KVR Audio

Lunch Money · Post by **Lunch Money** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 1:25 am

The only guitar magazine I can stand anymore is Guitar Player. I hope they keep it real. It's even showing signs of weakness, but yet stands out well above Guitar One and the ones out of the UK.

Greg

AndrewSimon · Post by **AndrewSimon** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 3:28 am

A3ntar wrote:
When we're done I don't think there will be anyone on the planet who could tell if we used a real amp or not. It does the trick! But, more importantly it is FAST! Not to mention you can use headphones (I can rarely crank an AC30 at home for instance).
"Fast" meaning what?

Squids, do you think that adding the dongle copy protection will make AT2 "slower"? ( AFAIK you're using a non protected version, right? )

It's "fast" compare to warming up a real tube amp, fiddling with microphones and a million other devices in the studio.
And the best and fastest feature is that once you captured a sound you can save it in a preset.
Then you can call it up at any time, always the same sound.

Squids · Post by **Squids** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:07 am

Andrew Vernon wrote:Squids, how does AT2 deal with tones like those in songs by Tool and Porcupine Tree. Specifically the tone in Tool's Schism is pretty unique sounding, could AT2 hit it?

www.toolband.com for a sound clip.

Probably very well. I am not an expert on Tool though so I'd have to investigate. Porcupine Tree on the other hand is very Floydy and AT2 can do very well for those type of sounds too.

Squids · Post by **Squids** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:12 am

A3ntar wrote:
When we're done I don't think there will be anyone on the planet who could tell if we used a real amp or not. It does the trick! But, more importantly it is FAST! Not to mention you can use headphones (I can rarely crank an AC30 at home for instance).
"Fast" meaning what?

Squids, do you think that adding the dongle copy protection will make AT2 "slower"? ( AFAIK you're using a non protected version, right? )

Fast meaning fast and easy to work with. Very immediate and logical layout. Also, the ability to change the components of the amps to up to 20,000 possible amp combinations really stands out from the rest. It's like having a custom amp shop built-in but again I use the word FAST (imagine how long it would take for a tech to switch out tubes, preamps, speakers etc. in hardware). So, you really get the benefit of software's ability to simulate something that would be impractical, time consuming and expensive to do in hardware. Nice!

As for the key, there is no hit on the CPU from the key. In fact, on Miroslav Philharmonik it is even lighter on the CPU than SampleTank was because of the way it uses the DSP. That myth had to do with another product and even there I don't see a difference (I use that other product... but I don't like discussing this because it is unfounded information from a suspect source and a damaging rumour relating to a company I like).

Squids · Post by **Squids** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:27 am

AndrewSimon wrote:
A3ntar wrote:
When we're done I don't think there will be anyone on the planet who could tell if we used a real amp or not. It does the trick! But, more importantly it is FAST! Not to mention you can use headphones (I can rarely crank an AC30 at home for instance).
"Fast" meaning what?

Squids, do you think that adding the dongle copy protection will make AT2 "slower"? ( AFAIK you're using a non protected version, right? )
It's "fast" compare to warming up a real tube amp, fiddling with microphones and a million other devices in the studio.
And the best and fastest feature is that once you captured a sound you can save it in a preset.
Then you can call it up at any time, always the same sound.

Exactly Andrew. Those of us that have been so used to hardware synths and guitar gear know that instant recall is MAJOR progress and the more certain software becomes like the hardware we love the faster we are able to work and try out things we might not otherwise try (or call up a sound the same way we had it before instead of "somewhat close").

I'm really being straight with this. As much as a I am a sample freak and a plug-in junky I am also a major hardware fan and have collected a lot of vintage gear in my day. I still love it and always will. I am not getting rid of my Minimoog or my Vox amp (and I need to buy back my Leslie too and an Arp 2600). I love the look, feel and smell of them too! I can get incredible sounds out of that hardware and it is even okay if I don't have instant recall either. However, in ADDITION to that I have my Arturia Minimoog and my AmpliTube 2 which I can use to mock something up, experiment quickly, create a very specific sound with AT2 that I can't get because I don't happen to have every amp brand in my collection and so on.

For me, especially when I am writing I tend to try to quickly get the idea down in demo form without spending too much time pretending to record the final track. Maybe some things will end up on the final but I like to get a good idea of what it is first (kind of like a first draft). Now I do this all with headphones and plug-ins. I'll mic up drums and amps later on if needed. But, working this way has really made me more prolific. So, you have to forgive me if I am a little more over the top than usual. For quite a while I've been running a business and making sounds but not taking the time to make music myself like I used to. That's changed recently and part of that has to do with COMPLETING a lot of the sounds I want to use in my own music (and others benefit from that extra effort I put in to make SR products great for my own selfish needs) as well as tools like AT2 which consolidate a lot of vintage guitar gear that I would use for my Beatle-esque and Zep/Floydy guitar tones. So, part of my happiness is that I am writing songs again and working on a lot of music. It's funny but I've noticed that most people that are really making music and using this stuff tend to have a lot of love for it. You get thankful that it exists because it is helping you get your ideas out. That's pretty valuable stuff to someone creative!

AndrewSimon · Post by **AndrewSimon** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:27 am

Squids

Will there be a demo version of AT2?
Will you need a dongle to demo it?
Will the upgrade version be downloadable or boxed?

Squids · Post by **Squids** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:29 am

AndrewSimon wrote:Squids

Will there be a demo version of AT2?
Will you need a dongle to demo it?
Will the upgrade version be downloadable or boxed?

I am not sure about that. You might need a key to demo it (although any Steinberg key or a $29 Ikey would work). But, that's not official news by any means. Just a guess. I think the upgrade version will be boxed but again I am not sure. When I know I will gladly answer better.

A3ntar · Post by **A3ntar** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:53 am

Will there be a demo version of AT2?
Will you need a dongle to demo it?
Will the upgrade version be downloadable or boxed?

These questions I asked previously but never got answered. Glad squids gave his opinion of this one.

I think that Synchrosoft has a very tough protection with time limit that uses no hardware dongle. I hope IK will go with this protection for the demo. Unlike Waves with Waves GTR, most IK customer base, including Amplitube1 users do not own iLok/iKey. It is going to be a bit challenging to get people to buy a 30$USD ( might come up to 60$ canadian ) item just for demoing a product. For sure you will be eliminating potential customers this way. One idea is that you get a credit if you decide to purchase the AT2. But people that do not like the demo will be throwing 30$ in the garbage ( and 60$ for us canadians ). Tough decision.

Sascha Franck · Post by **Sascha Franck** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 7:03 am

Squids, any word about the latency of the controller interface yet?
This to me would be the major issue.
I could seriously imagine getting either AT2 or GR2 along with their dedicated controllers because I'd love to finally use such things live without the hassle of conncting multiple devices and/or configuring some stock controller to get the most out of it. But of course latency had to be small in that case.

And btw, I'd find it ridiculous having to use a dongle to run a demo (even if I got a Synchrosoft one). That will indeed scare a lot of potential users away. If IK is indeed planning such a thing they should rethink it.

Guitarjeff · Post by **Guitarjeff** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 9:06 am

But can it sound like this?

If it can, sold!

Hell, if you have an amp that sounds like this, sold!

Can it also please teach me to play the the lick in bars 11 and 12 also?

Seriously, I hope it's good enough to surpass the Pods and V-amps (nice tones Sascha!!) If so, I'll buy.

Jeff

fritzman · Post by **fritzman** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 12:25 pm

Squids wrote:...

You know Squids,

you can talk as long as you want and you will, no problem.

I don't give a cent on all this anymore until I heard the first few tit free audio snippets. If they sound really good I'm interested in the demo version.
Obviously this all will need some extra weeks. Until then I won't hold my breath and see if GR2 is available and then I'll see if they have a demo available that I can try without any dongle juggle. Maybe it's just really good and I don't want to wait any longer ...

What was it, www.nativeinstr...

Best wishes, FRitz

P.S. I don't know if you ever checked some german guitar magazines but they are not as tits poluted (as american guitar magazines seems to be) so that I can buy them and have them at hand on the toilet that my kids do use also.

Squids · Post by **Squids** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 7:04 pm

Coome on Fritz, in Germany there are tits everywhere you look. There was even a painted naked girl at the Frankfurt Musik Messe. How many tits are showing at the beach? Prostitution is even legal in Germany dude. In the US you can't even see a nipple on "Wild On E"". It gets blurred out. Europe in general has more tits out than any place I know of! But, nothing wrong with that. I am not one to complain about it that's for sure.

Anyway, regarding a demo: there are plenty of products that don't have demos at all. I really don't know if there will be one for AT2 or not but there might be one that comes with the Ikey. So, it'd be the other way around. Pure speculation however so don't take my word for it. Just a guess. It is protected with a key though. If you want to talk true reality (despite what you read on this forum) the amount of people that would be "scared off" from the key are actually very very low. I can even prove this point by saying that Miroslav Philharmonik which has the IKey has sold more in 2 months than any other IK product did at the launch (without keys). So, truthfully it comes down to CONTENT being the most important thing. What the product IS and not "how it is protected". Only people on forums care THAT much about this part.

Sasha, the good news about the latency on the Stomp I/O is that it is as low as it can possibly get which is in the 3-5ms The reason for this is because it has a special driver that is written at the kernel level (sp?) so it bypasses Windows and even runs the audio through if Windows crashed. So, it is really great for live. But, to be honest, I was recording the other day with AT2 and a Firewire 410 that I have in a little home set up and I wasn't bothered by any latency there either.

Sascha Franck · Post by **Sascha Franck** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 7:32 pm

Squids wrote:Coome on Fritz, in Germany there are tits everywhere you look. There was even a painted naked girl at the Frankfurt Musik Messe. How many tits are showing at the beach? Prostitution is even legal in Germany dude. In the US you can't even see a nipple on "Wild On E"". It gets blurred out. Europe in general has more tits out than any place I know of! But, nothing wrong with that. I am not one to complain about it that's for sure.

It's not about tits per se. It's about them being abused to get some wannabe macho guitar heroes onboard. "Oh look, I'm shredding, I can surely twist some nipples too".
There's nothing wrong with prostitution, btw.
I'd never use such offers, but hey, it's sex because of sex, not sex being used to sell software.

Anyway, regarding a demo: there are plenty of products that don't have demos at all.

Too bad.

Unless software is samplebased I can't see a single reason for not offering a demo.

Sasha, the good news about the latency on the Stomp I/O is that it is as low as it can possibly get which is in the 3-5ms

That's not all that low. There's faster USB interfaces. Sure, CPU useage will go up with very low latencies, but I don't mind as long in case there'd be just one software running in standalone mode.

Midiworks · Post by **Midiworks** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 7:37 pm

Squids wrote:The reason for this is because it has a special driver that is written at the kernel level (sp?) so it bypasses Windows and even runs the audio through if Windows crashed. So, it is really great for live.

A3ntar · Post by **A3ntar** » Mon Oct 17, 2005 8:16 pm

Midiworks, what does this animation means?

I am guessing that you have an issue with what Squids is saying about the crashing windows and the continued playing dispite the crash? ( i guess he is referring to a user mode crash, not a system one )

Amplitube 2 Jimi Hendrix RELEASED this month!!!