Why Arturia seem unpopular ?

[chromatronic]

hey,

Very often in some thread comment about ARTURIA are not so positive...
Especialy about the CS80...
Then yesterday at a friend studio i had occasion of trying the Arturia CS80....
Of course it doesnt sound like the original but the most important or obvious parts of the cs 80 personality seem there... the plugin does sound different from many others VA...
Possibly one of the best VA i have heard running on a computer... of course its not a "do it all" kind of synth but what it does it does it very well...

So why so much hate ? lol

[BlueHexagon]

When I used the CS80V I didn't like the fact that the CS80V has got some switches that cannot be controlled by a hardware MIDI device. What's the point of buying expensive controllers if you still need to click with the mouse?

Now I'm also not getting excited about the sound of it or any other soft synth as I like the physical instruments better. It's probably most visible with simple synths - single oscillator machines, for example Juno 60 or Doepfer Dark Energy sound so good on their own while there are virtually no simple, good sounding sofsynths. They mostly rely on complexity, effects and processing to sound half-decent.

[cl516]

some people love their sound, some people dislike it. CPU drain is kinda heavy. the customer support i've (barely) received from them regarding prophet v and the origin was like pulling teeth. sometime you'll hear from them a lot, and then sometimes they disappear for months. go figure.

[ADamage]

I think the Origin kind of flopped (way to expensive for a software controller). They did a lot of research and development for it and forgot their other products.
And then there was this article somewhere (SOS?) that compared the oscillator curves from their plugins and they all looked the same. So everybody was complaining that they all sounded the same.

I think they should focus on the plugins again, do some upgrades. The upgrade to CS80V2 was already announced in 2007.

That said, i really like the Prophet VS and Arp2600. They probably don't sound exactly like the originals but the modulation and sound design capabalities are great and in a mix it sounds good.

[itisnick]

I like them, there is nothing really wrong with them and they are great from the standpoint of sounding good as virtual instruments go. Not so great from the standpoint of nailing the sounds of the originals let alone replacing them. But they definitely are capable of some very useful sounds.

Maybe their release strategy was a little of a let down over the years. While I'm happy they added some features to a few of them by and large after the Moog Modular and the CS-80 it was a lot of flavors of the same thing over again. Now if they really nailed the sound of the original that would be one thing. Or if they kept perfecting the code for the Moog Modular and the CS-80 over the years then they might change more minds. Tweak the sound of the CS80 to be closer, fix those annoying little bugs, make the moog into more of a modular, as it stands you can only use the effects at the end of the patch, you only have a couple minor choices of modules rather than freely choosing any combination until you run out of CPU, so it's really like matrix modulation, not a modular synth

But unfortunately the software business revolves around rolling out new stuff and I'd argue that Brass was the only new thing they've done other than make different skins and variations on what they had already (minimoog, 2600, Jupiter, Prophet) and then they developed some expensive hardware to repackage them.

[Jorg]

i own the anniversary suite. I do like some of the synth. I actually dont like the cs80 but thats probably in general and ould include the original hardware.

Customer support is bad. They were rude and responded with an attitude. Now thats the last thing I need after dropping a lot of money.
Also not that helpful either. Brass does not work as VST and the response was We know but we wont fix it. It will work in version 2 tho which will get released f*** knows when

Its not the product but the way Ive been treated that made them unpopular to me.

[foldback]

I thought the Arturia Minimoog sounded good but it was a cpu hog and their system of saving and selecting presets was so time consuming. I'd rather just have a piece of hardware that maintained where it was when I was last using it.

In general I think the virtual synths don't have the rich sound quality of actual hardware.

Messing around with iLoks and authorization schemes over and over sucks, such a waste of time. My old Oberheim and Sequential synths just keep going and going. When I get them lashed together I can spend my time creating music instead of trying to figure out why things are flaking out.

In the beginning Arturia used the install CD as the authorization but then they switched to something more complicated and I lost interest. With all the OS updates and other updates required to keep a computer going I've just moved away from virtual synths other than the ones that are built into Logic (which I rarely use).

I completely lost interest in my Native Instruments synths. The authorization schemes make it too hard to manage them. I purchased all the software I've ever used, I've never used bootleg software. I think DRM will be the death of software.

[OurDarkness]

I use the Minimoog V, a lot. It's one of my favorite soft-synths. I have made a couple of patches on it that sound fantastic, then I tried to recreate them on the Voyager and well... I kept the Arturia versions because they sounded better for the tracks I was working on.

It's not a Minimoog and it's not a Voyager either and I personally thing that this whole TAE thing that Arturia has been advertising is crap, but I don't really care. I use it for what it is.

[raffor]

I have the origin and I am very happy with it. The unit is very complex and doesn't portrait a certain sound character, as the Virus does for example. It is more of a sound chameleon that is difficult to pin down because it can do so much.

Customer service is european style. You get what you get and you also get direct answers. Yes, they look rude to us here in the States, but at the end they are listening and trying to fix bugs as good as they can. Don;t know why people complain about the price though. For the desktop version of origin and virus are similar and to me the origin sounds much more refined, especially the oscillator models. In addition the guys at arturia did a great job to put such a complex machine into a box with a great user interface and a nice, big display. I feel that arturia picked up the vision from Wolfgang Palm and produced the Realizer. That alone is worth to buy one...

[alphaproject]

Alot of VSTi's sound great....it's just a matter of picking the right sounds from various ones.

The more you have the better. People thought I used a Voyager or other hardsynths when in fact I don't use any hardsynths so I guess that was a compliment.

Certain sampled VSTi's are huge but sound awesome.

[Phaidon]

Originally Posted by raffor

I have the origin

So YOU are the one,then!

[Phaidon]

Originally Posted by alphaproject

Alot of VSTi's sound great..
The more you have the better.

Nah! Not for me anyway.
I end spending hours just scrolling thru half-ass stuff....
...definitely kills my workflow.

I just keep 2-3 proper ones and that's it.

Less is always more !

[NoVi]

Speaking about vaporware....I don't know how long it's been since they said they would release Brass 2.0.

Plus for me the Syncrosoft key is a nightmare, always trouble, the NI-protection to me is a dream compared to Syncrosoft.

I have Analog Factory, but am hardly using it anymore: clumpsy interface and restricted, unintuitive editing possibilities plus the Syncrosoft trouble.

[Simon The Gooch]

I wouldn't really say they're disliked around here, they pop up all over the place in every single 'favorite softsynths' thread. I think most of the hate here is from purists who own (or aspire to own) the original synths. This is Gearslutz after all.

They're solid synths with great sound quality and really if you ignore the (in my opinion) mostly uninspiring presets you can squeeze some truly amazing sounds out of them. If you absolutely need a real CS80 go ahead and mortgage your kids or whatever, but I'm personally fine with spending a couple hundred bucks and getting 'close enough'.

[Simon The Gooch]

Originally Posted by Phaidon

I end spending hours just scrolling thru half-ass stuff....
...definitely kills my workflow.

Seems more like a personal workflow problem. How much time would you expect to spend scrolling through presets on a Model D? Just get in there and make some sounds.

[spol]

I don't think they are unpopular at all, but at the end who cares?

Not many of us make the same music, why should we like the same tools?

If whatever number of their plugins work for you, then use those.

[Yoozer]

I suggested that they should offer their GUIs in two flavors; one for the people who delude themselves that a 3d plugin is exactly like having an actual Jupiter 8 in the studio, and one for the people who want a usable GUI. It's too bad that this would cost too much, but it'd certainly improve my opinion of their products.

It is ridiculous to maintain a black background + dark gray text color scheme and to meticulously imitate a hardware GUI on something that isn't bound to the constraints of hardware at all.

CS80V is indecipherable on higher resolutions.

[raffor]

Originally Posted by Phaidon

So YOU are the one,then!

I always liked the boutique items...

[greggybud]

One reason I don't care for Arturia is they never adopted the fxb/fxp system therefore making their products much less useful when running them in KORE2.

Another issue, as Yoozer pointed out, I get eye strain looking at the CS-80. While I'm not against making the GUI like the vintage classic...at least design it so you can have the CS-80 in different sizes. That was my big issue with NI's Pro-53.

[Phaidon]

Originally Posted by Simon The Gooch

How much time would you expect to spend scrolling through presets on a Model D? Just get in there and make some sounds.

Easy to say,hard to follow if you have another 15-20 softcrapsynths sitting around ur hd!

[kilon]

Originally Posted by chromatronic

hey,

Very often in some thread comment about ARTURIA are not so positive...
Especialy about the CS80...
Then yesterday at a friend studio i had occasion of trying the Arturia CS80....
Of course it doesnt sound like the original but the most important or obvious parts of the cs 80 personality seem there... the plugin does sound different from many others VA...
Possibly one of the best VA i have heard running on a computer... of course its not a "do it all" kind of synth but what it does it does it very well...

So why so much hate ? lol

I have tried 2 arturia products , Cs-80v and Jupiter-8v.

With Jupiter-8v I had never listen to the real hardware. Its sound was awful, and by awful I mean it was just lifeless dead boring stuff, the presets were a joke and the synth to me seemed like it had nothing to offer.

By the way I happened to listen to Jupiter8 2 days ago , while I has searching for an Andromeda alternative. OMG what a sound !!!!

Cs-80v on the other hand was the first I tried and when I tried I was very experienced with the sound of CS-80 which a synth I love dearly, again the same experience though, bad sound and crappy presets.

With the exception of the GUI , both virtuals have nothing to do with the original hardware and on the other hand are very bad vsts .

So Cs-80v and J8v would never even stand a chance against my top synth, z3ta+, zebra2 , absynth,fm8 etc.

Even their hardware Va and the demos I have heard , have failed me to impress as well. Even though I have to admite that ORIGIN seems like a very good VA candidate.

I heard many people say good things about the Minimoog emulation, I have to confess I never tried it, and I will probably when I get my first chance.

I have to thank Arturia for one thing though, it had shown me one thing that has been one of the reason I move completely to hardware,

there is a HUGE difference between one thing that CAN sound great and one thing that DOES sound great.

[alphaproject]

z3ta+, zebra2 - I got those....some sounds are good...some amazing...but as usual, I only use a few presets I really like.

The most presets I use from anything....Would maybe be in Reason from certain insane refills like Bitlord Wavefront. So many good sounds on there it's ridiculous. Sure you go thru many, many sounds...but there are many, many great sounds that took alot of time to program I'm guessing.

Check out XSynth and Bitlord Wavefront - you will appreciate it. One of the 2 best softsynths out there for many reasons.

[nikseven]

Originally Posted by kilon

there is a huge difference between one thing that can sound great and one thing that does sound great.

real talk.

[Don Solaris]

I don't understand why Arturia gives different names to their synths, when the all sound just the same.

[raffor]

Originally Posted by Don Solaris

I don't understand why Arturia gives different names to their synths, when the all sound just the same.

They do not sound the same, at least the different filter models in the origin do not. I think they copied the minimoog filter onto the ARP 4 pole. Otherwise they did a stunning job with the ARP 2 pole filter which is one of my favorite filters to use with the origin, next to the JP8 filter model. Not sure about their other software though.

[kilon]

Is anyone here owner of ORIGIN , is it any good ?

[pyvnd]

I tried their demos a while ago and didn't like the sound. I think much of their success is name recognition of the synths they emulate to be honest. Something tells me origin is pretty nice though. If it cost less I would consider it.

[DUNCAN29]

Originally Posted by Jorg

i own the anniversary suite. I do like some of the synth. I actually dont like the cs80 but thats probably in general and ould include the original hardware.

Customer support is bad. They were rude and responded with an attitude. Now thats the last thing I need after dropping a lot of money.
Also not that helpful either. Brass does not work as VST and the response was We know but we wont fix it. It will work in version 2 tho which will get released f*** knows when

Its not the product but the way Ive been treated that made them unpopular to me.

I agree completely. But I believe it is the fault of the silent consumer. Watch for my review on Amazon.com of their attitude behavior and just general too bad we have your money attitude.

[Metzger]

Originally Posted by Don Solaris

I don't understand why Arturia gives different names to their synths, when the all sound just the same.

I feel the same way about Native Instruments. Even trying out Guitar Rig, you can hear the same sounds in all of their products. I think the biggest issue with software synths from companies is that one company will use the same sound engine.

Nothing beats the real thing. Now with the CS80V, you really need a good poly AT controller to really get it singing like a real CS80.

[shadowelectronic]

I think Arturia makes awesome sounding soft synths but they really need to lose the whole marketing that they are "true analogue emulations." Really? That's quite a lofty statement. As long as you don't go into purchasing one thinking you are going to have a real Moog Modular or whatever at your fingertips then you will love them for what they are. They are fun and sound really nice but sometimes overhyping your own product can come back to haunt you in certain ways. Regardless I think there are other analog emulations out there that sound better *cough* Synth Squad