For mastering... Fab bundle, melda bundle or iZotopes Studio?

Still struggling with a mastering bundle.  Given black friday sales, trying to decide between....
 
Fab Mastering bundle: $362 
Includes:  Pro-MB, Pro-Q2, Pro-L, Pro-C
I just love the look, feel, and ease of use of this possible addition after listening to the vids and perusing forums last night.... everyone seems to love them...costs the most but seems like I could stop looking after this....???  And, unless they come up with a black friday inticer, I can wait as that's my price with prior purchases...
 
Melda Mastering bundle: $ 313
Lots of redundancy but includes the MSpectral dynamics everyone's raving about...could pick this up down the road sometime... but cheapest of all and money is tight! I also love the totally expandable UI, to help my old eyes see things... I am frustrated with "small" plugs when I have two large screens for my aging eyesight.  Still, can't imagine using the redundant plus and can always pick and choose later, which seems better for Melda plugs
 
Izotopes Studio bundle: $399
Ozone 6, Nectar 2, Alloy 2 
I love the Nectar harmonizing features but already have Melodyne editor and Antares everything, including Harmony Evo, none of which I use much...I just like doing harmonies the old fashion way (being a singer!)
 
I'm leaning to Fab even though money's tight... and if I go that way, I might drop the fab limiter and get the latest PSP Xenon, which I can get for 75$ with a coupon they have sitting in my user area... which would bring the Fab price down to  $412+$75 for Xenon: $487.  However, everyone just seems to looooooove Fab's Pro-L transparency which is what I'd probably want in the end.
 
I'm delirious from an all nighter trying to sort this all out!  I'm leaning towards Fabulous but...
 
One last question, If I delete fabs Pro-C, it brings it all down to $430 and as I'd get the Pro-MB compressor/expander do I really need this?  Boy, I must sound dumb!
 
NOTE: fab prices were wrong in the above....much better so I chose Fab at JRR shop for $362!!! (extra 15% discount applied in cart gets you there... DO IT

Hey, Scook... Yes, I understand what you're saying... Melda does offer a great long range relationship...and the ability to expand their UI so I can "see" everything is pretty important... I hate dinky plugs like PSP's... just don't use what I can't see and I have plenty of big screen real estate! And several Fab plugs are four years old... ie, Pro-L and C... and I imagine a "2" coming down the pike, like with Pro-Q... hmmmmm....
 
Re: demoing... probably should but as this is my first real interest in mastering plugs, I'd take a month of "swimming"... but maybe I should.  Figured all the lust for Fab's would make it easy and I'd rather write music then learn all the different options... ie, just get what is felt to be the best (I'll find the $$$ somehow... time is more precious at my age!)
 
Based on further thought, maybe I should go with Pro-mb and Pro-q2 for $302 and still get the melda bundle for $313...OY, my head hurts...

scook
There is no arguing the Fabfilter plug-ins are very nice and the limiter and compressor are due for updates. The Mastering Bundle is available ar jrrshop for $484. It may be cheaper at one of the other discounters.
 
You won't have to worry about iZotope when it comes to new versions. They will provide a paid upgrade every couple of years. Older versions do still work. If you are strictly looking for mastering buying Ozone would be the least cost solution for now and it does go on sale occasionally. They just released Ozone 6. Amazon still shows Ozone 5 available for $199.

wow! $484? Thanks... better than my deal... Started off yesterday thinking Ozone but after thread exhaustion with cpu hits, frustrations on Ozone6, and love for fab....  Do appreciate your taking the time... on this day, no less!  

For mastering an already good mix (I assume you're mastering your own music) all you really need is an eq, in some cases compression, a limiter, maybe a few others a few plugin tools for checking levels, rms, etc.

What don't you already have that can't accomplish these tasks?

Unless your mixes are poor you shouldn't need to be using much or if any dynamic, multi-band or other bs processing.

Scook...I'm on it!  realize why not demo them...
I've begun my all nighter trials.... Xenon is already OUT!  GUI too small/confusing...sounds great but...
Fab downloading now/installing.... but have to take Volt to beach for thanksgiving (belgium sheep dog...best friend!)
Thanks, all.... will delve deep tonight!
 
pathos... have all X3 tools and more but as my mixes get denser, with cinamatics/orchestrations, not to mention new insanity like Serium, I want to better "fit" each into the mix as well as get a better squirt to mp3/wave...
 
For me, as an intuitive songwriter/vocalist, being able to visualize and adjust things so my ears feel better just makes sense.... most of the tools I have lack the visualization my mind needs to correct clashes/saturated bands and the like...
 
As far as I've gone, feel my mixes are ok/so so... don't really want to get a slew of tools... just the best for visualizing and sculpting a bit more...
 
Clint.... I have all of IK's stuff... just too confusing... bought them years ago.  Maybe I should try them again but really leaning towards Fab/Melda for the visualization...which speaks to me more than knobs/meters/itybitty displays...

Well, Clint...I'll know my the time I'm comatose tonight! Just downloaded melda, fab, Izotope... should be fun... I have some cool heavy songs like Arctic Emergency which I think sound great... think I'll test them on that...
 
Of course, I'm so stupid I dont even know how to do that.... as an insert in the Master buss I suppose... or render down to wave and reimport the wave?  I guess that's how Izo works... use it outside of X3?  
 
Boy am I showing my ignorance....
 
Love you all!  Volts looking at me like, "come on, let's play!"

Just got back from a thanksgiving doggy swim and...a hearty thanks for the "giving" on this day, Clint.... I hope by this time next year to helping others in my boat... now I just got to locate those ik plugs from a couple computers ago....

lawajava
I have the iZotope Studio Bundle.  And quite a few FabFilter and quite a few Melda plug-ins.
 
All are great.  Choosing one path would be difficult.  One thing I can say about the iZotope Studio Bundle, and all the stuff included - it's very intuitive.  The tools have a consistent workflow across each of them.  And they come with a heck of a lot of really useful presets.  So for me it's fast to get in the neighborhood of what I'm trying to get, and then lightly tweak from there.  For speed of use, I think iZotope gets me there the fastest.  For cool capabilities and lots of bells and whistles, FabFilter and Melda have a wealth of capabilities that you may or may not end up using.

Hey, Lawa.... Thanks for the insight... You know, all night I was playing around with the demos... and I found that I'm really liking the combo of Fab and Ozone6 as I can bring Fab's MB and ProQ2 into Ozone and tweak a wave file there.... really neat!
 
Unfortunately, no money so gotta choose one or the other today and my feeling is Fab's JRR deal is rarer and iZotope will have bundle deals at Xmas... what say you?
 
It IS amazing what these tools do in the end.... what I thought was pretty good is better... 
 
A couple thoughts.... Ozone's displays suck... don't display impacts on waveform... like Fab... but having the abiility to work fab inside makes it way better... best thing about ozone...

scook
Historically Fabfilter did not discount. Things changed when Fabfilter started selling through 3rd parties. I suspect the discounting will continue. The current deal at jrr is one of the best so far. On the other hand, iZotope does have a long history of selling through 3rd parties and promo pricing. I bet both of them will have another wave of sales next month about this time.

Well... my dilemma is.... the choice! Funny how I ended up this way.... I do like working outside of X3 to tweak the final mp3/wave I send out or post to soundclick.... but really love the visuals MB&ProQ2 give...
 
With all the Ozone6 hate, maybe prices will drop further... everyone loves Fab....
 
got an extra 300?

I think I will become mad with all the demos I'm testing concerning mastering plugins, and with all the current deals, I 'va to decide myself (no joking, I come to have nerve problems so much I test, compare, listen carefully...) I started with the demo of the Waves Linear Multiband comp, and came to the FabFilter Multicomp...It's true that Fab plugin are really very easy to use and it's very nice; IMO, the Fab has a more "synthetic" edge but in a pleasant way... But when I engage the Melda Mspectraldynamics, damn, the sound was very good as it thickens the sound while controlling it, but in a way that seemed to me more natural than the Fab (Sorry for my lack of technical words) . BY CONS, even if the Melda plugs have a big window GUI, I don't grasp their "logic " and for me, it's a pity that they have not so direct access functions like Fab... And concerning Mspectraldynamics, it induces a big latency. I don't know for the other Melda plugins ?
Concerning Eq, I heard excellent things from DMG audio : particularly equilibrium and the "little" Equick... But I didn't test and it seems that they not propose "dynamic" ability.
 
On a personal feeling, I 'm always in search of  how a commercial hit song/music has this famous impact sound, and it would seem that these "dynamic" tools could help (?)

 

Highlight some text then click link icon in the post editor just under the font drop downs and add the URL. Alternately use BBCode or use the standard html anchor tag.

scook
Highlight some text then click link icon in the post editor just under the font drop downs and add the URL. Alternately there is a [l ink] [/l ink] (remove spaces in the "link") in BBCode which works like the html anchor tag or use the standard html anchor tag.

Understood half of what you said but will try later... gotta jet and plant some plants to make money to buy the goodies!   Thanks again, scook... reeeeeeeallly appreciate all your insightful feedback.  

WOW!  It worked! (had to fiddle with it to figure it out)  Thanks, Scook... now to figure out how to do that everywhere!