Obxd synthesizer

[.jon]

There will soon be two way superior emulations of that synth from Synapse Audio and Arturia, so what is the future of that free plugin, anyway?

Who really wastes money on emulations of old synth tech? Most VST synths are only cool because they're free.

[e-crooner]

There will soon be two way superior emulations of that synth from Synapse Audio and Arturia, so what is the future of that free plugin, anyway?

Who really wastes money on emulations of old synth tech? Most VST synths are only cool because they're free.

I would, if it comes with nice extras such as quality effects.

[Obsolete462444]

There will soon be two way superior emulations of that synth from Synapse Audio and Arturia, so what is the future of that free plugin, anyway?

What makes you think that they would be "way superior"? After all we are talking about oscillators, filters and modulation here - not some rocket science or mythical magic. I doubt that the way these are implemented in these two upcoming products would be significantly better.

[carrieres]

There will soon be two way superior emulations of that synth from Synapse Audio and Arturia, so what is the future of that free plugin, anyway?

What makes you think that they would be "way superior"? After all we are talking about oscillators, filters and modulation here - not some rocket science or mythical magic. I doubt that the way these are implemented in these two upcoming products would be significantly better.

it is rocket science !
every DSP coder have a great knowledge in physic and math.

[chk071]

There will soon be two way superior emulations of that synth from Synapse Audio and Arturia, so what is the future of that free plugin, anyway?

What makes you think that they would be "way superior"? After all we are talking about oscillators, filters and modulation here - not some rocket science or mythical magic. I doubt that the way these are implemented in these two upcoming products would be significantly better.

I don't want to talk this down, but, the guy who originally coded Obxd didn't model it after a unit he had to his disposal, but, after sound demos. Apart from that, it's of course also always down to the developer's skill, and experience. There's been a lot of progress in the last 15 years in terms of analog modelling.

Again, not to talk this down. Obxd is a good synth.

[Obsolete462444]

it is rocket science !
every DSP coder have a great knowledge in physic and math.

I'm aware of what DSP entails, no need for a lecture. In reality most coders of digital effects and instruments do not have a comprehensive knowledge that spans around all aspects and details of DSP, a lot is copy and paste from DSP textbooks or just use of the standard implementations / examples that are part of a given developement framework (eg JUCE, IPlug).

Not to mention that oscillators that produce sound in a synth are quite primitive entities and not really difficult to approximate / recreate in the digital realm, basically they just periodically output either a sine / square / saw wave (= a very primitive type of signal).

Sure, you can attempt to additionally recreate some minor side effects and randomness that is present in analog circuits, but they are not the main part that make the sound. The main part of the sound a synth creates (95%) are these very primitive and easy to digitally recreate aspects!

Same with filters: all kinds of filters have been modelled and described in DSP text books / online references and are readily available to the developers, so no need to go be an Albert Einstein and reinvent the wheel here.

[Obsolete462444]

I don't want to talk this down, but, the guy who originally coded Obxd didn't model it after a unit he had to his disposal, but, after sound demos. Apart from that, it's of course also always down to the developer's skill, and experience. There's been a lot of progress in the last 15 years in terms of analog modelling.

Again, not to talk this down. Obxd is a good synth.

Yeah, but I guess the original developer of OBXD at least had some kind of circuit sheet available? Sure, there will always be slight differences in quality in different models and implementations, depending on the coders level of skill and expertise.

I guess to some degree OBXD (which is not 15 years old btw) already reflects some of those progresses that have been made in analog modelling over the last decade already. For example: analog-like behaving filters are pretty much readily available in the main audio software development frameworks (like JUCE, IPlug) from bundled examples or public repositories, while 15 years ago it might have been more difficult to get this aspect right, since you probably would have to come up with a solution yourself.

After seeing this presentation of patches that were created for OB-XD I'm pretty confident that OB-XD is quite usable at the very least:

[e-crooner]

There is much more to a synth than oscillators, filter and modulation.
And there is a reason why different synths sound different.
I think the two new, commercial emulations are superior for instance because they will have effects, which can make a big difference.

I for one prefer augmented, clever emulations to perfect ones.

[carrieres]

it is rocket science !
every DSP coder have a great knowledge in physic and math.

I'm aware of what DSP entails, no need for a lecture.

If you don't need a lecture, you should be able to acknowledge that some dev are smarter than other (Urs Heckmann, Richard Hoffmann, Sean Costello ...) with their own quality and efficient code.
It's not just copy/past

[Obsolete462444]

If you don't need a lecture, you should be able to acknowledge that some dev are smarter than other (Urs Heckmann, Richard Hoffmann, Sean Costello ...) with their own quality and efficient code.
It's not just copy/past

What does that have to do with anything? Generally, some people are smarter than others - no particular relation to DSP at all.

[Obsolete462444]

There is much more to a synth than oscillators, filter and modulation.

Not really, at it's core a synth is just the combination of these three main entities / functions.

And there is a reason why different synths sound different.

In many instances the differences between synths are highly overrated by people who don't really grasp conceptually what an oscillator actually does (creating a very primitive periodic waveform).

I think the two new, commercial emulations are superior for instance because they will have effects, which can make a big difference.

Not a fan of built in effects in synths myself, I want my effects to be interchangeable and generally available, not only in one synth, not to mention that built in effects tend to be inferior in quality to third party solutions. Also, they can distract from the actual capabilities of a synth: Many 'popular' synth plugins used by self-proclaimed 'EDM producers' do actually sound horrible, but all their built in presets use additional on-board effects to distract from the actual inferiority of the core synthesizer engine.

[carrieres]

If you don't need a lecture, you should be able to acknowledge that some dev are smarter than other (Urs Heckmann, Richard Hoffmann, Sean Costello ...) with their own quality and efficient code.
It's not just copy/past

What does that have to do with anything? Generally, some people are smarter than others - no relation to DSP at all. You are not smart, are you?

if you don't copy paste, you need to be smarter, clever, more brilliant, more intelligent ...
but i agree no need to be Albert Einstein !
i find easy to understand don't you ?

[e-crooner]

There is much more to a synth than oscillators, filter and modulation.

Not really, at it's core a synth is just the combination of these three main entities / functions.

And there is a reason why different synths sound different.

In many instances the differences between synths are highly overrated by people who don't really grasp conceptually what an oscillator actually does (creating a very primitive periodic waveform).

I think the two new, commercial emulations are superior for instance because they will have effects, which can make a big difference.

Not a fan of built in effects in synths myself, I want my effects to be interchangeable and generally available, not only in one synth, not to mention that built in effects tend to be inferior in quality to third party solutions. Also, they can distract from the actual capabilities of a synth: Many 'popular' synth plugins used by self-proclaimed 'EDM producers' do actually sound horrible, but all their built in presets use additional on-board effects to distract from the actual inferiority of the core synthesizer engine.

Still, a saw is not a saw. The same waveforms may look and sound different on different synths. Then there are aspects such as aliasing and what not.

I am not saying that the free emulation doesn't sound good, not at all. But still, being 5 or more years more modern, the Synapse Audio emulation is destined to sound better.
And onboard effects can make a whole lot of sense if the effect is part of the patch. Think of sound designers, they can't include guides on what external effects people should use for every patch. And Synapse Audio effects do sound very good.
I think onboard effects only have a bad reputation because their quality clearly used to be inferior years ago. The reverb in Sylenth1 still sucks today.

[Kian Russell]

I think onboard effects only have a bad reputation because their quality clearly used to be inferior years ago. The reverb in Sylenth1 still sucks today.

Very true Fluffy.

[Calenberger]

a saw is not a saw.

Rene Magritte
(or someone else with similar mind set)