Synapse Audio OBSESSION is now available!

[urosh]

BTW,
that VCA saturation switch on the back, it's not subtle at all despite what manual claims, and it is very good, don't forget folks bout that switch when you're making patches from scratch.

I noticed it actually becomes very subtle if they are gain matched, I don't know if that's what the manual referred to.
Switching it on gives it about 3 dB boost, but once properly gain matched it's not so easy to tell them apart.

It saturates noticeably (for me), regardless of slightly higher gain. Check with some dark resonant 24dB bass, distortion is very noticeable. It also "opens up" in very pleasant way pads and leads, I mostly keep bass patches clean, but use it all the time on higher register stuff.

[Niowiad]

BTW,
that VCA saturation switch on the back, it's not subtle at all despite what manual claims, and it is very good, don't forget folks bout that switch when you're making patches from scratch.

I noticed it actually becomes very subtle if they are gain matched, I don't know if that's what the manual referred to.
Switching it on gives it about 3 dB boost, but once properly gain matched it's not so easy to tell them apart.

It saturates noticeably (for me), regardless of slightly higher gain. Check with some dark resonant 24dB bass, distortion is very noticeable. It also "opens up" in very pleasant way pads and leads, I mostly keep bass patches clean, but use it all the time on higher register stuff.

Yeah I stand corrected.
I tried something like you described and it's definitely noticeable (and quite pleasant to me) regardless of gain matching. I was trying it on the wrong stuff.
Nice

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

I'm trying to follow this conversation here but am having a little trouble doing that. So what essentially do we have here? Is this an OB-Xa? Is it an OB-X? Is it a combination of the two?

Obsession is very OB-Xa, down to it's-not-a-bug-but-a-feature selfosciallting peculiarity of CEM3320

And the missing saw waveform for the 2nd LFO.

[aMUSEd]

I'm trying to follow this conversation here but am having a little trouble doing that. So what essentially do we have here? Is this an OB-Xa? Is it an OB-X? Is it a combination of the two? Is it something else? Because based on some of the findings from what I'm understanding, there are either some things that are missing or have been added.

What would be great is if somebody who has both Obsession and a hardware OB-Xa and or an OB-X could go through the specs of each and point out the differences.

Thanks.

You forgot the OB-8
Probably the whole OB series in one plugin.

OBHave

[Julien Unison]

Instant buy

[BONES]

Filter envelope very much affects filter cutoff frequency when applied. And Mutant is talking about filter envelope behavior.

They open and close the filter, the filter does the work, the envelope tells it how to behave. If you bothered to read the context in which the comment was made, you'd understand what I was saying.
[/quote]

You are welcome to use Synth1 to play your Oberheim sounds if you don't care about the tiny details.

You do understand that all this comment does it reinforce Teksonik's point, right? People who play synths don't care about that stuff, they play whatever gets the job done. That's why OB's are so expensive today - people threw them away when better thing became available because they were seen as worthless. Only nerds hung onto them when synths that stayed in tune and sounded reliably the same every time you switched them on were being made by all and sundry for less money. Nobody gave a rat's about how closely they could imitate some sad, little Van Halen song (which I had never heard of until you brought it up, BTW, and still haven't actually heard), they had their own music to be getting on with.

One day, I'm going to post a contest over at Soundware to name the synths and watch everybody fall over themselves trying to get even one right.

They won't. I've tried it several times and they are all too gutless to put their money where their mouths are. They'll argue until they are blue in the face but if you try to put them to the test, they will run a mile. The reasonable people will have a go but the idiots will be too scared that reality might impinge upon the fantasy land they inhabit.

All I can say is it sounds fantastic to me. I now have 'The Legend', Repro 1/5 and Obsession. I could only dream of owning synths that sounded this good back in the day. I am equally as 'wowed' with this as I was when I first loaded up Repro 5.

Don't forget Odyssey. For my money it is still the best of the lot. There is just something about its sound - if I use Odyssey (Korg's VSTi) for a part it will just sound "better". The others are all great (maybe not Legend) but none of them are special in the way Odyssey is for me. I've been getting more into Korg's Mono/Poly since the GUI revamp, too, and it is definitely right up there with the others.

[quantum7]

Sounds great......but I have an OB-8 and an OB-6 and am pretty familiar with the Oberheim sound, so I'm a bit puzzled why the demo video has nothing in it that sounds like an Oberheim? Perhaps they just wanted to showcase modern sounds? I'm looking forward to testing out the demo though. I already own Dune and Legend and really like the Synapse Audio stuff.

[tony10000]

Don't forget Odyssey. For my money it is still the best of the lot. There is just something about its sound - if I use Odyssey (Korg's VSTi) for a part it will just sound "better". The others are all great (maybe not Legend) but none of them are special in the way Odyssey is for me. I've been getting more into Korg's Mono/Poly since the GUI revamp, too, and it is definitely right up there with the others.

The Legend is an awesome synth! The filter is phenomenal!

[vitocorleone123]

Sounds great......but I have an OB-8 and an OB-6 and am pretty familiar with the Oberheim sound, so I'm a bit puzzled why the demo video has nothing in it that sounds like an Oberheim? Perhaps they just wanted to showcase modern sounds? I'm looking forward to testing out the demo though. I already own Dune and Legend and really like the Synapse Audio stuff.

Speculation: People who know about Oberheim also have some idea of what it sounds like and how to get that sound. New producers and musicians may not, or may think it's limited to 80s music (god only knows how many people on the Internet seem to think that about the OB-6), so showing off new/different might be good marketing.

[zvenx]

Can't hurt to do both camps as I have been 'preaching'. Which I have also said u-he does perfectly.
rsp

[Sound Author]

For the life of me, I can't seem to notice any difference with the filter keytracking or treble when fiddling with the Filter Scale and Presence knobs in the Voice Edit section. I must be doing something wrong. I've tried all kinds of different scenarios and both knobs seem to have no effect on the filter at all.

[rdstreets]

Don't forget Odyssey. For my money it is still the best of the lot. There is just something about its sound - if I use Odyssey (Korg's VSTi) for a part it will just sound "better". The others are all great (maybe not Legend) but none of them are special in the way Odyssey is for me. I've been getting more into Korg's Mono/Poly since the GUI revamp, too, and it is definitely right up there with the others.

Many thanks for the tip. I noticed Odyssey on sale and today was the last day I think. It sounds great - Cheers!

[Sound Author]

Okay, I can hear (and see on the spectral analyzer) a TINY difference with the filter treble with the Presence knob cranked all the way up when the filter is almost all the way open. Too subtle. If that's how it is on the original OB-Xa then...well...it's still too subtle.

I have the same beef with the Variance "trimmers" in Diva. They are SO subtle that I hardly have any use for them....and I love Diva with the white hot passion of a thousand suns. I just think the trimpots should have a more noticeable effect...in both Diva and Obsession.

[Ingonator]

Was the filter track control really either 0 or 100 percent? Sounds like two rather extreme options to choose from
How about a half-lit LED (like with the OSC2 to filter button) indicating 50%?

Yes the original OB-Xa only had 0% or 100% filter keytracking. The 50% setting for Osc 2 volume was implemented as a separate button while in OBsession it is implemented in a single button (and you can override this setting in the mod matrix).

In OBSession with the TRACK button activated in the filter section you can "override" the filter keytracking amount by assigning a "Const" mod source to "Flt Keytrack". The mod amout has a range of -100 to +100 so you can use negative keytracking if needed. A value of +100 gives the same result as with 100% keytrackiing.

In my own patches i rarely used 100% filter keytracking so i am happy that this can be freely adjusted.
IIMHO this is one of the major improvements in OBsession compared to a real OB-Xa.

FWIW i would prefer a dedicated filter ketracking knob but with the current implementation you can either use it like in the real OB-Xa or have it freely adjustable via the mod matrix. With a dedicated knob you might not get access to negative key tracking except if the knob would be bipolar. If a knob would be implemented in the future it could be compatible with existing patches when the mod matrix setting like with the current on/off button can still override the knob setting (which should be 100% in the existing patches).

On the other hand instead of replacing buttons with knobs to save mod matrix slot it would make more sense to have more mod matrix slots in a future update.

[BONES]

Okay, I can hear (and see on the spectral analyzer) a TINY difference with the filter treble with the Presence knob cranked all the way up when the filter is almost all the way open. Too subtle. If that's how it is on the original OB-Xa then...well...it's still too subtle.

I have the same beef with the Variance "trimmers" in Diva. They are SO subtle that I hardly have any use for them....and I love Diva with the white hot passion of a thousand suns. I just think the trimpots should have a more noticeable effect...in both Diva and Obsession.

Those things are only there to accurately emulate the behaviour of the real thing, they have no use beyond that, which is why nobody puts 'em into synths that aren't emulations.