The "Zebra2 plays Virus" challenge

[DevonB]

This is my last attempt, that arp is driving me nuts !!

Zebra2 goes Virus.

There's something else going on in the Virus mp3, I have some of Manuel Schleis' soundbanks and sorry to say, but I didn't find a sound that powerful.

Peter.

The filter is opened too quickly in your example, and that phaser effect is set up differently because the orignal is a tiny bit more 'extreme'. The bass energy sounds a little more intense from the original too, like we have a sub oscillator an octave down. Otherwise, it sounds right.

Devon

[thespecialist]

v3 is the virus, and sounds much better.

Haha. Already bought that new pair of speakers, buddy ? Lol.

[Shy]

No, buddy, actually I have semi good headphones right now, not speakers. "lol".

[thespecialist]

No, buddy, actually I have semi good headphones right now, not speakers. "lol".

Right now I'm on a 80 euro set of Logitech computer speakers and even on those, I could tell the difference. The Zebra has a very personal sound, much 'cleaner' and maybe more 'anti aliased' would be a good description. Personally I prefer the somewhat more raw and dirty virus sound, but it's just a matter of taste.

[Shy]

Well done then, mate. Too bad you didn't dare to post your guess so that morons wouldn't laugh at you if you got it wrong.

[pschelfh]

This is my last attempt, that arp is driving me nuts !!

Zebra2 goes Virus.

There's something else going on in the Virus mp3, I have some of Manuel Schleis' soundbanks and sorry to say, but I didn't find a sound that powerful.

Peter.

The filter is opened too quickly in your example, and that phaser effect is set up differently because the orignal is a tiny bit more 'extreme'. The bass energy sounds a little more intense from the original too, like we have a sub oscillator an octave down. Otherwise, it sounds right.

Devon

You're right, the phaser on that Virus preset uses 4 stages, while in Zebra2 the phaser is fixed on ? stages. I believe the less stages in the phaser, the more extreme its effect will be.

I used 2 detuned OSC + 1 OSC tuned an octave down. It somehow didn't have the same effect (less 'creamy') on the sound when it was tuned in line with the other OSC's.

Peter.

[thespecialist]

Well done then, mate. Too bad you didn't dare to post your guess so that morons would laugh at you if you got it wrong.

Too bad Urs posted the solution so quickly. Maybe he can make our day and play another arp on both the Virus and the Zebra for comparison ? If so, please wait with your solution till tomorrow or at least tonight

[djsubject]

i honestly thought V3 was the virus

not that i wanted to favor the virus just assumed it would have the fullest sound i suppose

Subz

[Howard]

Dunno how many stages Zebra2 phaser uses but that preset from the Virus uses 4 stages in the phaser, which makes the effect more pronounced.

I count a maximum of 48 stages in Z2, without even using the dedicated Phaser or Phorus effects!

Allpass filter models in parallel with the original/already treated signal, 50/50 mix. That gives you 8 stages per filter * 6 filters = 48 stages.

Having said that, I think the Phaser module in Z2 is rather good (compares well with the one in my Virus C). Try turning mix up to maximum and using quad

[Urs]

Too bad Urs posted the solution so quickly. Maybe he can make our day and play another arp on both the Virus and the Zebra for comparison ?

That's been done before... the problem is, too many people want to hear that certain sound. The only point to make was, even the Virus itself can't produce that sound.

Will see what I can do though... when there's a bit more time.

[poonna]

Well, I don't think Urs intentionally made Virus sound bad. On my listening, I *much* prefer V2 to V3 myself. V3 sounds too harsh/aggressive. Urs himself even admitted he like V2 more.

[beej]

not that i wanted to favor the virus just assumed it would have the fullest sound i suppose

I think this is one of the reasons the Virus has so much "holy grail"-ness in forums, especially here - people hear a lot of other people talking about it, and without any real practical experience they just assume the Virus must be just so much better than anything else, without equating it to anything "real".

[pschelfh]

Too bad Urs posted the solution so quickly. Maybe he can make our day and play another arp on both the Virus and the Zebra for comparison ?

That's been done before... the problem is, too many people want to hear that certain sound. The only point to make was, even the Virus itself can't produce that sound.

Will see what I can do though... when there's a bit more time.

I think Manuel was also tweaking some knobs on that mp3. Eg. the filter cutoff starts much lower on the mp3 than on that Virus 'Exciter' preset.

Peter.

[Urs]

I think Manuel was also tweaking some knobs on that mp3. Eg. the filter cutoff starts much lower on the mp3 than on that Virus 'Exciter' preset.

Agreed! Wanna give it a try then?

What I found notable is the VCA Attack time. It's above "Punch" level. I'm gonna try a compressor on this...

Urs

[suthnear]

Yeah, modulation's definitely the thing. Urs's recording of the arp from the virus sounds pretty much exactly like I thought it would: it's definitely the same sound but something important is missing. I had to make loads of tweaks to get my attempt into the right area - two filter cutoffs, volume and filter envelope decay, phaser depth and mix. I tweaked the arp's note lengths quite a bit, too. And it's still far from perfect - there's a little too much drive on the filters and the lower notes are a bit too prominent. But that's as good as it's going to get from me

I've listened to quite a few of the other attempts now and they almost all suffer from the basic sound being too hard. While this is not a bad thing in itself, the original sound is quite delicate. The reverb on the original is also giving it quite a bit of depth.