Favourite Synths that uses 10% or less of your cpu

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What are your fav soft synths that uses very little cpu of your computer? Let's say 10% of it as average.

I'm curious to know how certain synths do against various cpus and setup :)

Update:
Thank you all for your answers :) I thought to update the first post, but you guys are fast to post!

I appreciate it if you write your cpu and example of the percent usage of each favourite synth of your setup.

I'm doing the list for my two setups, it is in this format:
1. PC, Win 10 64bit, i5 4570 @3.2 Ghz,
Power options: cpu min usage 50%, cpu max usage 100%,
Presonus iTwo, 44.1 Khz and 64bit in Studio One version 3 with 256 buffer size
Update:>> I also could achieve very similar results with above setup but with 96 Khz and 512 buffer size! There is however some quality difference in some plugins (especially the old ones) and most importantly the audio output of the Blofeld Keys! :o


2. Laptop, Win 10 64bit, i7 4700MQ @2.4Ghz,
Power options: cpu min usage 50%, cpu max usage 100%
Integrated Audio interface with Asio4All, 44.1 Khz and 64bit in Studio One version 3 with 512 buffer size

For the i5 PC:

Mojito < 5%
Impact < 2%
Oberheim SEM V < 10% (if not chords, but with chords, can be little bit more than 10%)
ARP 2600 V2 < 5% for most of patches! Some pads can reach 8% (Love this monster!)
Hybrid 3 < 10% (just sequences or mono leads)
Transfuser 2 < 5%
Velvet < 5%
Harmor < 10% (average)
Mono/Poly < 10%
MS-20 < 10%
Polysix < 5%
Waldorf Attack < 3%
Waldorf PPG v2.2 < 3%

For the i7 laptop:
Mojito < 10%
Impact < 2%
Oberheim SEM V < 10% (only some mono leads)
ARP 2600 V2 < 5% for some sequences and < 10% for some pads
Hybrid 3 < 10% (just sequences or mono leads)
Transfuser 2 < 5%
Velvet < 5%
Harmor < 10% (surprise! some leads or sequences can be < 5% and pads are in the range of 10%)
Mono/Poly < 10% (average)
MS-20 < 10% (but usually little bit more than 10%)
Polysix < 5%

:phew:

Well, the most surprise for me is Harmor! Really good cpu usage related to the quality. Loom was about the double of Harmor, so it didn't make it in my list.

ARP 2600 V2 is miracle for me! Wow! I love its sound and with that low cpu usage! I know it aliases a lot, but it doesn't matter because the overall character of the vintage synth still dominates :)

I was also surprised about Impact and Transfuser of how low they can be! I'm really happy for this result with my two setups, now I can choose to fill in the gaps that I have with my Blofeld and Casio :D
Last edited by EnGee on Sat Aug 29, 2015 12:29 am, edited 5 times in total.
Using: Cubase Pro 15, Reason 13, Tascam US-4x4HR, MODX6, DM12D, LaunchKey 49, Yamaha guitar(Pacifica 612v) and bass (BB234) and some virtual instruments and synths.

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There's quite a number of synths meet your requirement.

Hybrid 3
Hive
Blue2 (but depends on how complex the patches be honest)
I heard tone2's synth is light weight in terms of cpu usage.

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low CPU ?

Sylenth
V-Station
Synth1

:)

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- Sylenth1
- Dune2 (suprisingly!)
- Ableton Operator

Well that's it. I need to keep low CPU usage to handle full tracks on my 5-years old PC. I also use Serum a lot, but one polyphonic pad with warp on can easily hit 150%.

The issue is I use quite complex chain of effects on return tracks and they use a part of CPU all the time :neutral:
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Absolute cpu winners : FM8, Sylenth 1 ( Aliasing included )

Depend on patches ( Especially unison/long release ) : Blue, Oxium, PolyKB II, Largo, Massive, MonoPoly, MS-20, Dune and a lot of others tbh
http://www.lelotusbleu.fr Synth Presets

77 Exclusive Soundbanks for 23 synths, 8 Sound Designers, Hours of audio Demos. The Sound you miss might be there

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EnGee wrote:What are your fav soft synths that uses very little cpu of your computer? Let's say 10% of it as average.

I'm curious to know how certain synths do against various cpus and setup :)
Not that easy to answer as it heavily depends on the patch settings.

A survey which synths eat up one's CPU would be easier to answer I guess... :P

Because I don't look at my CPU meter when everything is fine, I only look if it goes crazy - so I can easily tell you which synths I cannot pratically use in normal production settings. :wink:

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Lotuzia wrote:Absolute cpu winners : FM8, Sylenth 1 ( Aliasing included )

Depend on patches ( Especially unison/long release ) : Blue, Oxium, PolyKB II, Largo, Massive, MonoPoly, MS-20, Dune and a lot of others tbh
So it's mainly the older stuff which is around at least a couple of years now. Quite understandable.

It's like asking which FPSs perform rather good (for me: Unreal Tournament/Quake3). :clown:

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Always: Microtonic, Synplant, Polysix, MonoPoly, FM8, V-Station, BassStation.
Depending on the patch: Alchemy, Hive, M1, Dune, Massive.

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Updated the first post :)
Using: Cubase Pro 15, Reason 13, Tascam US-4x4HR, MODX6, DM12D, LaunchKey 49, Yamaha guitar(Pacifica 612v) and bass (BB234) and some virtual instruments and synths.

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2ZrgE wrote:
Lotuzia wrote:Absolute cpu winners : FM8, Sylenth 1 ( Aliasing included )

Depend on patches ( Especially unison/long release ) : Blue, Oxium, PolyKB II, Largo, Massive, MonoPoly, MS-20, Dune and a lot of others tbh
So it's mainly the older stuff which is around at least a couple of years now. Quite understandable.

It's like asking which FPSs perform rather good (for me: Unreal Tournament/Quake3). :clown:
Well, to me it's more synths whose devs have set a certain point with quality vs cpu print. You'll notice that certain synths in the second list make zero compromise for aliasing and other digital artifacts. So it's possible to get a pristine sound with thoses plugs.( And many instances of them without having to freeze )

In the first list well the FM8 is a recreation of the Dx series, that had a good part of aliasing, so in a way, they might have choosen to stay close to the real thing. Otoh, linking directly very high cpu print with quality isn't always justified. There are many logical cases here that can be distinguished : Quality is there but similar quality can maybe be obtained with less cpu price, quality seems more/less unjustified, quality is fully justified vs cpu print etc etc ( And no I won't define 'quality' :hihi: )

And to the OP, your I5 is rather powerfull, so I think all the synths on my list should fit for most of their patches. ( except big unison and /or lonnnng releases and/or max polyphony )
http://www.lelotusbleu.fr Synth Presets

77 Exclusive Soundbanks for 23 synths, 8 Sound Designers, Hours of audio Demos. The Sound you miss might be there

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2ZrgE wrote:
Lotuzia wrote:Absolute cpu winners : FM8, Sylenth 1 ( Aliasing included )

Depend on patches ( Especially unison/long release ) : Blue, Oxium, PolyKB II, Largo, Massive, MonoPoly, MS-20, Dune and a lot of others tbh
So it's mainly the older stuff which is around at least a couple of years now. Quite understandable.

It's like asking which FPSs perform rather good (for me: Unreal Tournament/Quake3). :clown:
If you set your DAW to 96 kHz, there is not aliasing at all in Sylenth. And the CPU load is still very low, unless you use 32 waves per voice and turn all the effects on, of course. But in my view there is no reason to go beyond 3 or 4 waves per osc, more waves don't really add anything.

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How do the GForce synths fare? They are also older (despite updates) and probably don't have 0df filters.

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I'd like to see a SynthBench at KVR someday, based on CPU power / voice usage ratio. It will be fun :)

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George wrote:I'd like to see a SynthBench at KVR someday, based on CPU power / voice usage ratio. It will be fun :)
I suggested that some time ago, but people here said it would not be possible to come up with a reliable ranking...

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fluffy_little_something wrote:
If you set your DAW to 96 kHz, there is not aliasing at all in Sylenth.
I never considered this as a means for quality, I'm not sure it's even possible in my DAW (Ableton). Could you elaborate? :)
fluffy_little_something wrote:
But in my view there is no reason to go beyond 3 or 4 waves per osc, more waves don't really add anything.
Why are they there then? :?:

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