but... i also find it falls a tad short of that organic, 3D, whatever sound. (In lack of words to describe it )

[adamszabo]

What i always hear is a organic sound i usually only hear from analog synths.

Spoiler alert: The virus is not an analog synth. Its a digital synth in a fancy box. Its the same code that would run on a computer but instead it runs on motorola dsp chips.

[chk071]

I know that.

What i always hear is a organic sound i usually only hear from analog synths.

[recursive one]

I think Viper sounds a tiny bit cleaner than Virus which actually makes it easier to mix. Or if yoy want more dirt you may always add some saturation plugin.

For adding movement to the sound check the hardwired assignmets in the lfo section. This is what provides the "organic" sound. Virus init saw patch sounds pretty unspectacular, the magic starts happening when you add modulations and stuff, same with Viper. Viper perfectly caprures that Virus organic movement. Also dont forget to switch the charater on, most of the famous virus sounds use "analog boost" which is emulated by Viper character fx.

[chk071]

I think Viper sounds a tiny bit cleaner than Virus which actually makes it easier to mix. Or if yoy want more dirt you may always add some saturation plugin.

This might well be the differences i heard. Mind you, i didn't really spend that much time with Viper.

[v1o]

What i always hear is a organic sound i usually only hear from analog synths.

xbitz posted a nice example of that in another thread:



There's some movement in that sound that is really hard to get in a soft synth. Many soft synths just sound bland and lifeless compared. I guess it has to do with - saturation, oscillator drift, and surely also with phase, and detune/spread laws. Not sure why it's still, 20 years after the first Virus, so hard for soft synth devs to get a similar sound.

Not to talk about punch, and aggressive sound. It's almost pitiful how soft synths often lack in that department... it's like many soft synth devs deliberately take the "juice" out of their synths.

BTW, i'm sure you guys with a Virus can compare that well better, but, i also think Viper lacks a bit in that department. I'm sure it's the closest to the Virus sound, but... i also find it falls a tad short of that organic, 3D, whatever sound. (In lack of words to describe it )

While the demo does sound nice. The movement you are hearing is just good programming. It’s not anything unachievable in the box.

[recursive one]

I got virus certainly not for the wavetables, neither my colegues who praise virus. And as far as i remember hype for virus was always about the supersaw, punchy sound and distortions

I hear you, it's not the wavetables what made Virus famous, afaik they were only added in TI and the formant complex appeared in TI2. Anyway I do find them useful, mostly for various evolving pads and textures based on modulating the WT postion or F-Shift/F-Spread. Probably such sounds are more useful for goa/psy-trance and ambient/downtempo, not so much for classic trance or hardstyle I guess.

I also argee that you won't get that Virus sound simply by dropping the Virus wavetables into any synth that reads them. WTs are only a part of the sound, they are also affected by the filters, the envelopes, the effects etc. I have tried them in Serum but for some reason I'm getting more authentic "virusy" sounds from Rapid, especially the lastest version which has the formant shift and the saturator.

So long story short, from me Viper + Rapid + Virus TI WTs + Phazor is the setup which allows me to have almost all sounds I ever needed from my Virus Snow ITB. Viper does maybe 70-80% of the job, but when I want moving/morphing wavetable sounds I reach for Rapid. Maybe it would be different for someone else, Virus TI is in incredibly deep and versatile synth (this is why I'm keeping the real thing despite I haven't used it in actual tracks for months).

[kmonkey]

The movement you are hearing is just good programming. It’s not anything unachievable in the box.

Really? Then i am finding it hard to understand that for some obscure reason Plugin developers wouldn't include it in their synths and preset libraries.

Yes i know Virus is digital all that blabla. Take all the cheesy shitty Trance sounds coming straight from virus a,b,c or ti on youtube.

For some weird reason even today in 2019 plugins don't sound that punchy or call that whatever you want. Apart from Viper which seems like a little brother to Virus A and Virus Powercore - to me anyway - and i am saying this as a positive comment. And i am not talking about postprocessing either.

And yes i do have Zebra etc.

Access did something clever. I don't know what. And no it's not me, not my monitoring, not my saturation plugins and no not virus converters either. Some clever coding that's it. And it isn't something straight simple like you said so - otherwise industry of VST synths would already yield it.

And no i am not making Virus king of the trone. Like i said i have plenty of Synths. I like Zebra most of all. But Virus is a Virus. To my ear.

[4damind]

I've not heard a real Virus emulation (also Viper doesn't sound 1:1 like a Virus). So Christian Kemper does all things right, also in 2019: if you need the Virus sound, you need the hardware.
Anyway, for some "typical" unison sounds plugins can do it very well. I've heard some times ago a guy who made a remake with Ableton Life and a track by Above & Beyond (My own hymn) and he used Spire. Afaik A&B are Virus users and this sounded stunning close to the original.
I still own a Virus C/XL but for similar sounds I often use Sylenth or Spire. They are not a replacement for the Virus but I don't miss something.

[Glyn Darby]

Hi all once again,

I had a good few hours with the demo’s and must say I was impressed with them all, they all have great possibilities in sound design for sure but Spire just edged it for me until I watched a demo video of U-he Hives latest update with the wavetable functions, I will download the demo later and give it a go but till then has anyone got any firsthand experience with it.

Cheers,
Glyn.

[nachenko]

Hi, Glyn Darby. ex Virus C owner here.

For similar sounds, some elements of Spire (details in filters and distorsion) sound pretty similar, but they are still different synths. I don't know about Sylenth1 either, I didn't even demo it.

There was something in my Virus, some "edge", some "tension", some "I don't know what" that I couldn't find in the plugins I had. I remember the feeling, specially when I was trying to build some delicate sounds, that if I turned the wrong knob a bit too much, some monster sound was going to raise out of nowhere and blow my house's walls. That was the feeling with some heavenly patches I made: the beast was there, barely contained.

I'll never forget the first time I heard preset "A02 The Master". At that moment I was just testing it, to be sure i had spend my money on something good. BOOM. Then I slowly closed Filter 1 cutoff on this very patch.

Oh, boy.

But time passed, family stuff happened and I sold it. I used to miss it sometimes.

Just like most romantic movies, selling it was the big crisis near the end the movie, but this time there was a plot twist. Month ago I demoed Dune 3. It's a different synth with a different sound, but that feeling of "crouching beast" is there too. I don't miss my virus C anymore. A new beast lives in my studio, and I welcome it.

"A02 The Master" is back. New body, same spirit.

[recursive one]

Dune3 is great. I never was a big fan of Dune before but the new AM filters and some other stuff then have added made it for me.

But I wouldn't call it "virusy" sounding. With the new filters it feels more like an analog-modelled synth, sort of like Diva, with modern additions such as unison, wavetables, msegs and stuff.

Hive is shaping into something really very nice but Dune3 feels more mature product, is also has features like FM, global unison, vowel filters which are missing from Hive and probably aren't going to be added.

Spire is another great synth and it indeed can sound very similar to Virus but only for certain kinds of sounds (hypersaws, trance leads/pads/plucks, some vowel-ish sounds), it also doesn't do wavetables, doesn't have global unison, the FM sounds very different to Virus, the distortions can sound similar in a narrow range but behave differently overall. It's very good on it's own but I won't call it a Virus equivalent.

[xbitz]

I like VPS Avenger too