synth for live use?

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chitwilber
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2008/05/12 15:39:53 (permalink)

synth for live use?

I am looking to buy a softsynth with killer sounds and oriented toward live performance use -- lots of presets that are easy to organize and load, and playable with a very beefy laptop. What would be the best product for me?

Thanks
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    Fog
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    RE: synth for live use? 2008/05/12 19:30:49 (permalink)
    it really does depend on your budget + what sort of genre is the short answer , it would help others give you an answer to suit you better.

    lots of presets are all good, BUT the quality is more important and how usable they are.
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    Pablo1234
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    RE: synth for live use? 2008/05/12 21:22:54 (permalink)
    Killer sounds being Real? or Synth? I was just over at my Drumers house yesterday setting up his new DAW and I broght my PC and Keyboard over to jam for a bit. Rapture was great, I set 4 instances up with chanels 1 - 4 corasponding to Rapture and I had Mr Tramp set up on 5, Wavestation on 6 and 7 2 instances, and M1 set up on 9. I also had ch 10 set up on Cakewalk TTS for my drum stuff. We jamed for about 3 hrs and then I left. It was fun but it took some time at home getting set up befor I went over their.

    Sonar 3, Sonar 6, Rapture, Korg Legacy Digital, BFD Lt, Midi OX, MrTramp

    Fender American Strat x2 with custom Electronics/pickups - MXR EQ - Semor Duncan Crybaby - Mesa Road King 2 - Custom built 3/4 back Cab with 2 Jenson 12" and 2 Celestion 12"
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    chitwilber
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    RE: synth for live use? 2008/05/14 12:11:13 (permalink)
    I can buy top-of-the-line IF it acts and sounds the way I want it to. My 4some combo does new pop covers as well as oldies, so I need decent strings as well as ambient pads -- piano as well as cool and newer lead synth sounds. (But bass and drum sounds aren't as important).

    My Sonar6 seems too heavy (and overkill) to use live. It doesn't crash that often anymore but when it does crash I have to completely reboot the computer instead of just reloading Sonar (but even reloading Sonar alone takes too long IMO). I just don't have enough confidence in it to use it live.

    I didn't realize it would be so difficult to find what I need. Rapture won't accept program changes.

    Purity evidently will but will only let you save individual sounds to disk --- there is no load function except for indiviual sounds!! very weird. I can't figure out how someone might use the program change numbers if a patch can't be assigned a number in the first place!

    Older products seem to have a bigger drain on my computer resources -- not sure a laptop could handle lower latency settings that I need for live work.

    @Pablo1234 -- sounds like you're having more fun than I am. LOL
    I need to keep it simple to have that much fun.
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    Pablo1234
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    RE: synth for live use? 2008/05/14 13:08:10 (permalink)
    I felt the same way you do a while back, still do to a degree. I blame Hardware and Drivers realy, If I could load all my patches up and have everything cashed I would be in heven. But now that I'm on dual core I see the futer for what it is, Its just not totaly their yet.

    I recently started working on Pink Floyd Animals. I'm trying to learn the whole thing and recreate it hear in my bastment from begining to end without sampling any of it. Belive me makeing the dogs bark like that aint easy lol. But I am also getting realy close to that Wirlitzer Sound on the begining of Sheep. Not quite as easy as I though it would be. Its got a realy cool Tremole and some chunkyness on harder hits, but is also real resonant and smooth on the softer hits. Couldn't Imagin trying to emulat that suff with just some hardware I picked up at the store, would cost me a fortune trying to dial it all in.

    Sonar 3, Sonar 6, Rapture, Korg Legacy Digital, BFD Lt, Midi OX, MrTramp

    Fender American Strat x2 with custom Electronics/pickups - MXR EQ - Semor Duncan Crybaby - Mesa Road King 2 - Custom built 3/4 back Cab with 2 Jenson 12" and 2 Celestion 12"
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    kwgm
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    RE: synth for live use? 2008/05/14 18:02:32 (permalink)

    ORIGINAL: chitwilber

    My Sonar6 seems too heavy (and overkill) to use live. It doesn't crash that often anymore but when it does crash I have to completely reboot the computer instead of just reloading Sonar (but even reloading Sonar alone takes too long IMO). I just don't have enough confidence in it to use it live.




    This is exactly why folks are reluctant to use VST for live use. My S90ES rarely crashes (only when connected to the DAW, actually!), so I feel that I can trust it implicitly on stage. Can't say the same for my laptop and any soft synth, yet.




    --kwgm
    #6
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