# What is the Native Instruments RC 48 emulating ?



## nuyo (Oct 13, 2020)

I don't know much about anlog gear. What is the original hardware behind the RC 48, RC 24 and I believe the Lexicon 224 ?


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## Bear Market (Oct 13, 2020)

RC48 is an emulation of the Lexicon 480L.


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## davidson (Oct 13, 2020)

I'm surprised how little love the RC48 and 24 get, they're brilliant plugs.


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## nuyo (Oct 13, 2020)

Bear Market said:


> RC48 is an emulation of the Lexicon 480L.



Thank you. Are there any other great sounding emulations ?


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## nuyo (Oct 13, 2020)

davidson said:


> I'm surprised how little love the RC48 and 24 get, they're brilliant plugs.



It's crazy. Everybody has it (Komplete) but nobody uses it. It's heavy on the CPU so I wouldn't use during heavy sound design, but for mixing it's fantastic. Always sits perfect and adds the right amount of reverb.


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## Bear Market (Oct 13, 2020)

nuyo said:


> Thank you. Are there any other great sounding emulations ?



The ones from UA and Relab are probably the largest contenders.


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## wst3 (Oct 14, 2020)

I really like both the UA and Relab 480 emulations. I use the UA because, well, because I had it already. They are different, but really good.

I've tried the RC-48, it is a very nice reverb! I don't think it is as close in terms of emulation, but it still sounds great!


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## nuyo (Oct 14, 2020)

wst3 said:


> I've tried the RC-48, it is a very nice reverb! I don't think it is as close in terms of emulation, but it still sounds great!



For me it doesn't have to sound close to anything anyway. If it sounds great it sounds great. ^^


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## Philip Vasta (Oct 14, 2020)

davidson said:


> I'm surprised how little love the RC48 and 24 get, they're brilliant plugs.



Yeah I agree completely. They give you a nice amount of control over the sound without being overwhelming. I can almost always get a sound that I like from them.


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## wst3 (Oct 15, 2020)

nuyo said:


> For me it doesn't have to sound close to anything anyway. If it sounds great it sounds great. ^^


Yup! That's the ticket!!


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## lettucehat (Oct 21, 2020)

Personally I was really taking to both of them, but then I read some explanation (probably here on VI-C) that they weren't processing in true stereo like the hardware, or something like that, and while I didn't totally understand it it turned me off. I mostly use Spaces anyway. But I do like these and perhaps wish someone would tell me why they're actually still awesome. I know people love to add a bit of algo reverb on top of convolution or room-heavy samples to bring elements together, and these seem to fit the bill perfectly. I don't have any of the other big name algos, like Lexicon, Valhalla, Relab, Aether, etc. and I'd rather not buy them.


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## Bluemount Score (Oct 21, 2020)

davidson said:


> I'm surprised how little love the RC48 and 24 get, they're brilliant plugs.


I used them as my starter reverbs as I didn't had any other great reverb options, however found them and their parameters pretty confusing to use at first. Might have to check them out again.


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## nuyo (Oct 22, 2020)

Bluemount Score said:


> I used them as my starter reverbs as I didn't had any other great reverb options, however found them and their parameters pretty confusing to use at first. Might have to check them out again.



I never touch the parameters. Only Pre delay, size and high low cut.
The presets get you pretty far. At least with orchestral and world instruments.
The Large Hall and Echoes just sound real without any additional tweaking.


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## Bluemount Score (Oct 22, 2020)

nuyo said:


> I never touch the parameters. Only Pre delay, size and high low cut.
> The presets get you pretty far. At least with orchestral and world instruments.
> The Large Hall and Echoes just sound real without any additional tweaking.


Fair enough. I neither understand all parameters of Valhalla Room, which I currently switched to as my standard reverb. So it's probably more about the basic feeling I have to fully understand why exactly something that I apply on my music does what it does..


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## nuyo (Oct 22, 2020)

Bluemount Score said:


> Fair enough. I neither understand all parameters of Valhalla Room, which I currently switched to as my standard reverb. So it's probably more about the basic feeling I have to fully understand why exactly something that I apply on my music does what it does..



Valhalla is the only company I can actually recognize by only hearing the reverb tail.
At least I believe that. ^^


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## Vin (Oct 24, 2020)

RC48 is ok if you don't care about it sounding like the real 480L - which it doesn't. For a precise emulation you'd need to get Relab's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNDQzFTPcj8 (LX480).


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