New wavetable synth - Sektor by Initial Audio

[tapiodmitriyevich]

I watched the presentation on YouTube, I have Serum, I felt no itch to test or even buy it.

[bite_me]

My first impression of this synth:

+ Simple and reduced approach of editing.
+ Nice plate-reverb and distortion
++ The unison feature is GREAT! Big possilbilities to edit each voice:
StereoSpread, detune (semitones and cents), WT position etc...
+++ Best compressor I know inside a VST !!! (like UAD DBX 140)

- Unfortunately no swing option for sequencer and no velocity editing in sequencer.
- do I need 3,8 GB of samples and WT´s to demo?
- Highpass filtering in the EQ is very unprecise but +++ smooth lowpass filter
- not possible to choose from different sub oscillators
- Visuals of the filters are out of sight when filtering very low
--- No way to "default" the envelopes, knobs etc...?

Gui is a mashup of DAW Circle2 and Synthmaster - only waaaayyy better than SM

[mgw38]

- Unfortunately no swing option for sequencer and no velocity editing in sequencer.

That is very unfortunate. Reduces the usefulness of the sequencer significantly.

[wagtunes]

No sample import? Oh well, that's the ballgame for me.

Moving on.

[Robmobius]

I watched the presentation on YouTube, I have Serum, I felt no itch to test or even buy it.

Yeah... I'm in the same boat. I'm pretty happy with Serum.

[yellowmix]

What folder did it place the samples? I installed on S drive and I only see something like 50Mb folder there, can not find the 3Gb folder anywhere. Thanks.

I can't remember exactly but the folder is named Sektor if you do a search on C drive. I think it was Your Profile\AppData\Roaming\. It's a bad location for a large library that is used by a plugin available to all users.

[Thomas@InitialAudio]

No sample import? Oh well, that's the ballgame for me.

Moving on.

Currently samples can be imported by placing them in the samples folder of an Expansion. This can also be done for wavetables. For wavetables there is a little more too it. From the user manual:

In a future version of Sektor we have plans to add a wavetable and LFO designer into the interface. For now you can create your own wavetables by placing single cycle waveforms inside a folder with the name format “Your Wavetable.wt” Notice the .wt on the end. Check the Wavetable folder of the Factory expansion for an example of this in action. Inside each “.wt” folder we place the single cycle waveforms. We recommend a maximum of 20-30 waveforms per table and a size of 2048 sample size, this is to avoid too long loading times. To keep a set order for the waveforms in the table each waveform should be alphabetically named or appended with a number, for example the names could be wave01, wave02, wave03, which will keep them in the order desired.

The next update for Sektor (due in a few days) will include drag and drop of samples directly onto the sample player.

In the update after this we will be adding a wavetable editor and LFO editor directly into Sektor. Stay tuned.

Thomas

[Thomas@InitialAudio]

- Unfortunately no swing option for sequencer and no velocity editing in sequencer.

That is very unfortunate. Reduces the usefulness of the sequencer significantly.

Swing is definitely something we can add. I am looking at ways to add velocity that works with the current GUI design of the sequencer, while still keeping it very simple to use.

[ZeePok]

 
Could you pls reduce the size of the demo download. Having to DL and install 4Gb data just to try something still is a bit much

[DJErmac]

I really enjoyed most of the presets but in my opinion you should fix the volumes. As somebody already mentionned it, a lot of presets are heavily distorted. I'd also love to be able to choose the location of the sample folder please.

[Kinh]

We dont bloody need a new wave table synth

[chk071]

I dont bloody need a new wave table synth

FTFY.

[Thomas@InitialAudio]

 
Could you pls reduce the size of the demo download. Having to DL and install 4Gb data just to try something still is a bit much

Hi ZeePok, the problem is that the demo is the full version with all content. We wanted users to know exactly what they are getting. The reason it is so big is because it also comes with multi sampled pianos and other instruments.

If the user then decides to buy all they have to do is unlock it with their serial number and they have everything.

Regards,
Thomas

[Thomas@InitialAudio]

I really enjoyed most of the presets but in my opinion you should fix the volumes. As somebody already mentionned it, a lot of presets are heavily distorted. I'd also love to be able to choose the location of the sample folder please.

Thanks for the feedback we will look at this.

[plexuss]

 
Could you pls reduce the size of the demo download. Having to DL and install 4Gb data just to try something still is a bit much

Hi ZeePok, the problem is that the demo is the full version with all content. We wanted users to know exactly what they are getting. The reason it is so big is because it also comes with multi sampled pianos and other instruments.

If the user then decides to buy all they have to do is unlock it with their serial number and they have everything.

Regards,
Thomas

I was just downloading the demo but cancelled it. I don't want to download many gigs just to try it out since I am not really in the market for a new synth unless it's utterly mindblowing. Based on the reviews here so far, I stopped the download because I'm not likely to actually buy it. I already have Synthmaster and a numeber of other wavetable synths.

If you insist on keeping the full packge demo download, I would encourage you to offer a smaller demo download for people that don't want to use up gigs of their internet bandwidth. In otherwords, get the product into as many hands as possible without a bottleneck. I'd only commit to the large download if I was very close to buying it - but without demoing it and the reviews so far that is not the case. But if the download was say 300MB I'd be using it right now instead of posting this. Get the point?