clintmartin
 
I do believe Jim and his expertise, but there is no way I would pay $199 for an ilok reverb unit.

 
I respect those who take/maintain a strict "no dongle" policy.
For me, it was easy to justify the cost of Phoenix Verb.
When auditioning on drum-kit, the reverb sounds so natural (artifact free).
 

Once upon a time I had a strict no-dongle policy. I was badly burned by one developer, and had more than a couple adventures with one of the older PACE drivers (who didn't?)

These days I think I might be leaning towards preferring dongles... I have not had a single dongle related issue in several years (admittedly, I was fortunate to see a post somewhere when iLok went through their most recent debacle). Dongels mean I no longer need to keep records of license keys, or worse, keep backups of license files. Dongels mean I can carry my license with me.

As an example, my favorite reverb plugin thus far was WizzoVerb... hands down the best sounding, and most flexible reverb I've used. BUT, when Wizzo went out of business I could no longer authorize the plug-in. There was a guy who was supposedly providing auths, but I never received one last time I asked. Granted, without further development it was going to remain a 32 bit process, but I was fine with that!

Now it would be really cool if I could use any old thumb drive as a dongle - and that is starting to happen - but dongels ceased to be an issue for me when they started "just working."

Cost... well that'll always be an issue<G>! Pheonixverb sounds glorious, and I have no issue with paying the current price, I just don't happen to have that much change under the couch right now. Considering what I paid for a used PCM-90, that didn't work, the cost of the Exponential reverbs is quite a deal!

Bit,
 
May be just retreo hallucinating and not much time right now to reverify, but Timeless does have pitch modulation and distortion in the fine tuning pages.
 
Dreaming here, or can someone else verify for now?
 
John

Just checked the Timeless2 help file. The answer is indeed yes to both. Neither is implemented in a manner like any other delay I've seen.
 
If you modulate the delay time, there will be a pitch shift to simulate a tape delay. This is if "tape" mode is selected. If "stretch" mode is used instead, pitch remains constant even if delay times are modulated. A dropdown list between the delay knobs selects between Tape and Stretch, with Tape being the default.
 
This method should allow you to subtly emulate wow and flutter as well as moving the playback heads on a tape delay.
 
Distortion is a less-obvious option, being selected as a particular filter mode ("Metal"). I see no controls for the amount or type of distortion. If you search the help file, "distortion" yields no results, but "Metal" does.

+1 for Fab's Timeless 2
 
I have a buttload of delays... Timeless 2 is the only one I use anymore, although someday I'll get the scratch together to get the soundtoys bundle as it was nice when I demoed it.
 

Bajan Blue
 
My preferred "complex" delay is Sigmund from D16 - I love this, you can get nearly any effect you're after and I find this so much easier to use.
Nigel
 

Hey, Bajan... I checked out Sigmund when it first came out but was broke... it does look interesting but my biggest concern is whether it faithfully reproduces the entire frequency spectrum...I find virtually all other delays loose too much in the high frequency realm, but Timeless does this flawlessly...
 
Would be curious of a bit more of your experience... from the demos on d16, vocals sounded dull...

Vastman
I got Sigmund on an initial offer I think so it was pretty cheap IIRC.
I've not used it on vocals - I use it mainly on synths / keyboards and other instruments - on the new project we are working on at the moment, I have even used it on some drums (in a break sort of thing).
I have to say I have not noticed the dulling effect you mention - whether or not that's because of the nature of the source material  I have used it on so far, is hard for me to say, sorry. 
There is a demo so you can give it a try before you buy.
Cheers
Nigel