operator underestimated

holterzoff · Post by **holterzoff** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:18 am

i'm not an absolute synth-nerd, nor have i that much experience
but
the operator is absolutely a joy to use and play with
the more i dive into it the more i like it

leads me to the assumption that the whole operator rant comes a bit
shortsighted....

so finally great implementation

have fun

f

technam · Post by **technam** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:49 am

yeah, its an easy FM synth to program

joe

Rahlo · Post by **Rahlo** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 3:46 pm

dood, it's the easiest synth I've ever used. I'm diggin' the sounds mightily.

Of course, I haven't used a ton of synths before--just those in Reason. And then I just sorta twiddled around with presets. Using Operator has helped me to understand better how changing certain parameters affects the sound.

For me, this is huge. I've only ever sampled to make music.

JAMM · Post by **JAMM** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:01 pm

the discussion was 90% about the price and not the quality because it is a nice synth.

mexique1 · Post by **mexique1** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:02 pm

quality has a price

genshi · Post by **genshi** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:32 pm

mexique1 wrote:quality has a price

Yes, I think the initial problem with the release of Operator was, it looked so simple so people didn't think it was worth the $149 price tag. But after seeing the NAMM video of Robert and diving into Operator myself (actually programming sounds, not just going through the
presets) this is an amazingly powerful synth with the added benefit of ease of use, making it, IMHO, WELL worth the $149 price. I now own it!

The naysayers need to really get in there and start tweaking the sounds to see. And just a bit of background of my synth experince; I own 13 hardware synths and samplers ranging from Clavia to Roland(s) to Waldorf to Akai to Ensoniq(s) [I started on a Sequential Circuits Prophet 600 when they were first released; the first MIDI synth!], and on the soft synth side I've played with Reaktor and Absynth and of course, Reason, but to be able to get such great sounds so easily out of the Operator I think justifies the price... after all, it's all about stream-lining your workflow and that's EXACTLY what Operator is all about!

AdamJay · Post by **AdamJay** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:40 pm

Good point Genshi...

just like Ableton Live, the beauty of Ableton Operator is its simplicity. and perhaps folks are having a difficult time translating their appreciation for a simple program like Live to a simple synth like Operator. Or they're just turned off by seemingly simple things. To me Live 4 is simplistic, yet very intuitive. You can get very deep into the program with complex routings, follow actions, clip envelopes, etc. So to merely use it it is very simple, but it doesn't stop there. It can get as complex as you want it to. and all these concepts are in Operator as well.

you can do an entire track with Operator. It can generate all your drum sounds, synth sounds, bass sounds. pretty much anything but a human voice. Whats to hate about that???? The fact that it takes a little more effort than sampling drum/synth/bass sounds? well then who's really "producing" and who isn't? ooooooh... riddle!!

braj · Post by **braj** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 10:54 pm

I think you guys are overestimating Operator personally. For the money, I'd want to at least be able to use it in other apps. What happens if a new revolutionary application comes along and you can no longer use Operator in your new DAW? That would be a pain. And there are plenty of freeware plugs (at least in Windows) that sounds as good or better. How many here have tried Crystal? It's frickin' FREE. At least don't buy Operatror until you check out the alternatives, you may be surprised. I see a lot of posters that love Operator saying 'I'm no synth guru' which leads me to think most that are really impressed aren't that exposed to what other plugs are available. And don't say it's more integrated, because I don't see how it's any easier to deal with than any other VST.

I think the tutorial is great, and that is definitely a +, but if you read the manuals for most other plugs, I think you'd find them just as easy in many cases.

Buy it if you like it, more power to you. But the extremes of criticism and evangelism just seem whack to me. It's a decent synth that costs a bit more than it should and can only be used in Live. It's not that special.

leisuremuffin · Post by **leisuremuffin** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:22 pm

crystal has way too many pages for my taste.

operator, like live itself, is simple, elegant, and powerfull.

hoffman2k · Post by **hoffman2k** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:27 pm

braj wrote:I think you guys are overestimating Operator personally. For the money, I'd want to at least be able to use it in other apps. What happens if a new revolutionary application comes along and you can no longer use Operator in your new DAW? That would be a pain. And there are plenty of freeware plugs (at least in Windows) that sounds as good or better. How many here have tried Crystal? It's frickin' FREE. At least don't buy Operatror until you check out the alternatives, you may be surprised. I see a lot of posters that love Operator saying 'I'm no synth guru' which leads me to think most that are really impressed aren't that exposed to what other plugs are available. And don't say it's more integrated, because I don't see how it's any easier to deal with than any other VST.

I think the tutorial is great, and that is definitely a +, but if you read the manuals for most other plugs, I think you'd find them just as easy in many cases.

Buy it if you like it, more power to you. But the extremes of criticism and evangelism just seem whack to me. It's a decent synth that costs a bit more than it should and can only be used in Live. It's not that special.

If that revolutionary app your talking about doesn't have rewire. It's as bloody useless as a fully integrated synth like the operator. You would have to sell Live to not be able to use it in another app.

genshi · Post by **genshi** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:37 pm

braj wrote:I think you guys are overestimating Operator personally.
For the money, I'd want to at least be able to use it in other apps.
What happens if a new revolutionary application comes along and you can no longer use Operator in your new DAW? That would be a pain. And there are plenty of freeware plugs (at least in Windows) that sounds as good or better. How many here have tried Crystal? It's frickin' FREE. At least don't buy Operatror until you check out the alternatives, you may be surprised. I see a lot of posters that love Operator saying 'I'm no synth guru' which leads me to think most that are really impressed aren't that exposed to what other plugs are available. And don't say it's more integrated, because I don't see how it's any easier to deal with than any other VST.

I think the tutorial is great, and that is definitely a +, but if you read the manuals for most other plugs, I think you'd find them just as easy in many cases.

Buy it if you like it, more power to you. But the extremes of criticism and evangelism just seem whack to me. It's a decent synth that costs a bit more than it should and can only be used in Live. It's not that special.

And if you read my post, I AM a synth guru. And I have tried Crystal and it sounds pretty nice, but not as elegant, simple to use while still having great sound like Operator (and Crystal or any other VST is not as tightly intergrated into Live which IS my main app at the moment, so...). I think YOU, braj, are under-estimating Operator. Why would you say someone is over estimating it?

My point is, if some revolutionary application comes along as you say, and in this case, it was Live, and something like Operator stream-lines your workflow while still sounding good, then yes, it IS worth every penny. Do you understand that?

I have MANY VSTs and they are almost ALL a pain in the ass to use when I have an instant bit of inspiration that I just want to get down real quick; and having Operator intergrated into Live is PERFECT for that! Now if you use another app, then of course Operator wouldn't be the answer, but whatever your chosen app is, I'm sure it has some sort of synth you can only use in that app (say for example, Logic 7 and its new Sculpture synth, and Ultrabeat, etc.)

My bottom line is, I'm not trying to evangelisize Operator, just for me, with all of my years of using hardware synths and the last few years of using soft synths, diving into Operator allowed me to work way more quickly, creatively and efficiently while still sounding great thanks to the WAY it is intergrated in Live 4 and how SIMPLE it is to program powerful sounds, so why wouldn't I have bought it!?

conny · Post by **conny** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:51 pm

AdamJay: "pretty much anything but a human voice" - yea, that's what I am waiting for, apowerful voice/speach synthesizing monster - but then OK, I am a neard in that respect.

And I think, regardless of much else, that's its a great thing that Live users may interchange Live sets, now complete with a synth sound engine like Operator.

// C

braj · Post by **braj** » Fri Jan 28, 2005 12:02 am

genshi wrote: And if you read my post, I AM a synth guru

Good for you!

My bottom line is, I'm not trying to evangelisize Operator, just for me, with all of my years of using hardware synths and the last few years of using soft synths, diving into Operator allowed me to work way more quickly, creatively and efficiently while still sounding great thanks to the WAY it is intergrated in Live 4 and how SIMPLE it is to program powerful sounds, so why wouldn't I have bought it!?

THat's valid, I wasn't really referring to you. If you think it was worth the money, good for you.

braj · Post by **braj** » Fri Jan 28, 2005 12:08 am

hoffman2k wrote:
If that revolutionary app your talking about doesn't have rewire. It's as bloody useless as a fully integrated synth like the operator. You would have to sell Live to not be able to use it in another app.

And you should fire up Live as a Rewire slave just to use Operator? That's a waste, especially since Live itself will be using quite a bit of system resources. What it you want to use something else as a slave, like Reason3? You'll be out of luck since you have this huge wrapper called Live4 running.

I can't see why you don't just agree that it would have been better to also have a VSTi version. You're defending a bad decicion IMO. That's my only reason for objecting to the price. If it was cross-DAW compatable, I would care less. I would then at least entertain the possibility of buying it.

genshi · Post by **genshi** » Fri Jan 28, 2005 12:10 am

braj wrote:
THat's valid, I wasn't really referring to you. If you think it was worth the money, good for you.

I do agree with you that if someone doesn't have the money and they are new to synths, then they should definitely checkout the free or donationware VST stuff first. I personally love the SmartElectonix stuff and the MDA synths. And as for value for money, Pluggo3 is hard to beat (and what I was using the most).

...but yes, for me, there is just something about Operator that makes me smile!