How does Analog compare to Automat or Zebra?

udp · Post by **udp** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 3:54 pm

U-he Filterscape package is a better comparison. I use Analogue and Filterscape VA, and Analogue is easier to use and sounds GOOD, but if you want to get really dirty, Filterscape VA will kick your ass. It can be so warm it'll make you sweat! My 2 cents.

dave dominey · Post by **dave dominey** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 4:08 pm

zebralton - the live modular synth

i'd buy it

condra · Post by **condra** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 6:56 pm

I haven't used Automat in about 2 years. Might download it later, just to use the random function.

The skin always annoyed me and the amp envelopes were often noisy, but hopefully 2 years later things have improved.

I was playing with Zebra last night. It's hard sometimes not to spend up to half an hour making just one patch, but the results are amazing, especially for weird sounds like distant fog horns, metallic twangs, eerie strings or robotic motifs. If I could only use one softsynth, it would have to be Zebra.

tylenol · Post by **tylenol** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 8:33 pm

merges wrote:i heard there is a "hidden" midi map/midi learn feature in zebra but i don't know how to access it.

Right click (or ctl-click) on a control to get an option to midi learn or unlearn, and then move the midi control. If you want to see what is currently mapped, look at "~/Library/Application Support/u-he/com.u-he.Zebra2.midimap.txt".

merges · Post by **merges** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 8:40 pm

i can't get that to work while running zebra through live 6... :-/

Tarekith · Post by **Tarekith** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 8:48 pm

Make sure you're using the latest version of Live 6, there were some bugs in earlier versions that affected Zebra.

tylenol · Post by **tylenol** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 12:12 am

Tarekith wrote:Make sure you're using the latest version of Live 6, there were some bugs in earlier versions that affected Zebra.

And the latest version of zebra, the midi learn menu wasn't there before 2.1 or so; it just midi mapped silently on right clicking (iirc). Though now that I try it I can't seem to get midilearn to work with my padkontrol in live 6; it works fine in live 7, and I'm pretty sure it worked fine with other controllers in the past with live 6.

nuperspective · Post by **nuperspective** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 12:18 am

analogue is pretty good at bread and butter sounds - but it isnt going to blow your mind. thats not to say you cant get very good results from it. combine this with operator and the fx and your away.

it scores points [for me] because of the live integration which is always a bonus make routing very easy.

however

i personally think its one of the worst GUI's ableton have designed its pretty crowded. i would hope this gets changed - maybe to the tabbed method used in sampler.

the amount of real estate for the synth just isnt enough.

leedsquietman · Post by **leedsquietman** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 12:31 am

The presets that come with it aren't amazing.

It is quite a nice analog synth though, much better than say 'Subtractor' in Reason. And you can use racks to layer it or double it with Operator or Sampler or various effects etc. (caution, racking it can cause the CPU load to be very heavy depending on how you rack it)

The patches that the Covert Operators just released show the synth in a much more powerful light, some awesome sounds there.

You can't compare it to the full blown Zebra, which offers more than one type of synthesis than analogue subtractive, plus more parameters and a much nicer GUI. Bith have their uses.

condra · Post by **condra** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 2:44 am

Speaking of GUIs, Zebras is nothing to write home about IMO, but luckily its easily skinable