Massive X or Hive 2. Need an opinion.

[machinesworking]

Anyway, the more I play around with Massive X, the more I feel the negative points! I mean pdxindy is right about the LFO space! What is this?! What about a little indication of the knobs position in the envelopes? When I look at the envelopes I must look closely and stay for seconds to get the feeling of the ADSR envelopes! Also what is this silly static illustration?! DX7 emulation? or what?

Look at those Envelopes from various synths and tell me which one you want to work with more (notice, I said work with not look at!)?!

Yeah that's my downfall with it too. Another GUI more about looks than function. I'm all about skeuomorphic if it's not in the way of function, (Arturia's preamps and filters are fine IMO) but I would rather work in Pigments than any plug in about now, in terms of lay out. Same with Hive, for the most part, the GUI is functional more than pretty.

[pixel85]

Look at those Envelopes from various synths and tell me which one you want to work with more (notice, I said work with not look at!)?!

Massive X envelopes.jpg

Massive envelope.jpg

Largo Envelopes.jpg

From these three? MX. Sorry MX have shapes, peak and hold - functionality that original Massive doesn't have and it was a major problem for me. Largo? I didn't used it but from the picture it looks like it's really tiny visually and it's also the most basic ADSR.
Obviously the best option would be a visual envelope that we can edit like in Absynth for example.

[pdxindy]

Awesome. I wrote up a similar blow by blow, but it got lost in KVR’s stupid Post Review thing, so it never got posted. Do you mind if I repost this in the Massive X UI thread on the NI forum?

Sure... go ahead...

[EnGee]

Look at those Envelopes from various synths and tell me which one you want to work with more (notice, I said work with not look at!)?!

Massive X envelopes.jpg

Massive envelope.jpg

Largo Envelopes.jpg

From these three? MX. Sorry MX have shapes, peak and hold - functionality that original Massive doesn't have and it was a major problem for me. Largo? I didn't used it but from the picture it looks like it's really tiny visually and it's also the most basic ADSR.
Obviously the best option would be a visual envelope that we can edit like in Absynth for example.

The "peak" is the same as "level"! What's the difference? Yes, there is no "shapes" in the original Massive but there is no "Morph" in Massive X and most importantly, you see a visual feedback what is going on, and you can change the GUI presentation from clicking the mouse on the visual dots and drag the slops, and ... there is a scroll mouse support ... and there are presets to save and load ... and ... Come on now!

If you prefer working with Massive X, then good for you but for me I really can't go back to inferior design and functions in a very important module like an envelope.

[Urs]

Also what is this silly static illustration?!

Particularly the omission of several esoteric parameters which are not self explanatory, i.e. parameters which would have required a visual representation/feedback.

In this thread one could get the impression that some obvious flaws (monophonic complex envelopes weren't even mentioned?) were deliberate so that people only speak about that product and not about the others

#----

Anyhow, we're very happy with Hive 2. Its recent transformation has given it a big boost in customer satisfaction.

I have the impression that it's still often viewed as "the more simple synth in comparison", which, on the surface, it is - that's its concept, after all. Hence people ask "can you make this sound of synth X in Hive?". But that omits that Hive's is also capable of things no other similar synth can do, such as running modulation sequences of different lengths against each other and the vast options of randomness. I think people should be asking the opposite question more often: "How long will it take you to whip up this Hive patch in Synth X, if ever?".

Also, something I think we've never really mentioned, is Hive's new voice stealing algorithm. Play an exactly identical pad or piano type sound in Hive and in another synth for a while. I'm almost certain that the way Hive schedules its voices will be preferred. If you want to make it more obvious, set both synths to 4 voices, hold a chord with your left and and play a melody with the right hand.

[EvilDragon]

Also what is this silly static illustration?!

It won't stay static forever.

[fmr]

(Hive) Staying with the idea to be "better than Sylenth1" is not going to save it. It should be developed to compete with Serum level in mind not Sylenth1.

Amen brother

[audiot]

(Hive) Staying with the idea to be "better than Sylenth1" is not going to save it. It should be developed to compete with Serum level in mind not Sylenth1.

Amen brother

Hive 2 is perfect as it is. I dont know serum, but I dont need more feature porn in hive. Hive 2 gets me directly to the sound that I want within a few minutes (with the eclipse skin from plugmon).

I wouldnt have commented this if urs wouldnt have joined this thread. If you read this urs ... please ignore them

I think we should close this thread, wait for Zebra3 and then we do a "Should I buy Massive X or Zebra3"-thread

[Urs]

(Hive) Staying with the idea to be "better than Sylenth1" is not going to save it. It should be developed to compete with Serum level in mind not Sylenth1.

Amen brother

While I agree that there are certainly more things we could do (e.g. free running shape seqs), I think we have left the paradigm of "catching up with". That was a msitake from the beginning, and we fixed it in Hive 2.0

It's like, when Colour Copy came out many people wanted it to be another Echoboy. But that would have destroyed what Colour Copy actually is. Yet, Colour Copy covers the vast majority of applications with a much simpler workflow, and it adds real world options which Echoboy can't do.

Hive has surpassed much of its competition in ways that don't express themselves in bullet points of feature lists. I think I have changed my whole stance on synthesis over the past three years. Using modular synthesizers I'm exploring my best musical phase by creating music with only two oscillators (and Rings, hehehe). I'm so over "two dozen LFOs with custom waveforms".

[EnGee]

Anyhow, we're very happy with Hive 2. Its recent transformation has given it a big boost in customer satisfaction.

I'm glad for this success and I hope that Bazille and ACE get the attention they deserve as well (by potential buyers).

Anyway, when first Hive 1 came out, I did felt it is not enough with few others. The majority didn't agree and found it more than enough. This time I also feel it is not enough because the FM and other "strong" modulations are needed to give Hive the "general purpose easy to use" synth stamp in my opinion.

However, I'm keeping my eyes on it. Let me first get Bazille back then see where Hive development is heading

[audiot]

Anyway, when first Hive 1 came out, I did felt it is not enough with few others. The majority didn't agree and found it more than enough. This time I also feel it is not enough because the FM and other "strong" modulations are needed to give Hive the "general purpose easy to use" synth stamp in my opinion.

However, I'm keeping my eyes on it. Let me first get Bazille back then see where Hive development is heading

There are a lot of people still making great tunes on very basic synths. I completly got away from feature porn synths (only exception is Zebra). One of my best purchases this year was Dagger Synth from beepstreet. I say: LETS KEEP HIVE AS IT IS!

Listen to the the masterpiece below and ask yourself if you need all that features. The whole track is knit around a MS-20 bassline (with external processing of cause) ... but look at the feature set of a MS-20 ... it's nothing compared to modern vst's.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q04ILDXe3QE

[EnGee]

What does "porn synths" mean?!

Anyway, adding FM and sync won't make the synths unusable for you I guess! And if the majority feel like you, then sure Hive 2 will stay as it is now, so cheer up my voice is not important

[audiot]

What does "porn synths" mean?!

Anyway, adding FM and sync won't make the synths unusable for you I guess! And if the majority feel like you, then sure Hive 2 will stay as it is now, so cheer up my voice is not important

No offense ... but urs has joined this thread ... defending one of his best creations. That makes me nervous a bit

[EnGee]

I'm not attacking Hive 2 (or Massive X). I wish the two to be successful in reality because I like both NI and u-he products and they are the most I'm using now Well, besides also some others but mainly NI and u-he for synths and I'm very happy with their products. So, it is just a criticism for a better product that what I believe it can be

[audiot]

I'm not attacking Hive 2 (or Massive X). I wish the two to be successful in reality because I like both NI and u-he products and they are the most I'm using now Well, besides also some others but mainly NI and u-he for synths and I'm very happy with their products. So, it is just a criticism for a better product that what I believe it can be

... wait for zebra3! And if you haven't ... check out zebra 2