[ddots-l] Re: Dimension vs hypersonic

Thanks Brian,
I'm an acoustic stringed instrument player who recently got interested in MIDI, and have no real knowledge of synthesizers. All I really want is to be able to program realistic backing tracks for my Blues, Bluegrass, and jazz banjo playing. The emphasis for me is to have a decent sounding guitar, fiddle, mandolin etc. I'm leaning toward the Hypersonic, but I'll let it sit a while in my head and wait.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Bryan Smart" <BSmart@xxxxxxxxx> 
To: <ddots-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, December 31, 2006 11:45 AM
Subject: [ddots-l] Re: Dimension vs hypersonic



Phil, the TTS-1 is terrible in terms of sound quality. Imagine the
instruments in an early 90's Yamaha PSR keyboard or old Roland Sound Canvas, 
and you have a good idea of what to expect from the TTS-1. Cakewalk should
be ashamed of bundling the TTS-1 with Sonar. The TTS-1 is everything bad
about the early sample-based keyboards. For most of the instruments, you get 
just a few samples that are pitched up and down as you play across the
keyboard. The synth doesn't really respond to how hard you play the
keyboard, other than to adjust the volume of the sound from soft to loud.
The instrument voices do not have any type of real effects with them
(autopanner with rhodes, distortion with guitars, phasers with clavs, chorus 
with FM pianos, etc). It does not even come remotely close to the type of
sounds that you'd get out of a modern synthesizer like a Yamaha Motif or
Roland Fantom. Either Dimension or HS2 will sound extremely superior to the TTS-1 with out a doubt. Choosing Dimension or HS2 is up to your preference, 
but either will be a superior choice over TTS-1. Dimension focuses on some
large sample-based sounds, and HS2 focuses on behaving like a hardware
module. The TTS-1 also works like a hardware-based module, it just acts like 
one from 15 years ago. I'm not kidding about the 15 years part. The Alesis
QS6 that I had back in 1996 would eat TTS-1 for lunch, and there is no way
that I'd use a dated sounding QS6 today.

Bryan

-----Original Message-----
From: ddots-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ddots-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On 
Behalf Of Phil Halton
Sent: Sunday, December 31, 2006 11:22 AM
To: ddots-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [ddots-l] Re: Dimension vs hypersonic

I'm very new to the game, and don't really know much, if anything, about
editting  patch parameters like attack etc.  In general, it sounds like
there's nothing that really set these softsynths apart from the TTS-1, aside 
from a wider range of sounds, and perhaps sound quality in some instances.

So, just how much worse is the TTS-1 than the Hypersonic?  Its free after
all, and if its not completely outclassed by hypersonic, or some other
synth, what's the point of spending a few hundred on another softsynth? I 
guess I really need to hear these synths for myself, but I don't live near
anyplace that has these things set up for demo.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Bryan Smart" <BSmart@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <ddots-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, December 31, 2006 10:58 AM
Subject: [ddots-l] Re: Dimension vs hypersonic



When you buy a softsynth like this, you're going after a general purpose
tool to give you many types of sounds that you don't have specific
softsynths to cover. Dimension Pro has some good sounds. On the whole,
though, I don't like its library. The weak sounds are very weak. Guitars
and
basses are quite bad. Strings are good for orchestral styles, but I hate
them for pop. Keyboard sounds (rhodes, FM rhodes, clavs) are extremely
cheesy. Drums are poor, and they aren't even laid out in GM format across
the keyboard. I have a few sounds that I like in Dimension, but it isn't
worth the cost to me. You only get one instrument voice per instance, it
isn't that easy to change presets, and you can't edit them at all to any
real degree.

Hypersonic II is very different. Some of Dimensions sounds outclass HS2,
but, on the whole, HS2 has a huge library of useable sounds. It has a few
spectacular sounds, but lots of average sounds. There aren't too many
awful
patches. HS2 is more like a hardware MIDI module: it accepts patch change
commands and it responds to all of the general MIDI CC commands. You can
also edit patches through sending MIDI CC messages. Each patch has six
edit
controls that are specific to the patch, plus there are all of the
standard
MIDI CCs that can be used for editing (filter cut-off, filter res, amp
attack and release, portamento time, etc). If you have an external
controller with knobs/sliders, you can map these to the CCs that HS2
expects, so that editing a patch is as simple as moving controls until you 
get the sound that you'd like. It isn't full editing of every parameter,
but
most of the main characteristics of a sound can be tweaked, and, anyway,
its
way beyond what can be accomplished with Dimension. Plus, HS2 isn't
strictly
sample playback. The engine supports analog and FM synthesis, so there is
a
wider variety of sound tambers than with Dimension. Its 1.5GB library
isn't
quite to the 7GB that is used by Dimension, but taken as a whole,
Dimension
doesn't sound as good as a Motif, which only has 175MB of sample ROM. So,
sample ROM size isn't everything.

Bryan

-----Original Message-----
From: ddots-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ddots-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On
Behalf Of Phil Halton
Sent: Sunday, December 31, 2006 10:08 AM
To: ddots-l
Subject: [ddots-l] Dimension vs hypersonic

I've been considering upgrading from the cakewalk TTS-1 to a better soft
synth, and I've been watching this thread on Dimension Pro with interest.
I
hear alot of Pro's, but a few con's that put me off a bit.  For example,
its
not multi-timbral (as if I knew why that mattered--just doesn't sound
good).

Question, is the hypersonic by Steinberg, or any other soft synth, in the
running with dimension pro?  What other softsynths are in this class, and
should be considered?  Of course, accessibility is a main consideration.


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