Underrated/overlooked synths

[EnGee]

This plugin[/url] has been flying under the radar for years. It has exactly the feature you need to make the music style.

And no-one will ever know because you're too f**king lazy to write its name.

He meant it as a joke

Never used Talpha so no opinion. And yeah, could see people discounting Talmod based on some of the annoying features I mentioned, but for me, it's a trade off I'm willing to make. I've set up a Bitwig preset with assigned macros to compensate for the gain drops when using saturation or bandpass filter. Which is a hassle but to my ears, the sound quality is good enough for me to work with it.

IMO, TALMod is their best synth or their only interesting synth. I purchased it (with other TAL synths) when I thought to go Linux native only. On that land, very few native synths, so it could shine easily.
On Windows or Mac, I rarely use it (or other TAL/U-he synths) as I found more interesting synths easily. Nevertheless, it is a very good synth, I would give it 7.5/10.

[osiris]

I have Omnisphere 1. Don't have space to install. Yeah, I know, get another drive. I've never had that work well.

[questionaire]

I can not believe that "one ping only" has yet not been mentioned!

[Gam456]

I have Omnisphere 1. Don't have space to install. Yeah, I know, get another drive. I've never had that work well.

I don't know with the v1
On v2. You only need to link the steam folder with Omnisphere, nothing else

[buffalo roam]

Spectrasonics Omnisphere. Great synth, no demo, expensive and so doesn't get a lot of attention in Community. I love my copy of Omnisphere 2.5 keeps getting better, but not a lot of talk, tutorials, etc

Was just scanning through the manual for Omnisphere 2.8, and I see a section on "The Orb". Does this really require getting a separate iPad, which effectively would add several hundred dollars to the price of the software ? Or can The Orb be used within the computer using the trackpad?

[buffalo roam]

I'll add another one: MOK's Waverazor. This takes care of all your outer-space needs. Having just upgraded to version 2.8, with extra sounds and wave shapes, this remains a monster. It can seem off-putting, at first, when you go under the hood and encounter an overwhelming variety of choices to shape sounds, but at bottom it's a synth that takes each oscillator's wave form and slices it into four parts, each of which can be reshaped to change the sound. Rather than try to create sounds from scratch, I think this is really best for taking a sound and tweaking the hell out of it, to see where you land.

[BONES]

I've set up a Bitwig preset with assigned macros to compensate for the gain drops when using saturation or bandpass filter. Which is a hassle but to my ears, the sound quality is good enough for me to work with it.

Yeah, that's definitely the kind of shit that would put me off.

I think it's probably overlooked because it's so simple and doesn't really do the 'exciting' multi engine stuff everyone seems to love these days. I would put it in a similar category to Hive- easy, simple, not a show off synth, overlooked but well worth checking out.

It looks way too simple for most people, I think. They buy emulations of classics but otherwise seem to prefer big, complex do-it-all kinds of synths. Personally, I just look at it and go "meh" so I've never got as far as listening to any demo tracks. If it wasn't $100, I might give it try but that seems like a lot of money for something so basic. We are so spoiled for choice, it's hard to get me interested in something that's a few years old, which is why I like threads like this.

He meant it as a joke

I assume you had to click on the link to get the joke, which I didn't do. But my comment wasn't just directed at him, he's one of several posters who've done the same thing in this thread, and one of hundreds who've done it across KVR. It's really f**king lazy.

Anyway, when I look at all the synths I own and those that get the most use, it's impossible for me not to see Soundspot's Union as the most overlooked/underrated synth I own. Soundspot gave up on it, as they tended to do with all their plugins. It's not even listed in the KVR database. Plugin Boutique have revived it as WaveOSC, with a new GUI but no new features. They missed a trick by not allowing it to load Union presets, too, which makes it of limited use to me (although I still bought it).

It's got a great sound that works in so many different things for me. It's not a terribly cleverly designed synths - it's basically just three single osc synths stacked together, so there is no cross-modulation at all, yet somehow it manages to be very versatile. I use it in most NOVAkILL songs and it's also in quite a few of the 80s covers I've worked up as a side-project. It does all kinds of bass patches, lovely lush strings and big powerful leads.

WaveOSC is only $13.90 at Plugin Boutique at the moment and I think it's well worth having at that price.

Other synths that I think get overlooked because they are free or cheap are Phuturetone's brilliant GR-8 and e-phonic's Invader 2. They are both great V/A synths with a great sound and more than enough features for us to find use for them all the time. I'd also add Adam Szabo's JP6K to that list. It's only €25, it looks quite simple but it sounds great and has enough features to make it quite versatile. I think it suffers from living in the shadow of Viper but it's a great little synth.

[MachineClaw]

Spectrasonics Omnisphere. Great synth, no demo, expensive and so doesn't get a lot of attention in Community. I love my copy of Omnisphere 2.5 keeps getting better, but not a lot of talk, tutorials, etc

Was just scanning through the manual for Omnisphere 2.8, and I see a section on "The Orb". Does this really require getting a separate iPad, which effectively would add several hundred dollars to the price of the software ? Or can The Orb be used within the computer using the trackpad?

iPad, orb is an app. You can get a cheap iPad now at a pawnshop, cable to Mac or pc. I’ve only used it a couple of times in my setup. It’s interesting, but it’s not a required must have. Better to get a hardware synth and control omnisphere that way, best both worlds. But I have a iPad Pro m2 with tons of space so I have lots of music apps, KORG gadget 3 etc etc

[Gam456]

Spectrasonics Omnisphere. Great synth, no demo, expensive and so doesn't get a lot of attention in Community. I love my copy of Omnisphere 2.5 keeps getting better, but not a lot of talk, tutorials, etc

Was just scanning through the manual for Omnisphere 2.8, and I see a section on "The Orb". Does this really require getting a separate iPad, which effectively would add several hundred dollars to the price of the software ? Or can The Orb be used within the computer using the trackpad?

iPad, orb is an app. iPad, orb is an app. You can get a cheap iPad now at a pawnshop, cable to Mac or pc.

What are you talking about ?
On ipad the app is Omni TR

Orb is a source modulation inside Omnisphere.
You don't need an Ipad, mouse, trackball will work

[IvyBirds]

Spectrasonics Omnisphere. Great synth, no demo, expensive and so doesn't get a lot of attention in Community. I love my copy of Omnisphere 2.5 keeps getting better, but not a lot of talk, tutorials, etc

Was just scanning through the manual for Omnisphere 2.8, and I see a section on "The Orb". Does this really require getting a separate iPad, which effectively would add several hundred dollars to the price of the software ? Or can The Orb be used within the computer using the trackpad?

You can also control it using MIDI CC's and a midi controller, that is how I use it

https://support.spectrasonics.net/manua ... age06.html

It works great when you assign the "angle" to a fader that moves up and down, and the "radius" to a knob right above it. Conveniently that is how many controllers are already setup. Really any X/Y control works well with that setup

[NoriSato]

Underrated synth,

- U-he ACE

Someone mentioned TALmod, but I dare to say it is NOT modular synth. Because it has no audio-signal patching capability (except osc3 out). On the other hand, ACE has full patching capability as the name suggest (Any Cable Everywhere). You'll be amazed how far it can make wide variety of sound with very few modules, as Dan Worrall's video show (linked from U-He's product page). It is old synth, but its warm analog sound is still applicable today.


- Xils-lab PolyKB-III

For warm rich analog synth sound, it might be standing alongside famous DIVA. It has 3 osc and 2 filters, so sound can become rather complex than DIVA. Also its space effect is super nice.


Also I add +1 for Synchlavier V and ANA2.5 .

[buffalo roam]

Thanks for the responses regarding the use of The Orb in Omnisphere. I really appreciate it!

[JerGoertz]

A couple analog emulations that don't get much mention (AFAIK). They're both quite versatile with a rich fundamental sound.

- Rob Papen BIT 2
- Tone2 Saurus

[MachineClaw]

Omni TR, sorry my bad. Use it so infrequently.

[emef]

Underrated synth,

Someone mentioned TALmod, but I dare to say it is NOT modular synth. Because it has no audio-signal patching capability (except osc3 out).

so what?
it's a great synth, very easy to make great sounds with it
i'd go along with it being a bit underrated/overlooked