Ableton Forum

Post what you think are the top 10 soft synth and effects of 2008 and if they are released in 2009 also.

if you cnt make a top 10 list make as many as you want.

Top10? Do you buy more than 10 VSTs a year to select a top ten?

In my overall VST list you'll find sylenth as well as the arturia minimoog which I love both, but there are (of course) more I like and I cannot tell whether some VST is really better than another, some have a clearly superior usability or lower CPU load (sylenth!), but I find it hard to compare them totally.

1. Omnisphere
2. Massive
3. Sylenth1

don't much use any fx ;\

#1 thru #5: Stylus RMX ver. 1.7 When ver 1.8 comes out it'll fill the top six spots. Specially with Ableton Live 8, I'll be able to automate everything in the freakin' proggy. It'll either be brilliant or I'll go frackin' mad.

#6 KT Granulator on a buss, adds a little spice to any mellow riff.
#7 Kore Playa for that thing you can drag around and mess things up good.
#8 Reaktor because a bunch of people alot smarter than me make a bunch of stuff for it.
#9 Massive because I won it in a raffle last time NI came around hawking their wares.
#10 All six IK plugs I bought last year just cuz they suckered me into the buy-one get-one-free madness.

Reaktor has been around for years. It gets updated to bring in more revenue every 12-18 months but that doesn't make the concept new.
Massive was released November 2006.
Stylus RMX has been around forever.
IK plugs, excepting Amplitube Jimi Hendrix (released 2007) have been around donkey's years.

There has been precious little innovative new stuff recently. Omnisphere and Alchemy are a couple of examples of synths released this year which are promising.

leedsquietman wrote:There has been precious little innovative new stuff recently.

Glad you said that... read the topic title and was like "oops did I miss a complete year of new amazing VSTs?!?"

leedsquietman wrote:Reaktor has been around for years. It gets updated to bring in more revenue every 12-18 months but that doesn't make the concept new.
Massive was released November 2006.
Stylus RMX has been around forever.
IK plugs, excepting Amplitube Jimi Hendrix (released 2007) have been around donkey's years.

There has been precious little innovative new stuff recently. Omnisphere and Alchemy are a couple of examples of synths released this year which are promising.

Correction, Reaktor hasn't been updated since ver 5 about four years ago. Nevertheless, I interpreted it to mean synths that were new to the user.

fwiw- Stylus RMX with Time Designer and Chaos Designer is a completely different beast than the Stylus that has been around "forever". If those two features, specially when used together, aren't innovative then I don't know what is. In fact, Ableton is going to incorporate groove variation technology into it's flagship Live 8 with it's much-touted new groove engine. Stylus RMX has been doing that forever.

Of course, the real mother of invention is gonna be DNA when/if it comes out later this year.

Anubis, you have fair points about new features that vastly improve workflow of older products.

I was just literally going by the title. I would like to hear about some new plugins though from 2008-9 which people are finding essential.

leedsquietman wrote:Anubis,
I was just literally going by the title. I would like to hear about some new plugins though from 2008-9 which people are finding essential.

OK then, I change my answer to...
1) SampleTron! It was released in April 2008 but I got it as one of my freebies in January. I don't know about essential but they say Kanye West used it on one of his tracks so it has to be innovative right?

Well I haven't bought 10 vsti's in the last year...but here are the new ones I have.

Synplant
Alchemy
Omnisphere

and I'll be learning these for the rest of the year or 2

Actual new ones, both of which I feel really take VST instruments forward to new levels:
1) Synplant
2) Alchemy

Synplant completely changed the way I think of synthesis and how I interact with the software. Alchemy gave me more power than I know what to do with and managed to pull it off in a way that I could easily and intuitively use.

If I had it available, I might put
3) Live 8 Operator

on that list cause I think the new feature list would make this thing a fucking killer

Overall, my top plugins are:
1)Alchemy
2)Operator
3)Zebra
4)Sylenth
5)Zebra
6)Microtonic
7)Camelphat/Camelspace
8)PSP nitro
9)Uhbiks
10)Ohm Force fxs

ran out of space for my fx but fabfilter volcano 2 and CSR reverbs are up there too, along with little shit like dblue stretch and other misc stuff. OH shit forgot my babies Sampler and lounge lizard. can definitely have too many instruments, but can never have too many fx

Alchemy
Synplant
Omnisphere (Don't own this but I think it's obviously a big deal)
MTron-Pro
Sugar Bytes Effectrix
Stylus 1.7 (1.8 when it gets here will be much better though)
Live 8 Operator

And I can solidly guess that I'll be adding the following, which are soon out, to the above list :
Minimoog V2
ImpOSCar 2
DCAM Synth Squad

Since they don't have to be released in 09
Instruments

Zebra 2
Absynth
Automat
Massive
Symptohm

FX

Speakerphone
Buffer Override
PSP Vintage Warmer
Ohmicide
Spectral Shapers

Sylenth1 and Zebra2 are my two, go to vsti’s, for effects, Camelspace and Camelphat of course!

dab

Omnisphere
Stylus RMX
Sylenth
Kontakt
Korg Legacy Digital
Minimonsta
NI B4
FM8
Truepianos
NI Prophet 5