Tone2 Saurus Teaser - Competition - KVR Giveaway

[zvenx]

am I the only one who is pressing constantly on the up and down arrow for the preset/bank change instead of the squares next to it?

Try pressing 5 times the shift button and then set the accessibility options to on. Remember to enable the "troll-lo-lo" option by clicking on it!

Y am I a troll?
rsp

[Echoes in the Attic]

Ultra paranoid demo again. So strange, people complained about the ElectraX demo and they extended the timeout didn't they? And now they've gone back to ten minute timeout AND the audiomark voiceover and no saving. Isn't two out of the three enough? Voiceover and no saving but no timeout or timeout but no voiceover?

Great filters as always, but I'm not really seeing anything more analog about it then the ElectraX VA section.

[braj]

I thought part of the marketing of this synth was to give them something in between Firebird+ and ElectraX price-wise, which it achieves. I personally wouldn't be getting ElectraX because of price so this is more in my range. That it is similar shouldn't be too surprising, as ElectraX is supposed to 'do it all' no?

[D N A]

I like:
1. assignable pitch wheel - love the idea
2. filters - cutoff, reso, soft, feedback, fm, boost give plenty of options to make sound brighter or more dirty
3. cpu usage
4. mod matrix (as in every tone2 product) - it's just clean and there are plenty of things to choose from
5. GUI
6. Delay / Reverb - sound ok

[bmanic]

Well I'm a bit underwhelmed by Saurus but it got me to check out the ElectraX demo again and that synth is bloody brilliant! Tone wise they sound pretty much identical to my ears. Sure, Saurus has a bit more flexible filter with the feedback but that's about it.

I can't get any meaty vintage type sounds that I can from Diva. It'd doesn't get even close IMHO. However as an all-round good basic synth Saurus is indeed very impressive!

The only complaint I have is that high resonance at high cutoffs sound really ear piercing in a not good way. In fact, I think ElectraX filters sound better in this regard.

For an entry level priced Tone2 synth this is just marvelous and I highly recommend it for anybody who want the Tone2 kind of bright, very processed kind of sound. For a bit more money I do however think ElectraX is a much better purchase.. speaking of which, I guess I just have to finally get the damn thing! It's been on top of my "must buy!" list for quite some time now.

Cheers!
bManic

[zvenx]

I like its cpu usage, and there are quite a few decent sounds in there.

I may eventually get it just to add to my sound palette, but as an owner of ElectraX, as others have pointed out, they sound very alike to me.

The VA's that I have already (not including novation v synth or AAS's Ultra Analog) are the DCam Synth Squad stuff, and Diva and impOSCar 2, the latter two I really love. I am 48 years old, and have been playing music long enough to have played with quite a few analog synths back in the day, but I don't' get that vibe at all from Saurus.....it has the tone2 sound, as others pointed out, bright and very processed...which isn't' a bad thing, but I think I have already have that covered with nexus 2, electrax and to some degree gladiator 2 (which is still my favourite tone2's synth).

I will probably get it one day, to add to my sound palette but not as a virtual analog that replicates classic analog synths.

Not bowled over by GUI, especially with the constant need to click vs. hierarchy submenus (to change filter type or oscillators) etc and of course the previously mentioned square button instead of arrow button to change presets and banks...

rsp

[olikana]

the init parameter doesn't work in the demo and there's no init patch to be seen (or i couldn't find one in such short time)....so 3/4 of the time spent demoing the product were wasted tryin to reset all parameters.
the 2 minutes i had left before the demo closed down on me i was having fun with the filter which seems indeed yummy (although the feedback parameter behaved unexpectedly with larger feedback at the lowest values hm...but it closed before i could investigate further)
difficult to form an opinion on all the synth features in 10 frustrating minutes..and with an annoying robot voice and hoover sound thrown in your face on opening....doesn't make me wanna open the synth again.
just the fact that it came without the init feature working or an init patch is reason enough not to bother with the current demo .

[himalaya]

If I may give some pointers with regards to ElectraX vs Saurus.

The two do not sound alike. I have ElectraX and Saurus open side by side just now, doing the same sawtooth snap sound with a 24db LPF cutoff modulated by a steep envelope. There is a big difference to the resultant sound with Saurus being more in your face, more peppery dry, and less 'scooped'. (ElectraX sound engine is set to 'Linear Processing' here).

Also, when sweeping the LPF with resonance at 3 o'clock ElectraX has a much different response. Its resonance has a sinusoid sound at the beginning of the sweep, but then it quickly fizzles out, whereas in Suarus that sinusoid overtone is more even and pronounced (read: more real). Both also differ at the lower spectrum of the sweep, where Saurus has stronger overtones. These filters are not the same, hence will give different sounds. To test them you'd need to match the volume of both synths as Saurus' output is stronger, at least on the init patch.

Then Saurus' filter FM and feedback push it into new sound territory which ElectraX can not provide. These two give some very dirty and characterful sounds.

Then the biggie, which nobody has yet commented on: the LFO sound at audio rate. Has anybody tested this yet? The sound is absolutely superb and a great source of all manner of percussion patches.

Do this:
1. Oscillator 1 - sawtooth
2. Mod matrix 1 left slot (source) LFO1 -+
3. Mod matrix 2 right slot (destination) Osc1 Pitch
4. set the amount value to max, all the way to the right
5. Filter - LPF 24db with filter envelope set to max
6. Filter envelope - attack to zero, decay to about 1 o'clock, sustain at zero.
7. Amp envelope - pretty much as above with perhaps the decay time a bit longer - up to you.
8. Now set the LFO 1 rate to max and play the whole of the keyboard range.

If set correctly, you should hear a very rich FM percussive sound, which some of my other favourite VA synths can not do, not with LFOs.

Anyway, these are just a few observations of mine.

[zvenx]

ok, see though you are looking at it from a different perspective than I am.

I am a composer, producer and musician, who uses presets or may tweak presets as necessary..the nuts and bolts don't make any difference to me... I either like the sound or I don't. I either am inspired by the sound or am not.....

to me, and please forgive my analogy Raphael, you are like a sound geek or as a friend likes to say, an intellectual rockstar....you love the microscopic differences, the subtle nuances, the 'lfo at audio rate', etc..... I don't care about any of that... I play a sound and hear how it affects me or appeals to me or not.......so those huge differences you hear between the two on a microscopic level, for me on a macroscopic level they sound more or less the same.....

I am sure a car enthusiast can look at a car and tell the difference between the 2011 and 2012 model (assuming no big body change), whereas someone like me will look at the two cars and not appreciate the subtle nuances between the two and say, they look alike to me....

my humble 2 cents
rsp

[LeVzi]

I don't see it as a Saurus vs anything, it is it's own animal, it's capable of some pretty incredible sounds, it's got mega guts when needed, play with the oscillators and subs together, you'll find it hammers a punch when you tell it to.

The 303 esque noises you can get from it are really impressive too, but I am loving it for hoovers, even though they aren't too popular for some

[zerocrossing]

The demo limitations are REALLY annoying

Nothing new on tone2 demo limitations. Developer is paranoid, so what you can expect, huh?

Soundwise, nah. It is okay. Kinda plastic, not analog at all, but still okay. There are much better synths out there, with similar pricetag, so no thanks for this plastic synth.

Yeah, I'll still download it and get annoyed by the demo but my reaction to the demo songs was "If it can do "Unique sounds which no other synthesizer can create" then why not show that off?" Instead you post two mp3s of very, very generic sounding VA type sounds.

I saw this coming though. Those jabs at Urs are true Tone2 form. Yeah, Diva does use a lot of CPU cycles, but at least you get something for the cost. Unless their demo songs are vastly different than what the instrument can do, me thinks this is a pass. Too little... too late. In this day and age, if you're not nailing "analog" (it's not) then you better have some really interesting character.

[himalaya]

I absolutely understand you, Richard. If the sound doesn't inspire, it doesn't inspire. I was just trying to highlight the differences between these two synths, from the same company, as there are big differences in the sound (to my ears).

Remember, I'm a musician too.

you love the microscopic differences, the subtle nuances, the 'lfo at audio rate', etc..... I don't care about any of that...

Those LFOs, or rather the sound they produce at audio rate is anything but a subtle nuance, seriously. They make some ultra cool percussion sounds. Not for everybody, granted, as we are talking about very electronic sounding percussion and drums, and not acoustic modelling, but within its electronic genre, these are superb. Get those LFOs flying!

[zvenx]

hi Raphael, you already know I love your vintage analog stuff... that's why I posted a few pages ago I was glad you were onboard.
Also to clarify, I am not saying Saurus doesn't inspire me at all, what my opinion is is that it sounds like another electrax to me.

ok...re: lfo's, can you send me to one factory preset that shows the glory of these lfo's at audio rate, so that I can bask in its glory too ?

[MaxSynths]

Those jabs at Urs are true Tone2 form. Yeah, Diva does use a lot of CPU cycles

The only comment about Diva CPU usage was from me; and it was not a "jab", just a comment since a lot of people started a comparison between the two synths. No meant to talk bad about Diva (in fact this never happened because that Diva is a CPU monster is known and clearly written on Urs site too).

[himalaya]

that's why I posted a few pages ago I was glad you were onboard.

Oh shoot. I missed that. Thank you for words of support.

I don't know what sounds were included yet, so I can't point you to such a preset. But I will make a demo to show some nice FM percussion (might not be tonight as I'm about to call it a night, bedtime!).