I don't know anything about synth other than being a listener.  I would imagine that there are some differences between the three, but not knowing anything about synth, I would not know what they are.  Was hoping someone could help me understand what the differences between the three are, and when you might use one synth over another.

Thanks
Rick

Dimension Pro is essentially a sample player with a few synthesis features like envelopes and filters and effects.  You can layer up to 4 elements with it.  The presets include a few synthesizers and pads, as well as a lot of pianos, orchestral, basses, ethnic, and other acoustic instruments.

Z3ta+ is a full featured synthesizer.  It features six oscillators, envelopes, features, effects, mod matrix, etc. Oscillators can modify each other through ring modulation, FM, PM and Sync.  Most people think of it as an EDM synth but you can get some ambient and analog synth patches if you try.

Rapture is somewhere in between.  Like Dimension it is very heavily sample based.  However, its presets are much more synthetic.  Rapture has six elements, each with its own set of envelopes, LFO, step sequencers, and effects.  It's a very versatile synth, but what truly sets it apart are the sequenced sounds you can get.

All three use the same basic SFZ engine.

Z3TA was the first of Rene's synths - Cakewalk bought RGC out and Z3Ta w/ him.  As mump sez it is an Virtual Analog synth.  Most of the "samples" are analog waves.  It has a waveshaper to change the actual waveshape and, in Z3TA + 2 you can sync those changes, thus affecting the sound of the sound before any envelopes and filters and such.

Dimension was Rene's next synth, made for P5.  It was more of a sampler, with a large sample pool of acoustic instruments.  It is still a synth, tho, with filters, LFOs etc.  And it can be layered via elements (each of those a single mono-timbrel synth in itself).  The patches/presets were mostly of acoustic instruments, but there were some pads and spacey sounds too.  DimPro mostly added more samples - it went from 3 gigs or so to 7.  And more presets.  And was sold as a stand alone synth before it got included w/ SONAR.

Rapture has a different set of sampes/SFZ, 6 elements and step sequencers.  All the organs that were missing in Dimpro (which had 10-20) were in Rapture, as well as more electric sounds - synths like moogs & arps, more eps, etc.  However, Rapture can't play back samples but plays a "wavetable" approximation of the sample, giving Rene's SFZ the clean playback such are known for, including little aliasing.  DimPro will wavetable samples less than 3000 samples long (I think that is right), but will play longer samples back in all their sample length glory.

Do you need all three?  No, not if you have all the DimPro samples for Rapture (since the wavetable will do a good job on them).  Most patches don't use all 6 elements, but DimPro can't emulate the step sequencers, so Rapture is the most flexible of the two.  But it can't exactly replicate longer samples, either.

I divide them up according to what I'm trying to do.  I use Z3TA for a VA, doing modular-style stuff w/ it. DimPro is for mostly acoustic instruments.  Rapture is for synth stuff, but it cuts better than Z3TA (or Alchemy, which is my go-to VA).  The basses, for example, even if they are synth based, still sound less synthy than Z3TA.  Z3TA is better for buzzy sounds.

Ideally, there should be one synth using SFZ, with all the Z3TA synth oscillator waves, Rapture's various short wavetables and longer, DimPro samples.  But Cake serialized them and made money from each as they added to the sample pool.  That is where the synth money is - in libraries.  Cake just used a different synth to sell them, rather than nickel and diming the customers.

@

Learn something every day, I did not know that Z3TA+ was an sfz engine synth. I thought it more like other rcg:audio synths Pentagon I, Triangle I & II and Square 1. At least there are no sfz files in the Z3TA+ directory tree.

I need to go find a good read... A lot of those terms mean squat to me.  I'm really interested in dabbling in them as well.

Scook,

you are probably right.  Z3TA +1 came out first.  I can't even remember if it used real samples or wavetables.  Maybe Brock or Chad will jump in here, they know more of the inards of the synths.  However, it has the same sound as the sfz synths - a little thicker but still more of a cutter.  RCG-style.  The modules are a little different, but they are mostly the same for all three synths.

And I think of Z3ta as more modular w/ all the extra functions in the mod matrix.

A few years ago there was the rumor of a Cake super synth.  Rumour also has it Beatscape was the result.  Not really a synth's synth, but a good idea.  I still wish Cake would finish that, esp. if you could use it Live!  Maybe we'll get BeatScape + 2 one day.  Pads hooked up to the SONAR engine/mixer w/ plenty of individual control w/in the Pads.

Anyway, the 3 most successful Cake synths are all alike but still different.  Different enough that you need all three to make the entire pallete of sounds.  Good marketing on Cake's part, and if you wait you've been able to get all 3 synths at a really good price.

@

Yeah, AT.  z3ta+ (1 or 2) isn't an .sfz-based synth.  I believe the first one was the 'sfz player' (*not* sfz+).  Once P5's original Dimension landed, they all have it 'under the hood'.  Not sure about anything in the future, other than the non-Cakewalk entries that picked up on the immense possibilities (Alchemy; Aria; that killer hardware workstation that I can never remember).
 
One quick correction:  Dimension Pro and Rapture can both load long samples and wavetables.  DP is optimized for longer samples; Rapture is optimized for wavetables.
 

the rumor of a Cake super synth.  Rumour also has it Beatscape was the result ... I still wish Cake would finish that ... Pads hooked up to the SONAR engine/mixer w/ plenty of individual control w/in the Pads.

 
Agree 100%.  Beatscape is to the "SuperSynth" as a tricycle is to a Ferrari.
 

I need to go find a good read... A lot of those terms mean squat to me.  I'm really interested in dabbling in them as well.

 
The bible: Cakewalk Synthesizers: from Presets to Power User

Tom,

thanks for jumping in here.  Apparently, my mind is no longer optimized for long-term retention.  I always wondered about that wavetable fact - the few times I loaded in longer samples into Rapture the wavetable seemed pretty evolving for a 3000 sample representation ;-)

Never bought the Cake book.  I need to see if it is available as a tablet book.  I've got an amazon card left over from christmas ...

Thanks

b rock

The bible: Cakewalk Synthesizers: from Presets to Power User

Hey Tom, thanks for the link!!!


Rick

About the Cakewalk synthesizers book...

Does the book go into much depth as far as what goes on 'underneath', especially with respect to how progams and samples are organized and processed ?

Or is like a lot of tutorial videos that only go through the various controls one by one, with comments, but don't provide much in the way of methodology, philosophy, architecture, etc. ?

Seems to me that the number of instruments the book covers must limit the depth that the author can go into for each one.