OTO BIM vst alternative?

[drsyncenstein]

The 12 bit isn't just like a bitrcusher either.
Please explain how the magic works then.

A 12 bit dac is just a 12 bit dac.
Any voltage going into the delay is limited to 12 bit data. That 12 bit data is entering the dac and converted to a voltage.
A bitcrusher just limits the amount of bits, if you set it to 12 bit you end up with 12 bit data.
The dac has no magic tricks that the bitcrusher lacks. The dac clocking and analog levels can be better or worse, so you might get a litte distortion each time you pass the AD\DAC.
But guess what, the same happens each time you pass a bitcrusher.
They might use a companding dac, like e-mu used in some samplers, then the resolution would perhaps be closer to 14 bits. But I doubt that is where the magic is.
12 bits with a high sampling rate is already pretty clean, 14 bit is even cleaner.

Oto writes on their site: the signal was converted to digital just for the delay section.
That sounds special, but almost any hardware digital delay works that way. You need the analog signal to be digitized to be able to delay it, then you need a dac to be able to hear it again.
Sure, any analog stuff you put behind the delay will have effect, basically distortion.
I would expect the Bim engineers to put some good engineering effort into that.

The magic in the Lexicon prime time (Bim's inspiration?) is considered to be the the limiter\compander.
The other thing is that doubling the delay time reduces the sampling rate, so the bandwith is reduced from 12k to 6k or all the way down to 1k5. Now the signal breaks down in a much more extreme way. Which is one of the reasons the prime time is loved.
Can the Bim do that? I can't find it in the manual.

So if you take a vst delay with feedback set to zero, put a bitcrusher in front of it set to 12 bit with a sampling rate of 32k or lower. And then create a feedback loop to the input of the delay containing: compressor\limiter, eq\filter and a bit of clipping in it, you have basically recreated the hardware that inspired the Bim. Add a frequencyshifter, pitchshifter or chorus in the loop if you need more modulation. Use a higher sampling rate on the bitcrusher to make it cleaner like the Bim.

No it won't sound exactly the same, i've yet to meet a plugin that sounds the same as any as hardware. Or a hardware clone that sounds exactly like the source. A Bim is no Lexicon either.
But there will still be lots of the same sort of magic in it's sound.
Even better, it will be YOUR signature delay sound.

Anyway, tastes differ. I have a stack of Lexicon hardware, but can't detect any of that magic in the PSP delays. The soundtoys Primal Tap to me is the first delay that reacts like a vintage Lexicon. On most delays when you twist the delay time you don't get the switching artefacts that the real thing has. The primal tap emulates that nicely. And the bandwith reduction.

For the people suggesting lx480 and LX24; those are reverbs. The 480 is not vintage enough to compete. The 224 hardware is a great reverb, but a shitty delay. Because it was'nt designed as a delay and lacks the features. Other desert cities or NI Replika XT won't sound like the Bim, but to me are at least on the same level. From Valhalla, i think ubermod comes a bit closer to oldschool digital vibe than Delay.

[El°HYM]

Some good thoughts here...

No it won't sound exactly the same, i've yet to meet a plugin that sounds the same as any as hardware. Or a hardware clone that sounds exactly like the source.

...my favorite part.

[audiouser720]

The 12 bit isn't just like a bitrcusher either.
Please explain how the magic works then.

A 12 bit dac is just a 12 bit dac.
Any voltage going into the delay is limited to 12 bit data. That 12 bit data is entering the dac and converted to a voltage.
A bitcrusher just limits the amount of bits, if you set it to 12 bit you end up with 12 bit data.
The dac has no magic tricks that the bitcrusher lacks. The dac clocking and analog levels can be better or worse, so you might get a litte distortion each time you pass the AD\DAC.
But guess what, the same happens each time you pass a bitcrusher.
They might use a companding dac, like e-mu used in some samplers, then the resolution would perhaps be closer to 14 bits. But I doubt that is where the magic is.
12 bits with a high sampling rate is already pretty clean, 14 bit is even cleaner.

Oto writes on their site: the signal was converted to digital just for the delay section.
That sounds special, but almost any hardware digital delay works that way. You need the analog signal to be digitized to be able to delay it, then you need a dac to be able to hear it again.
Sure, any analog stuff you put behind the delay will have effect, basically distortion.
I would expect the Bim engineers to put some good engineering effort into that.

The magic in the Lexicon prime time (Bim's inspiration?) is considered to be the the limiter\compander.
The other thing is that doubling the delay time reduces the sampling rate, so the bandwith is reduced from 12k to 6k or all the way down to 1k5. Now the signal breaks down in a much more extreme way. Which is one of the reasons the prime time is loved.
Can the Bim do that? I can't find it in the manual.

So if you take a vst delay with feedback set to zero, put a bitcrusher in front of it set to 12 bit with a sampling rate of 32k or lower. And then create a feedback loop to the input of the delay containing: compressor\limiter, eq\filter and a bit of clipping in it, you have basically recreated the hardware that inspired the Bim. Add a frequencyshifter, pitchshifter or chorus in the loop if you need more modulation. Use a higher sampling rate on the bitcrusher to make it cleaner like the Bim.

No it won't sound exactly the same, i've yet to meet a plugin that sounds the same as any as hardware. Or a hardware clone that sounds exactly like the source. A Bim is no Lexicon either.
But there will still be lots of the same sort of magic in it's sound.
Even better, it will be YOUR signature delay sound.

Anyway, tastes differ. I have a stack of Lexicon hardware, but can't detect any of that magic in the PSP delays. The soundtoys Primal Tap to me is the first delay that reacts like a vintage Lexicon. On most delays when you twist the delay time you don't get the switching artefacts that the real thing has. The primal tap emulates that nicely. And the bandwith reduction.

For the people suggesting lx480 and LX24; those are reverbs. The 480 is not vintage enough to compete. The 224 hardware is a great reverb, but a shitty delay. Because it was'nt designed as a delay and lacks the features. Other desert cities or NI Replika XT won't sound like the Bim, but to me are at least on the same level. From Valhalla, i think ubermod comes a bit closer to oldschool digital vibe than Delay.

BIM i sin mainly inspired by PCM42 in terms of component design. The Prime Time is a different architecture as far as far as I know.

I do agree that no VST delay sounds like these vintage digital delays. Would you rate Soundtoys PrimalTap higher than NI replika?

[elxsound]

For the people suggesting lx480 and LX24; those are reverbs. The 480 is not vintage enough to compete. The 224 hardware is a great reverb, but a shitty delay. Because it was'nt designed as a delay and lacks the features. Other desert cities or NI Replika XT won't sound like the Bim, but to me are at least on the same level. From Valhalla, i think ubermod comes a bit closer to oldschool digital vibe than Delay.

That was when the conversation veered off course to talk about BAM instead of BIM.

*Primal Tap is one that I often ignored, but now I'm looking forward to comparing to Bim

[egbert101]

Saying you've not heard a plugin sound the same as hardware is subjective. Clearly digital plugins can sound exactly the same as digital effects, so you must mean analog, and analog emulation has become so good that you would not be able to tell the difference in most cases.

[audiouser720]

Saying you've not heard a plugin sound the same as hardware is subjective. Clearly digital plugins can sound exactly the same as digital effects, so you must mean analog, and analog emulation has become so good that you would not be able to tell the difference in most cases.

You mustn’t know what the BIM is, I suspect. It’s not just digital. I also don’t think that analog emulations are ‘there’. There is not one analog emulation yet, either synth or effect, that maintains the same sound properties above certain thresholds. Just within its limits. That, of course, doesn’t mean that you can’t make fakken amazing music with them

[egbert101]

Well okay, that's your opinion. Some people think it's already there, again opinion.

[El°HYM]

Which analog emulations now are indistinguishable? Not really following that branch.

[elxsound]

Aren’t there enough analog vs digital threads out there?

I think it’s easy enough just to discuss BIM without going into all analog emulations and post endlessly with no end.

[drsyncenstein]

Saying you've not heard a plugin sound the same as hardware is subjective. Clearly digital plugins can sound exactly the same as digital effects, so you must mean analog, and analog emulation has become so good that you would not be able to tell the difference in most cases.

Is anything objective where human senses are concerned?
Are digital effects fully digital? With no analog components at all?
Only if you connect them totally digital. But who does that?

Is the output always identitical to the last bit when you port a digital fx to vst?
I doubt it.
I'm no dsp guru, but that it's digital does not mean that you can easily recreate it exactly just on any platform. How bits get treated differs per platform.
Then there is digital and digital. If it's dsp, yes, then you have just code. But early Lexicons use lot's of logic chips, they don't behave as ideal as the emulation logic would dictate.

Analog emulation is great, still developers have to take lots of shortcuts to fit all that non linearity in a plugin that is light on the computer. Basically they're cheating to give us a close approximation. It's not an exact emulation.
That's not my thesis, you can find developers on this forum who state that.
Subjectively, al plugins smell like my audio interface and DAW.

[drsyncenstein]

Aren’t there enough analog vs digital threads out there?

I think it’s easy enough just to discuss BIM without going into all analog emulations and post endlessly with no end.

Sorry for your pain
a conclusion was already reached; there is no plugin emulation.

[elxsound]

Aren’t there enough analog vs digital threads out there?

I think it’s easy enough just to discuss BIM without going into all analog emulations and post endlessly with no end.

Sorry for your pain
a conclusion was already reached; there is no plugin emulation.

For some it’s not true, for others it’s absolute true, then come the blind tests, conversations about how things sound in a mix and on and on and on before it gets personal and people flag posts.

[zerocrossing]

I’ve never used a BIM, but one trick that Bitwig users can do is to put a bit and rate reducer (I like NI’s Bite) and an analog filter emulation that’s got a drive feature, inside Bitwig Delay’s feedback loop. If you don’t have Bitwig, you could try Bluecat’s Late Replies, which allows you to put various effects in the feedback path including hosting VSTS.

Yes but no but yes but no. I get what you are saying but it's not how BIM works. This won't emulate the nonlinearities caused by the interaction of the analog components. The 12 bit isn't just like a bitrcusher either.

Unless you're saying that the digital delay part of BIM interacts with the analog components of BIM, then I have no idea what you're talking about. I'd be surprised if it did. I clearly said, "and an analog filter emulation that’s got a drive feature," would be part of the setup. I guess you could really add anything, I often use an analog limiter in there as well, as things tend to get out of control quickly.

For instance I just set up DELAY-2 with Softube Model 72, IK's Black 76 and NI's Bite set to 21.1 hz, 12 bit with a tiny bit of crunch and I got a gorgeous complex delay tone.

Is it a BIM? Of course not, but there is no BIM emulation, and the question was asking for a "BIM alternative," not a "BIM emulation." I bet I could get a hell of a lot closer with my setup than with Valhalla Delay, as much as I like it.

[drsyncenstein]

Would you rate Soundtoys PrimalTap higher than NI replika?

I typed a elaborate reply but somehow lost it
I love the sound of primaltap, how can other plugins compete against such emotions?
Replika XT is way more flexible and cool in it's own way.

[audiouser720]

Would you rate Soundtoys PrimalTap higher than NI replika?

I typed a elaborate reply but somehow lost it
I love the sound of primaltap, how can other plugins compete against such emotions?
Replika XT is way more flexible and cool in it's own way.

Does PrimalTap have any latency like Echoboy?