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The "loot" thread


Eusebio Rufian-Zilbermann

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Haven't pulled the trigger on almost anything yet. Luckily many of these sales go till tomorrow / Thursday.

Still deciding on:

1) Audio Imperia Lite bundle + upgrade to Nucleus Full + crossgrade to Jaeger + grabbing Cerebrus.

2) Orchestral Tools Ark 0-5 bundle.

3) Spitfire Audio ==> looking at various libraries to qualify for Cassette Symphony. Likely Polaris + a couple of Originals I don't own.

4) East West Opus upgrade from prior orchestra.

5) Performance Samples Con Moto Basses to qualify for Pacific Strings intro offer.

Will potentially spend a TON of money in the next 6 hours. Or nothing at all. I can't decide. Fffffffffff. Clock is ticking....

Did pick up Total Max 3.5 upgrade for  $70, and a couple small plugins and libraries. But can't decide on big orchestral purchases, and I haven't upgraded orchestra stuff in years. Which is why I'm tempted to wait on Pacific Strings.

 

 

Edited by Carl Ewing
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I am not listing prices because it messes with my denial.

Reveal Sound Spire synth + 500 preset bundle
Synapse Audio Dune 3
Dawsome Novum
UJAM Synth bundle
Completed patch lib for AAS
3 Unify packs

Audio Imperia Nucleus + free Lite series Nucleus/Areia/Chorus
Audio Imperia Solo
Audiofier Pragmabeat

Cable Guys Shaper Bundle Upgrade
Devious Machines Infiltrator 2
Reason+ sub
Audiothing Bubbles, Melda Mtransient and some other freebies

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39 minutes ago, locrian said:

This year my focus was vocals:

  Synthesizer V Studio Pro (love it!)
  Dreamtronics Natalie (love it!)
  Eclipsed Sounds Solaria (love it!)
  Zero-G Ethera Gold Atlantis 2 (hate it!)

Can I ask what you hate about Atlantis 2? Did you have the previous version and if so, did you like it? Just curious because I haven't upgraded yet and Ethera is usually pretty quality. 

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My big purchase this year was:

  • Arturia V Collection 8 upgrade to VC9

Others:

  • BrainWorx Knifonium
  • Cherry Audio GX-80
  • Cherry Audio Miniverse
  • Dorico Elements 4
  • PlugInGuru Unify Library - Absynth Power Pack
  • Toontrack Fusion EZbass MIDI
  • Toontrack Folk EZkeys MIDI
  • Toontrack drum MIDI Contemporary R&B Grooves
  • Tracktion Waveform 12 MIDI Producer Pack
  • Udemy courses

Left in cart:

  • KORG Wavestate Native
  • Studio One 6 Pro update
  • Tone 2 Icarus 2
  • Valhalla Shimmer
  • WA Prod Instachord 2
  • Zebra Legacy

 

Edited by abacab
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29 minutes ago, Steve Madden said:

Can I ask what you hate about Atlantis 2? Did you have the previous version and if so, did you like it? Just curious because I haven't upgraded yet and Ethera is usually pretty quality. 

Short answer:

I find the GUI to be extremely frustrating to use, especially the controls which are very fiddly, counter-intuitive, and often poorly labeled.  There are huge differences in sound level among the instruments (as much as 15-20dB).  And the library is not nearly as versatile as I had hoped (which is truly disappointing given my only expectation was to use it as 'melody support' where I'd layer it under certain vocal melodies to produce a fuller sound).

Long answer:

Atlantis 2 was the first Kontakt library I bought a la carte (I have many others, but they're part of Komplete 13 UCE).  I don't care for Kontakt and, up until now, I'd just load a library, select an instrument, close the GUI and never even think about making any adjustments; I would do all that in Cubase.

However with Atlantis 2 it does seem that to get what you want you do have to interact with the GUI a bit.  And as I mentioned above, it's very difficult given the way the controls are set up.

I also had hoped there'd be more 'playable' instruments vs fixed vocal lines/phrases.  And much of the playable content is somewhat timbrally homogenous.

To be clear, the three voices are hauntingly beautiful, and that makes it even more frustrating because I don't feel I can get them to do what I want.

Of all the vocal libraries I own (some of which are Kontakt-based), this one is the most unresponsive and inconsistently responsive; and this is only exacerbated by the huge variation in sound level among the instruments/patches.

Bottom line, if I knew everything I mentioned above before purchasing the library, I would have passed.

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9 hours ago, husker said:

OO!  Love that thing.  I played with one several times at Perfect Circuit in LA.  I'd love to get one some day.

Yeah I'm really excited about it. It's a crazy haunting machine. I'm planning on the white version. And what about you. Your hardware plans?

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16 hours ago, Jan Schmitz said:

I didn't want to know this, but here goes...

Audiomodern Atom
BFD3 + 5 extensions
Cherry Audio DCO-106
Cherry Audio Dreamsynth
Cherry Audio Eight Voice
Cherry Audio GX-80
Cherry Audio Memorymode
Cherry Audio Miniverse
Dawesome Abyss
Dawesome Novum
DDMF PluginDoctor
Evolution Series Erhu
Evolution Series Harmonium
Evolution Series Suona
Evolution Series World Percussion
FXpansion Cypher
FXpansion Strobe
GForce Imposcar2
IK Multimedia Tape Collection
inSession Shimmer Shake Strike 2
Klevgrand Fosfat
Klevgrand Skaka
Madrona Labs Aalto
Madrona Labs Aaltoverb
Madrona Labs Kaivo
Madrona Labs Virta
Nembrini IR Loader
Newfangled Equivocate
Newfangled Generate
Newfangled Invigorate
Newfangled Saturate
Physical Audio Derailer
Physical Audio Preparation
PSound Vintage Accordion
Rhizomatic Plasmonic
Softube Model 84
Softube Modular
Softube Parallels
Sonic Academy ANA2
Soniccouture Hammersmith Pro Upgrade
Soniccouture Sun Drums Crossgrade
Spitfire Originals Cimbalom
Spitfire Originals Cinematic Soft Piano
Spitfire Originals Jangle Box Piano
Spitfire Originals Mrs Mills Piano
Spitfire Percussion Swarm
Taqs.im SOLO
TBTECH Kirchhoff EQ
Tone Projects Kelvin
u-he Diva
u-he Repro
XILS KaoX
XILS PolyKB
XILS PolyM

Really gotta put a leash on myself next year.

Did you sleep? It was only a week. 🤔

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4 hours ago, Nick Blanc said:

Yeah I'm really excited about it. It's a crazy haunting machine. I'm planning on the white version. And what about you. Your hardware plans?

I think a Cobalt 8m to join my Argon 8m.

Then one of two others:

1. A Guitar Center about an hour away from me has a pristine Fractal Axe FM III Mk. II that they've had in their used rack for a few months.  I've been bickering with them on the price for two months.  I think they are about to cave.

(or)

2.  An Elektron Analog RTM 2.  I've got plenty of hardware synths, but I don't really have a good drum machine.  I've been researching them for quite awhile, and have about settled on this one.

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Well - had about $4K set aside for BF, and bought basically nothing. Sales don't last long enough to make an informed decision. Too many vendors, too many products, weird things bundled together, weird / confusing crossgrades and product overlaps, really old and brand new things bundled together to inflate prices, and having to scour Youtube for (usually terrible) walkthroughs of expensive libraries. Very frustrated.

The one purchase I'll probably regret not making is OT Ark bundle - but just can't justify the enormous drive space for what looks like a ton of overlapping content that would take weeks (months?) to sort through.

One thing is clear right now - this market is oversaturated af and vendors really don't understand how difficult it is is parse through content. Sales seem to geared to impulse buys before consumers really understand what they are buying. 

Luckily, have a line on a used Gibson and an RME interface I've wanted for a while. Will buy those instead.

I think others here have a smarter approach - spend time really getting to know what you need to buy, then wait for sales. Don't wait till November 25th to cram in a month of research to make a decision lol. Me dumb.

Edited by Carl Ewing
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7 hours ago, Carl Ewing said:

Well - had about $4K set aside for BF, and bought basically nothing. Sales don't last long enough to make an informed decision. Too many vendors, too many products, weird things bundled together, weird / confusing crossgrades and product overlaps, really old and brand new things bundled together to inflate prices, and having to scour Youtube for (usually terrible) walkthroughs of expensive libraries. Very frustrated.

The one purchase I'll probably regret not making is OT Ark bundle - but just can't justify the enormous drive space for what looks like a ton of overlapping content that would take weeks (months?) to sort through.

One thing is clear right now - this market is oversaturated af and vendors really don't understand how difficult it is is parse through content. Sales seem to geared to impulse buys before consumers really understand what they are buying. 

Luckily, have a line on a used Gibson and an RME interface I've wanted for a while. Will buy those instead.

I think others here have a smarter approach - spend time really getting to know what you need to buy, then wait for sales. Don't wait till November 25th to cram in a month of research to make a decision lol. Me dumb.

I know how you feel.   I was kind of in the same boat a couple of years ago. 

This is my problem - I love researching things as much as I love playing with them.    FWIW, that is what they now call "non sustainable."  :)

I've gotten so much more "picky" about what I get.  I keep a spreadsheet of things that I know I will pick up at some point, and the price I am willing to pay.  All that info comes from research, reading manuals, and this forum.   Members here are so helpful in that regard.   Shoot, a couple of years ago, I was looking at keeping my Gothic Dronar collection moving along.  I posted what I was planning, and @cclarry sent back this super complex process in like 87 steps (slight exaggeration), that actually got me more libraries at a lower cost.  I still can't believe he went to the trouble to figure that all out for me.  

That list keeps shrinking every year, and at some point I'll be like @bitflipper and a couple of other sage members who just don't buy anything.

There are only a couple of instant buys for me.  Any new Ethera library.  I know I'll pick up the year's collection from Samples From Mars.  Past that, I'm now super picky about what hits Paypal.  

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I hate to say this, but this is premature.  Every year some big deals come out in December.  It has driven me nuts because I wouldn't have bought A if I had any idea that a sale on B was coming.  But my $$$ was gone.

For example, I did know that there would be the yearly BIAB sale, and was expecting that.   But I didn't remember how expensive it would be to buy the upgrade, plus $49 pack and a few Xtra Styles paks.  By the time I get through studying this, I'll probably be out close to $200 or even more.  Who knows what tasty additional products they are selling this year?   And to think I almost bought OPUS/Hollywood Orchestra on impulse for $249!

So don't be so sure that you have reached the end of your spendage.  One year there was a big OT sale on the Inspires and the Arks.  That's a pretty common thing these days, but not then.  Nobody saw that coming.  There is also always a big NI partner sale in December.  Last year was a whole set of Evolution Series instruments that I bought and use all the time. 

And the Sonokinetic 12 Days will soon come a caroling. 

Hide your money!!   💸😮

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