PavlovsCat

I've always loved this song. When I fall in love with a song, as I did this one, I sometimes have a habit of naturally -- in my head -- thinking about different arrangements of the song. This arrangement has been in my head since I first heard the song. As usual, I play and sing everything. I brought my voice up louder before anyone had a chance to ask!

Thanks, @Zolton, I appreciate your sharing that, it was very kind of you. I'm going to give Dr Device a spin.

From someone who knows how to use them (you) to someone who really doesn't (me), is there anything you think would be worthwhile? That is, something easy to use for someone not savvy on effects to fairly easily get decent results? I've been starting to experiment with a bunch of effects lately and it's been eye opening creatively, but I'm learning little by little. Thanks in advance.

For those of you have ez2 and SD2 or 3, do you enjoy ezD because of the patterns? For me, I don't use the patterns, I'm only focused on the included kits. Like Simon, I own a bunch of ezD kits and like them. Sure, they're not as extensively sampled as SD kits, but I think they're really nice for what they are. I suppose I should start trying different ways of working, as I simply just play a part in and if I like it I use it, if I don't I play it again. But I have bad tendinitis and can't play very well anymore, so I should try editing.

Does anyone see a reason(s) to get ezDrummer3 when they already have Superior Drummer?

If we wanted to be legalistic about things, any comment not pertaining to a "deal " is off topic. People post complaints occasionally -- usually people who don't contribute much to the community. But the complaints are rare. The majority of community members clearly enjoy discussions related to a library or plugins category and I think it's not the kind of problematic off topic posts to be concerned with in a forum as Simon explained very well. If you're bothered enough by long threads, you can simply ignore all of the posts that bother you and anything beyond the original post. If you're looking for the original deal content only, it's commonly found in the original post. You can simply look at that and ignore the rest of the thread. Problem solved.

I was ready to order the BFD3 upgrade when I got a message from a friend -- a very talented musician -- who I had shot off a message to about this. He told me that he finds both AD2 and SD3 superior to BFD3 in terms of ease of use and preset quality/quantity. He told me that he felt he spent too much time working to make presets on BFD3 and it had issues, so he eventually deleted it from his hard drive. That gave me pause. Beyond all of the tech problems with BFD3, it's been nearly a decade since it came out (2013, right?). I still would consider BFD, but I think I'll wait and see if there's a BFD4 and check out what that's like. As for the discussion on the sound of the kits, that's incredibly subjective. But I love Toontrack's kits better than anything I've heard from BFD, orAD2 (which I own) or any of the others (one of the developers of a popular drum library is a friend, but candidly, those drums just aren't a fit for the sounds I'm after). That's not an assertion that I believe it's going to be the same for everyone. If someone else prefers BFD3 over the others, that's great. I think it sounds very good. One thing my friend wasn't sure of was if the latest version of BFD3 had more presets. He said that was an area where, at the point he deleted BFD from his hard drive, he said BFD3 was very weak. And, candidly, he's great at creating presets and I regularly use presets he's made for AD2.

The BFD website shows the upgrade deal for $49 USD is still available when you enter your serial number. I own the first version of ezDrummer -- which I really liked -- and I own SD2, so I've contemplated getting the ezDrummer3 upgrade IN ADDITION to upgrading to SD4 when it's released but am thinking I'll save the money. That's an invitation for someone to try to persuade me I need both! Hahaha.

Well, I'm just a hobbyist who worked professionally as a drummer many years ago, but I can't play anymore and I just do music as a hobby, so I'm looking for realistic sounding acoustic kits. the demos of BFD3 easily sound good enough to justify spending $49USD on an upgrade from ECO -- and I bought a bunch of BFD libraries -- like the eSoundz Neil Peart kit -- years ago thinking I was going to upgrade to the full BFD, but never did. So, if you're no longer having any problems, you're making me think that maybe I should take the plunge. I use the latest version of Cakewalk with Windows 10. Please any BFD3 users, please weigh in on whether you think this is a decent time for me to get the upgrade to BFD3 or if there are still major problems with the plugin. I would greatly appreciate it. $49 is less than the price of another SD library, so it's super tempting. But if the plugin still has major problems, of course, it's not worth it. I know that I waited around 1 year before AIR fixed one of their plugins I owned, so I realize that InMusic regularly buys up old plugin brands and uses them as cash cows, not even investing enough to get a bug free product out and BFD clearly has been no exception to the rule. But perhaps the plugin is working satisfactorily at this point?

The demos of that viola feature a bunch of off pitch notes. I just never understood why the developer put that out the way he did. I'm certain that if you use that in a song that people will comment that you had some sour notes. I seem to recall that the developer responded to a comment I made on VI Control back when he first released it that he was going for that sound, but I just can't imagine why anyone would desire a sampled instrument with off pitch notes-- and if someone does want that off pitch sound, I can't imagine they'd use it in many productions. I'd be interested in hearing from someone who is looking for that to understand more of its appeal, because it just sounds wrong to my ears.

I'm just counting on all of you BFD3 users to make sure you let us know when the plugin is stable. It's rather clear that it's not at this point. When it is, if they still have an upgrade deal from BFD Eco, I'm definitely going to get it. Until then, I'm out. SD is my go to and AD2 is my second choice. I realize it's really subjective. I fell in love with the sound of a couple of the SD expansions years ago -- that reminded me of the way I used to tune my drums. AD2 sounds really processed to me, nothing like what a well tuned drum kit sounds like when you're playing it and BFD just didn't sound all that exciting to my ears and similar to the way I liked to tune my drums (I played drums semi professionally for many years until I had an injury that stopped me from playing). But if BFD ever gets its tech issues worked out, and I can still pick it up for $100USD or less with upgrade pricing, I'm definitely getting it. Until then, I'm looking forward to the SD4 upgrade and hoping that Toontrack will offer SD4 upgrade pricing for SD2 customers as they have offered upgrade pricing to ezDrummer 1 customers.

8Dio just shot back that they are aware of the issue and working on it. I'm guessing that Larry was right -- that a hacker inserted malicious code on their site and they're fixing it.

Bit Defender shows the site has malicious code, so I ran Sucuri on it and it comes back clean. It's not fool proof, but the code on the site appears clean. I sent the folks at 8Dio a message to let them know of the situation. It may be a result of when they were recently hacked.

This is the Cakewalk forum. That's not even something worth worrying about. It can't hold a candle to some of the tangents most of us have gone on here! Plus, it was related and relevant to the topic of drum plugins and the choices many of us face (for example, I own ezD, SD2, AD2, BFD Eco and numerous KONTAKT drum libraries). I've long considered BFD, but I never pulled the trigger because the demos didn't win me over the way SD demos have (and I love almost every ToonTrack library I own and want more) and when they recently offered an upgrade price of $49 USD from BFD Eco, I seriously researched moving to BFD3, but I've seen a great deal of posts from BFD3 users sharing serious unresolved issues with the plugin and I have prior serious, show-stopping bad experiences with InBrand plugins (AIR plugins) that went unresolved for a long, long time, so I'm not ready to buy anything from AIR again until I see A LOT of community members I'm familiar with posting that their issues are resolved.

As an owner of the first version of ezDrummer and Superior Drummer 2 -- which I use regularly -- I'm very encouraged that Toontrack is extending upgrade pricing to owners of the first version of ezDrummer (as they presently don't offer upgrade pricing for SD3). I'm hoping they'll do the same when they release SD4. I love Superior Drummer and SD libraries -- even some of the ezDrummer libraries are excellent -- more than any other drum plugin, but the price for SD3 is pretty steep and Toontrack pulling upgrade pricing for SD2 owners was a far less than customer-loyal move, IMO.

This is literally the most positive comment I can recall seeing about an Aria Sounds library on any forum in more than a decade that I've known of the brand. Even considering the subsequent post stating "Whell, it's not the best of strings. Not at all. But it's a lot of them for a very low price. If you haven't got any, this is okay," it's still the most positive commentary on an Aria library I can recall seeing. Aria should use that on their site as a testimonial (I kid. I kid). For those considering the library, they're constantly on sale at this price, just like Aria's other libraries (the other strings library and a choir library) are constantly on sale at similar price (I think $39 USD for the other string library and the choir libraryis regularlyon sale somewhere for $29 or $39). For anyone considering an Aria library, I'd strongly recommend searching for comments on them at this forum and at VI Control first.

"Evolution Series presents a brand new collaboration with the DA's Office." DA = District Attorney? Dragon Age? Dark Arts? Department of the Army? DeviantArt? Anyone?????

Same issue here. I liked some of the patches I heard, but it's really not worth the hassle. So much for their inflated claims that this is worth $500. If this weren't free, I couldn't imagine it would be worth more than $5 or $10 USD. The content is far too limited. But the constant crashing is a deal breaker. It crashed around a dozen times on me so far. No thanks.

An upright piano for $11 USD??? It sounds good in the demos, bit there's no info on layers or round robins. Does anyone here have it that can share their knowledge and opinions of it?

I've bought some IAmLamprey libraries directly from the developer in the past and thought they were pretty cool little libraries. I noticed they have an upright piano for only $5USD at Pluginboutique.com -- I'm a sucker for quirky uprights and the developer did some unusual things to this one and it sounds interesting in the demos. Plus, you get the free uJam drum plugin. I'm only listening on my cellphone, but for 5 bucks to get the library and the uJam plugin...why not? https://www.pluginboutique.com/products/8082-Gloom

Well, in that case, then it's perfect. It definitely is far easier on system resources than an extensively sampled, well programmed KONTAKT bass library. I'm completely in agreement that nothing beats the real thing of a real player with fingers (or a pick or sticks) playing real instruments in real time.

@Heath RowI'm mainly referring to Orange Tree Samples bass guitar libraries. The only time I've used MODO in the final production is when I really want that Hofner tone. MODO does a really good job of getting the tone but there are certain nuances that are missing that keep it from being as authentic as the OTS sample libraries. Consequently, I've been using an OTS Fender James Jamerson preset most of the time when I want a Hofner-- unless I can pull off a believable enough part with MODO's modeled Hofner (most of the time I've started with MODO, I've replaced it with OTS -- it just sounds more realistic). I think the Scarbee Rickenbacker library with KOMPLETE is pretty good and well scripted. It's not as detailed as the more recent OTS basses (to be fair, the Scarbee basses have been around a long time and were pretty much the gold standard when they first came out, which I believe is easily more than 10 years for some of them) . But if you put up the Scarbee Rickenbacker that comes with KOMPLETE against MODO, I find that the Scarbee is the clear winner for realism. That's what my ears hear, and I spent two decades playing drums professionally and played with a number of bassists that played Rickenbackers and am pretty picky. The MODO sounds really good for modelled bass, but if it's well exposed in the mix, I don't think it's going to fool a discerning ear. Just to be transparent, I've worked with OTS in the past and I've known the founder for more than a decade (I've consulted to a couple of dozen sample and plugin developers, including other KONTAKT devs that make bass and guitar libraries and am also friends with devs like Andrea from Pettinhouse; I've been using samples since the 80s).

MODO is currently my only serious option for a Hofner 500/1 Beatles' / McCartney violin bass (I'm in love with the tone of the Hofner 500/1, as I am with a lot of Beatles' gear). MODO is really good and it's a lot less taxing on my system than sample libraries. But I still find the better detailed and well scripted KONTAKT libraries are superior (more realistic sounding). I'm not sure if I'm going to pick up MODO 2. Can anyone who's upgraded from MODO to MODO 2 compare the two? I've searched but have yet to find any reviews. FTR, I don't use patterns, I play my own parts, so while I realize that feature is really important to some people -- and an area of improvement for the new version -- it's not a factor for me.

I have several AIR plugins from several years ago, but they've had so many problems -- including a problem that required me to rollback Windows 10 (which I later found their customer support knew about for the better part of a year without fixing) -- that were neglected for so long, I would never buy anything from them again unless it was ridiculously cheap and I've seen A LOT of people at this forum and KVR posting very similar show stopper issues. Consequently, I feel a duty to make sure others get a heads up before going down the AIR / InMusic path. Plus, InMusic often puts AIR plugins on sale for a small fraction of their retail price -- like $10 or less.

Larry > Affiliate Sites / Influencers This is exactly why Larry is the best and makes this forum what it is. He's very different -- and more valuable to users -- than a bot driven sales site and "influencers"/compensated faux reviewers. Those parties are motivated by maximizing their affiliate sales commissions, not merely creating the best possible content for users, as Larry is. They're not going to post much -- if anything at all -- of sales where they don't make a commission (affiliate marketing kickbacks from the products they promote or do "reviews of), whereas Larry posts it all without concern for affiliate sales. I'm not into calling people kings, but I do believe that Larry is a boss.