I was wondering which of these DSP cards have the best software.
For example Vinco vs 1176LN , which is the best compressor?
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: claudioD on 2005-01-08 03:41 ]</font>
Pulsar vs UAD
right - and that's the one and only thing that reviewers neither do nor are they interested in...On 2005-01-08 11:42, stardust wrote:
...
I guess you need to trust your own ears.
...
Once it comes to big names and big money it always ends like '... but again it shows that xyz is slightly more transparent (punchy, warm, brilliant, etc)...'
I once read a confession from a hifi geek that he could easily distinguish all those (typical high-end) audio attributes, ...as long as he knew what was playing.
But when he entered a room where the gear was unknown it was all the same for him, as he frankly admitted with a good sense for self-humor
cheers, Tom
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King of Snake
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I'd say that if your prime concern was audio processing/fx and you don't care about synths, than the UAD seems to be the best choice. Creamware does have great effects though like Vinco, but also reverbs, vocoders, eq, multiband comp etc, some from Creamware, some third party, and also great synths and free routing.
Just get both!
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: King of Snake on 2005-01-08 14:21 ]</font>
Just get both!
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: King of Snake on 2005-01-08 14:21 ]</font>
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Liquid Len
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I think the UAD card's effects sound better overall. HOW much better is a matter of opinion. I'm not going to presume to tell you 'not to waste your time worrying about it, you really need to focus on other things etc etc'.
My heavily opinionated summary of the differences :
The UAD's modulation effects (chorus, flange, phaser) don't distort the original signal as much, it's easier to get a very clean flange or phaser effect sounding exactly the way you want it. On the other hand, there are a wider range of effects for the SFP, some with unusual sounds. You can also buy 3rd party effects that are reputed to be very good. On top of that you can construct your own effects with the Modular, although this approach admittedly has a bigger learning curve.
The UAD cards come with some very good compressors (or used to - I'm looking at the site and see that some effects that used to come with the card are now sold separately). They don't take up a lot of processing power, relatively, so you can separately compress a number of tracks without fear of running out of processing power. As for Creamware compressors - the stock compressors that Creamware supplies aren't the greatest - they don't take up much processing power but seem to distort the signal (somewhat) rather than give it any clarity or focus. Better compressors are available for the Pulsar for extra $. I tried the Vinco demo, I didn't find it was much different than the equivalent plugin for the UAD. It took up too much of the processing on my limited DSP system to really consider it something I needed at the moment.
The stock reverb the UAD comes with is much better than Creamware's stock reverb - but the 3rd party STW reverbs and choruses are very cheap to buy for a Creamware card and sound EXCELLENT (oh yes it's verra nice). I haven't compared the UAD's new plate reverb against the STW reverb yet.
If it's recording that you're using the card for, the UAD effects integrate nicely with a number of sequencing packages and are very convenient to access that way. (You can use an 'XTC' mode with the Pulsar to do this, but it apparently prevents you from using the routing window, which is one of the Pulsar's real strengths). As has been mentioned, the UAD effects are not usable live, whereas any Creamware effect is. If you can afford it, I recommend having BOTH cards, they compliment each other nicely.
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Liquid Len on 2006-01-18 14:44 ]</font>
My heavily opinionated summary of the differences :
The UAD's modulation effects (chorus, flange, phaser) don't distort the original signal as much, it's easier to get a very clean flange or phaser effect sounding exactly the way you want it. On the other hand, there are a wider range of effects for the SFP, some with unusual sounds. You can also buy 3rd party effects that are reputed to be very good. On top of that you can construct your own effects with the Modular, although this approach admittedly has a bigger learning curve.
The UAD cards come with some very good compressors (or used to - I'm looking at the site and see that some effects that used to come with the card are now sold separately). They don't take up a lot of processing power, relatively, so you can separately compress a number of tracks without fear of running out of processing power. As for Creamware compressors - the stock compressors that Creamware supplies aren't the greatest - they don't take up much processing power but seem to distort the signal (somewhat) rather than give it any clarity or focus. Better compressors are available for the Pulsar for extra $. I tried the Vinco demo, I didn't find it was much different than the equivalent plugin for the UAD. It took up too much of the processing on my limited DSP system to really consider it something I needed at the moment.
The stock reverb the UAD comes with is much better than Creamware's stock reverb - but the 3rd party STW reverbs and choruses are very cheap to buy for a Creamware card and sound EXCELLENT (oh yes it's verra nice). I haven't compared the UAD's new plate reverb against the STW reverb yet.
If it's recording that you're using the card for, the UAD effects integrate nicely with a number of sequencing packages and are very convenient to access that way. (You can use an 'XTC' mode with the Pulsar to do this, but it apparently prevents you from using the routing window, which is one of the Pulsar's real strengths). As has been mentioned, the UAD effects are not usable live, whereas any Creamware effect is. If you can afford it, I recommend having BOTH cards, they compliment each other nicely.
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Liquid Len on 2006-01-18 14:44 ]</font>
Don't forget that Creamware cards are the only cards that have no latency UAD and powercore are unsuable if you want to use your effect on stage or if you want to monitor your effect during a session in studio.
and there's a lot of exotic effect others don't have.
+ the routing facilities + the modular (where you can create your own effect)
and there's a lot of exotic effect others don't have.
+ the routing facilities + the modular (where you can create your own effect)