Albino 3 returns.....

[egbert101]

I still own Spectral and it is indeed a rather unique plugin.

[zerocrossing]

I own Albino3 and I like it, but honestly I cannot understand the hype.
Apart from the filter, what is the special thing in Albino3 when we compare to other RP synths?

Anyway, congrats for the resurrection!
Glad to see it!

I’m with you. I bought Albino back in the day because there seemed to be so much hype around it and I never really got into it. I remember it as sounding kind of bland. I haven’t installed it in years… I bet I still have the CD installer somewhere.

[MrJubbly]

If changing the name to 'Albino 3 Legend' somehow prevents that highly beneficial functionality, then that will be have been a pretty short-sighted mis-step by the developers.

Plugin name and plugin ID are two different things. This should be possible. But it doesn't hurt to shoot RP & crew an e-mail to make them aware of this.

Yeah, I know.

I found that out after emailing several developers, some of whose plugins do support automatic migration VST/VST3 (for example, Valhalla DSP, Applied Acoustics Systems) and others which don't (e.g. Kilohearts, Fabfilter, etc.)

Valhalla's Customer Support were quite helpful though in their response (as I had asked for their advice on how they managed to make their plugins work, whereas many other developers had not been able to):

Valhalla DSP Customer Support:
As far as automatic migration, I think that the Valhalla plugins benefitted from migrating to VST3 fairly late (in late 2020, to be precise). I use the Juce framework for my plugins, which a lot of plugin companies do, so porting to VST3 mostly involved hooking up to the latest VST3 SDK, downloading the latest Juce SDK, and enabling the VST3 build option. Which seems simple, but there are a few problems with this:

- The VST3 SDK is constantly changing. Which is weird, as VST3 is supposed to be a “standard.”
- Juce had their own VST2 implementation for several years, which had an incorrect VST Plugin ID generation (the bytes were out of order). So, if a Juce developer was building a VST2 and VST3, even if they supposedly shared the same ID, the DAW may not recognize it as the same ID. Juce has now pulled their VST2 implementation, so more recent builds might address this.
- VST3 plugin support is a shifting entity in DAWs. VST2s tend to work the same across all DAWs, but it is a crapshoot about whether or not the VST3s will behave the same across DAWs.

So, my guess for what is going on with other developers is that

- they name their VST3 builds something different, which is either intentional or accidental
- the VST Plugin ID has different formatting between VST2 and VST3, which is probably accidental.

I’m not sure how to fix the VST Plugin ID issue. I only have one plugin that was affected by this, a build of VintageVerb from 2018 or so. The latest VintageVerb builds match the older VintageVerb builds as far as VST Plugin ID, and the VST2 and VST3 plugin IDs match each other now.

[cryophonik]

I'll probably upgrade, even though I haven't used Albino 3 in... I have no idea how many years.

My hope is that this means continued future development, maybe an Albino 4 in the future, etc.

[Teksonik]

Apart from the filter, what is the special thing in Albino3 when we compare to other RP synths?

The 4 layers in Albino were unique. Will it stand up to the competition now, even Rob and Jon's more recent offerings?

I liked Albino a lot back in the day but will I still feel that same way in 2023? I still have backups of a ton of Albino presets including a boat load of my own. Would I pay to get them back now? Only time with the demo will tell.

[gearwatcher]

I might consider it if they have a dark theme otherwise I'm not paying fiddy bux for something I already have.

[HcDoom]

Hopefully, theyll improve filters a bit

[Teksonik]

Hopefully, theyll improve filters a bit

Only if they leave the old filters intact. Otherwise it would effect old patches.

Hopefully it will be both a non-destructive update and an upgrade as well.

[martinjuenke]

That sounds like the Zombie Apocalypse!

[hurricaneaudiolab]

I don't want the new Albino 3 to sound like Predator or Go2/Vecto/Quad. They all sound rather samey as it is and I don't think I'd be able tell them apart in a blind test. As for the "bland" sound of Albino - well I wouldn't call it bland, but rather...."soft", which is why I like it. It does those "in-between" sounds very well, and in my opinion, it does soft 80s digital exceptionally well. Albino is not hard, heavy, or very analog sounding, and it's not an edm "supersaw" synth or a vicious FM monster. It does its own thing, there are LOTS of presets out there, and it serves a specific and useful purpose, in my setup at least.

I did this in 2021, and hope it gives you an idea of why Albino 3 is one of my favorite synths. It's not gonna blow you away, might even put you to sleep, but I love the sounds:

[chk071]

I doubt that they will change something about the sound. I mean, why? I see no compelling reason for them to do so, especially when they market and sell it as "Albino 3 Legend".

Pretty sure they will just change stuff which makes it more contemporary technically. Which is reflected in the info they've given as well.

[fmr]

It’s Linplug’s best synth

I love me some Albino, but Spectral is the best Linplug synth. It's kinda irreplaceable...

I was about to say exactly that.

[fmr]

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[fmr]

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[fmr]

Hopefully, theyll improve filters a bit

Only if they leave the old filters intact. Otherwise it would effect old patches.

Hopefully it will be both a non-destructive update and an upgrade as well.

I doubt they will mess with the synth engine. IMO, it will be just a modernization, maybe with some code polishing, VST3 support and a new, resizeable GUI.