I spent two hours last night playing with ST3 and apparently I did not get through as much of it as larry. I honestly just touched the surface so I will begin section by section on sounds.

I will agree that the vocals ARE so-so...just like every rompler ever compared to high end vocal libraries. They certainly sound no worse than comparable products and are an improvement over previous version. For starters they give individual voices for the same sounds. It is somewhat redundant but does give variety and options to build on. Pretty much every rompler "aaaah" and "ooh" preset ever stopped being inspiring years ago when listened to in a vacum. Yes, I look forward to more extensive vocal library ad ons but these are par for the course. Anyone requiring heavy duty vocal sounds (film composers and sound designers I suppose) are likely using Kontakt or other full fledged sampler capable of using speciality libraries that don't come standard with Kontakt or any other sampler.


Pianos are hard to compare with st2.5 because the pianos were already good for a workstation. Again, and perhaps some may consider it cheating, what gives st3 a slight edge is the built in effects and mixer to more finally tune custom layered pianos. Most synths and pianos have effects but none have effects on par with what is available within st3. The main grand piano sounds beautiful but takes forever to load. No, it does not sound as good as dedicated piano vsts or add on piano libraries but can hold its own with the best of stock sounds. Again, these are preliminary opinions. I know I have to spend more time because with piano flaws are more likely to show in performance playing versus hitting a few notes and chords in a vacum.

A touch rough there. My judgement in music is suspect it must be admitted. I just got told so in no uncertain terms on the IKM forums. So take this with a grain of salt, but in my initial forays in ST3.
I really like the two grands and the upright pianos. They layer nicely and sound smooth.
The electric pianos can't touch Scarbee. They sound like patches not instruments if you know what I mean.
Has anyone ever gotten an acoustic guitar right? ST3 doesn't either, but for being a digital guitar I rather like the sound. Most steel strings sound terrible to me, while these have a pleasant ring. I like the 12 string best.
My theory on electric guitars is take a good piano or guitar or banjo or mandolin..., run it through your amp sim and batter it until it sounds like whatever genre you want. The amp is whats important. You could take these electric guitars and batter them with an amp sim and they would sound about as good as any other amp battered guitar.
There are two types of people in this world, those who revel in every bass sound and those who think hey that's a nice bass it goes 'thud'. Lets say just they don't sell Trillian to people like me. I think there are some nice thuds in there, but I'll still go Scarbee Rick anywhere that it fits.
The drums almost impressed even the excellent Mr. Larry. Being me I enjoy the Jazz and Brush. I think this is strong point of ST3. Only problem is its a strong point of EZDrummer (love Nashville), KU (love older Abby Roads) and even BFD Eco ain't bad. So not sure how much action it will see. Still nicely done.
E-Drums, Synth Bass... like dating a doll instead of a woman.
Summary for band instruments. Piano: A-, EPiano: D, Acoustic Guitars: B-, Electric Guitars: C, Bass: C+, Drums: A-

Drewfx (and Dub)
 
My disdain for a companies business practices has nothing to do with how I feel about their PRODUCT.
Everyone here knows how I feel about THE PRODUCT.  

So, you may not consider it an objective viewpoint, and I certainly understand that...
But it is nonetheless....

This, to me, is not a marked improvement over ST 2.5XL.  It gives a better GUI, and 64 bit support,
which could have been done in a few weeks...while still using "mediocre" samples...

again that's just my opinion...and I will certainly listen to others opinions objectively, and, if they
have valid points, most certainly respect that (i.e. bigcat)

Those who know me know my objectivity.  I see the product as a separate entity from THE COMPANY.
If I did not...I certainly would not post and promote their sales, ads, and specials...and I also respect
others rights to buy what they feel they want or need.

IK is eminently aware of their shortcomings in the development cycle of this product
and how most feel about what they did...and it's not just from me...there is a host of others...

But that has nothing to do wiith how I rate THE PRODUCT ITSELF.

On a scale of 1 to 10, it falls in about a 6 or 7...and actually, based on "OVER 10 years in the making"
development time it should get a lesser rating...

So bash me all you will - that is your prerogative, as it is mine to continue to bash
IK THE COMPANY.  The facts are the facts and they stand on their own...
 

I didn't feel the upgrade price without hearing ST3 was worth me throwing $99 away for the upgrade.  Now the upgrade price is $149.
 
I have MOTU 3 Five and Kontakt  lots of addon sample packs and a bunch of rompler hardware like EMU Proteus boxes, a Yamaha MOFX 8 and a Motif 6.
 
My sales rep at Guitar Center installed SampleTank 3 on the GC Mac and I went and played (I think this was his personal copy of ST3 but I don't know if it was CG copy or not).  I went primarily to hear a Roland Integra 7 and play with the new Roland FA keyboard - but played with ST3 for about 20 minutes.
 
Interface was improved, liked the effects and how they were implemented, those were nice features.
 
Some of the samples were just crazy bad.  a lot of them were okay and might be usable with a lot of effects processing or tweaking in ST3.  The vocal choir sounds were just terrible.  I had listened to the IK website demos of the sounds and didn't think they were that great but sometimes compression, web etc so tried to keep an open mind.
 
for me, there is absolutely no way I will pay $149 as an upgrade for sampletank 3.  $50, maybe - but after playing I'd almost rather buy a $50 sample pack for kontakt.
 
I am not a long time user of IK products.  maybe 2 years.  When I started building my studio recording rig I started with IKM Total Studio 3 which had amplitube 3, sampletank, miro, t-rack etc.  as one of the 1st recording software products I had I thought it was a great bundle.  Now that I have invested in so many other software products I just feel that sampletank is just a beginner product and not very usable professionally.
 
btw the Roland Integra 7 is an amazing rack sound module, AMAZING that there are 6,000 sounds and tons of historical patches.  loved the sound module I just don't think I can justify the $1800 it would cost for me to have one.  The Roland FA 8 I played has some of the same sounds as the Integra 7.  I didn't care much for the FA8.  I'll stick to my Yamaha MOFX 8 for now.
 
I am not one of the IK bashers, I just think the ST3 sounds are meh to horrible.

"you suspect Tonesy is something other than just a forum user simply because of his post count?"
 
That's comical.  I've been in construction for thirty years.  I have eighty employees and many millions of dollars tied up in equipment.  So I don't have the time, nor the desire, to post much on any music forum.  But I've played musical instruments for about 45 years.  Just bought a new Taylor 912ce a few days ago.  I think the sounds in ST3 are generally excellent with a few exceptions, and I think the product overall rates an A+ for it's price point.  I wish you the best of luck, Larry.  You sound kooky trying to pass yourself off as "objective" though.  I've only read a little of what you've posted here.  Way too long winded for me.  You're not just trolling.  You're hyperventilating.

It occurs to me that should make something clear:
 
Larry I very much value your opinions, contributions and input here on any subject not involving IK.

MachineClaw
I didn't feel the upgrade price without hearing ST3 was worth me throwing $99 away for the upgrade.  Now the upgrade price is $149.
 
I have MOTU 3 Five and Kontakt  lots of addon sample packs and a bunch of rompler hardware like EMU Proteus boxes, a Yamaha MOFX 8 and a Motif 6.
 
My sales rep at Guitar Center installed SampleTank 3 on the GC Mac and I went and played (I think this was his personal copy of ST3 but I don't know if it was CG copy or not).  I went primarily to hear a Roland Integra 7 and play with the new Roland FA keyboard - but played with ST3 for about 20 minutes.
 
Interface was improved, liked the effects and how they were implemented, those were nice features.
 
Some of the samples were just crazy bad.  a lot of them were okay and might be usable with a lot of effects processing or tweaking in ST3.  The vocal choir sounds were just terrible.  I had listened to the IK website demos of the sounds and didn't think they were that great but sometimes compression, web etc so tried to keep an open mind.
 
for me, there is absolutely no way I will pay $149 as an upgrade for sampletank 3.  $50, maybe - but after playing I'd almost rather buy a $50 sample pack for kontakt.
 
I am not a long time user of IK products.  maybe 2 years.  When I started building my studio recording rig I started with IKM Total Studio 3 which had amplitube 3, sampletank, miro, t-rack etc.  as one of the 1st recording software products I had I thought it was a great bundle.  Now that I have invested in so many other software products I just feel that sampletank is just a beginner product and not very usable professionally.
 
btw the Roland Integra 7 is an amazing rack sound module, AMAZING that there are 6,000 sounds and tons of historical patches.  loved the sound module I just don't think I can justify the $1800 it would cost for me to have one.  The Roland FA 8 I played has some of the same sounds as the Integra 7.  I didn't care much for the FA8.  I'll stick to my Yamaha MOFX 8 for now.
 
I am not one of the IK bashers, I just think the ST3 sounds are meh to horrible.

 You make some great points.  They are not the best sounds because the libraries are smaller. I think it is best used as a sketchbook.  The new features allow for more sound designing.  There was no major need for 64bit because ST never used a lot of memory but was an inconvenience for those who use DAWs with no bitbrdge.

drewfx1

mike_mccue
IK says Sweetwater "jumped the gun" by making the download links available on the actual date that has been advertised as the date. 

Sweetwater didn't follow instructions and sent out serial numbers so some of their customers ended up downloading useless files because the proper files had not been uploaded yet.
 
IK uploaded the files as soon as their US office opened (that timing being their standard practice) and promptly sent out the proper emails. on the proper date. Well, the proper date depending on where you live, but intelligent people understand a concept called "time zones" and wouldn't make assumptions that 12:01 AM where they live was the release time.
 
Sweetwater was in the wrong here and the joke's on them for making life harder for some of their customers by not following instructions and trying to give their customers special treatment.

 I downloaded everything before I found out the files were the wrong ones.  Unfortunately I have the ST3 standalone not working which could be the result. Even overwriting the files, it doesn't work.

Kite..I had the same issue with standalone yesterday. Then suddenly it just worked. Keeping an eye on that

Machine, I wholeheartedly disagree. Pretty much that places Dimension Pro in a similar category. Yes, sampletank shares some features with more full featured samplers but I doubt anyone including the people at IK use them the same. I know people who build their own instruments, drum kits and other advanced sample manipulations. Kontakt does everything but sample from external sources that a hardware sampler does. Good luck trying to build a multisample instrument within sampletank.

I did not mean multiple instruments. I was referring to a basic sampler function like making a multisample instrument. St3 has preset multiple sample instruments like most romplers but creating one in the manner one typically can with a sampler is not happening. Sample editing is pretty much limited to envelope type functions and time stretching. St3 compares more to kontakt player with more user options and basic sample import features.

kitekrazy

dubdisciple
Kite..I had the same issue with standalone yesterday. Then suddenly it just worked. Keeping an eye on that

 Someone posted a fix on the IK forums that worked.  Install ASIO4ALL and it opened up. Then I changed the output to the right drivers. Very odd.

These issues have been reported (including the current workaround) so support and development are aware.  Thanks for relaying the workaround here.

I wish IK would have extended the pre order price of $99 a little longer........guess I have to wait for a sale

Gaffpro
I wish IK would have extended the pre order price of $99 a little longer........guess I have to wait for a sale

Its currently discounted at the introductory rate. It will be going up to regular price soon.