Live Suite...is it worth it?

telepathy51 · Post by **telepathy51** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 5:06 am

im not sure what im gonna do with the "lousy president check" i'm getting next week but, I have been thinking about Live Suite. I listened to a few samples on the site but I'd like to here it from the people who use it. What do you think of "Analog" & "Operator"? I havn't heard anyone really raving about them so I just don't know. I've heard "Tension" sounds great and don't know much about "Sampler". What do you all think?

cheameup · Post by **cheameup** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 5:18 am

I recently upgraded from 6 to 7. Im now regretting not going the suite. I recently bought drum machines and operator seperatly . And I wouldnt mind tension and that will make up the price difference if I just got suite

bensuthers · Post by **bensuthers** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 5:29 am

yeah. it's worth it.....

Pasha · Post by **Pasha** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 5:50 am

I went to the suite and within 30 days from purchase I upgraded to boxed suite. No regrets. Electric, Tension and Sampler are worth it alone (I already owned Operator). If you add Session Drums you really can't be wrong. Analog is good for bread and butter synth sounds and even if I went Zebra2 recently it's useful. EIC2 is not on top of my list because I do not like gigs of sampled instruments but it delivers on promise. Although Truepiano is still the best piano out there, EIC2 provides a viable alternative for some piano parts except very complicated ones like Jazz solos and fast harmonies because it's heavy on my HDD and jitters a lot under pressure, so I load the Lite version in memory and exchange with the full version when mixing. The other sounds are good but some of them are still too heavy on HDD, some jitter occurs with the bigger ones.

- Best
- Pasha

sublimelobc · Post by **sublimelobc** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 6:24 am

I don't regret getting the boxed version of 7 Suite. I've loved session drums, EIC2 is competent in my opinion....lots of usable tools for sure.

liveISlife · Post by **liveISlife** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 6:49 am

If you have the money to burn I would say to get it 4 sho. All the stuff is high quality. It's cool having all the stuff it comes with cause it gives you a variety of things to fuck with. I really enjoy operator and analog is fun as well. Session drums is cool, its like u got a shit load of drum sets to fuck with. I'll get like some hip hop beats goin with that when I take breaks from doing like techno/ house stuff. Yeah just make sure you have the hard drive space for it man.

sporkles · Post by **sporkles** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 9:31 am

Analog and especially Operator are quite essential tools for me now. Sampler
is also great, though I still seem to return to Reason's NN-XT when I create
multisampled patches. Drum Machines are cool, if you're into retro drum
sampling (which I am, to an extent). The rest of the suite is just collecting
virtual dust in my case. Off hand, I can't even readily remember what the
others are called or what they do...

No regrets, though. Operator alone more than makes up for it, to me!

creature · Post by **creature** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 11:04 am

I also think it is worth it. Operator and Analog are also well used synths for me. I have really used tension, electric much yet. No particular reason other than lazyness.

The drum machines samples are quite nice also.

rewind · Post by **rewind** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 11:09 am

I had Live 6 with none of the instruments and I bought the Live7 suite. I'm very happy with with the extra instruments.

I use Drum Machines and Operator the most -- really love Operator -- and I use Analogue and Electric a fair bit too. I really expected to love Analogue but it turned out to be relatively difficult to make really good patches using it; much more difficult than, say, Reason's subtractor. I think I'm starting to get there now though. On the other hand, Electric is just super fab.

I don't tend to make multisamples so I doubt I'm getting the most out of Sampler, but it is excellent for sound sculpting, so I use it often for that.

I don't really use the EIC or the sessions drums, simply because my music rarely requires traditional* instrument sounds. The samples do sound good though, and a decent piano is always handy. Tension remains more or less a mystery to me.

Don't underestimate the value of the printed manual.

* What do I want to say here? Natural? Real? Acoustic? I just mean: not synthesised.

andydes · Post by **andydes** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 11:47 am

rewind wrote:I had Live 6 with none of the instruments and I bought the Live7 suite. I'm very happy with with the extra instruments.

I use Drum Machines and Operator the most -- really love Operator -- and I use Analogue and Electric a fair bit too. I really expected to love Analogue but it turned out to be relatively difficult to make really good patches using it; much more difficult than, say, Reason's subtractor. I think I'm starting to get there now though. On the other hand, Electric is just super fab.

I don't tend to make multisamples so I doubt I'm getting the most out of Sampler, but it is excellent for sound sculpting, so I use it often for that.

I don't really use the EIC or the sessions drums, simply because my music rarely requires traditional* instrument sounds. The samples do sound good though, and a decent piano is always handy. Tension remains more or less a mystery to me.

Don't underestimate the value of the printed manual.

* What do I want to say here? Natural? Real? Acoustic? I just mean: not synthesised.

Spookily similar to what I was going to say. Except, I quite like Tension as well, for making damned strange lead parts. Wouldn't know where to start making a realistic violin solo with it though.

Whether it's worth upgrading is kind of dependant on what you want and what you already own. If you're lacking in decent instruments, then I'd say it's well worth it.

oddstep · Post by **oddstep** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 12:00 pm

I've got the download suite, s'alright.
I didn't have decent samples of x0x kicks and claps, I've got them with Drum machines. Pure Magnetik have even gone to the trouble of setting up multi sampled simpler patches for me to use.
The aggregate cost of sampler, analog, operator, tension and electric is substantially greater than the suite price. I thought I'd really like sampler, operator and analog.
Operator is unique.

Sampler is sort of good- not as good as Kontakt (I've only got kontakt 1.1) but easier to use within Live. The modulation is fun as is the fm oscillilator.
I've given up on analog- if I didn't own a MS2000 I might use it more - but the modulation is a bit limited and it seems to be power hungry.

Electric is.... an electric piano. Its good for the 3% of the time I want to use a physically modelled emulation of hammer hitting a metal surface.

Tension is bizarre and inspiring.

In retrospect I could have got away with the basic download. Simpler and drum racks are sufficient + the limitations would probably focus my energies... but I've found operator is an essential part of almost every track.
Tension is great - but I don't know if I'd buy it separately- I'd have to consider what else I could spend that money on, and that would always be more important/immediately gratifying.

piZMo · Post by **piZMo** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 1:04 pm

how come you have to ask telepathy51?

Meef Chaloin · Post by **Meef Chaloin** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 1:27 pm

havent tried it, havent heard it but i think its a rip off

feyshay · Post by **feyshay** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 4:01 pm

Having said no in the past to this question, I changed my mind. I already had Operator and Sampler (and consider them essential). Note that I already have Reason, Zebra 2 and most of NI.
I am very impressed with Tension and Electric. Not so sure about Analog, but I can see it has a lot of potential. Drum Machines--not so sure about.
I think it is debatable for someone with a lot of stuff, however I went for it anyway (after only getting Live 7 solo at first).
For someone who does not have a large collection of instruments, I am convinced that it is a very worthwhile purchase.
My biggest complaint is about the GUI (although I like Operator).

doc holiday · Post by **doc holiday** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 4:30 pm

i went with the DL suite, and for me it was worth it just for sampler.