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Most Disappointing Library Purchase?

Albion One. A lot of hoopla and I barely use it.

That's another, though I do use a couple patches from it from time to time (legato woodwinds and spic/stac patches). Overall, I was fine with Legacy...still am. Seemed like a blatant repackaging imo.

I honestly don't want to badmouth SF too much here, as I do love a few of their libraries.
 
8dio‘s Rythmic Revolution. Watched the Walkthrough Video about this „so inspiring“ instrument and -bam- done again. Played around with it for 2 hours and never found a way to use it in a track. Inspiration is the one thing but IMO a tool is useless if You just don’t get it fit into any given musical environment.
Anyone out there who could ever use RR for anything meaningful?
 
Embertone Solo Strings Bundle. I think they are nice sounding instruments with great features. But what causes me not to use them right now is the fact that the Interface is just not intuitive and clear-cut enough and I have not been able to make it work with ArtzID.

I remember they wrote somewhere that they wanted to streamline the Interface and make it more consistent between the instruments but so far that has not happened. Since I also have the original Spitfire Solo Strings I am eligible for the upgrade. If they can deliver on the legato patches (knock on wood) this might be the ticket for me then. The Spitfire GUI makes so much more sense and is fairly consistent throughout their products. My only gripe is that in some spots the typography is way too small for my eyes.
 
What about making this thread a positive one? Anyone who is able to sell his most disappointing purchases should announce them in the classified thread. Maybe we'll help each other to get what we want from someone who's unhappy with the same product.
 
When one switches from orchestral to hip hop... well, there's a lot of money left on the table... the point being, ad nauseam, it's a damn shame we can't cash out a portion of old investments into new ones
 
Albion 2. If SA allowed resale, that would be gone yesterday. Also Sonixinema Hybrid Scoring Strings. None of the sounds do much for me in a useful way. Lackluster bass and guitar tones, no real orchestral string sounds to be had other than weird scrapes with the bow etc. Most of the "variety" extra patches just appear to be the same instruments run through overdrive plugins instead of any real sound design. But at least it was cheap unlike Loegria.
 
It's not 2017 but very recently:
Light & Sound Concert Grand...

Very nice tone and character... that's why it was almost an instant purchase.
But once I started to dive in, I found out more than acceptable number of keys are with distortions @ high key velocities (ringing noise that is too loud that makes the overall tone sound like a prepared piano). It would have been more acceptable if it was consistent, but neither samples @ lower velocities nor the neighboring keys @ high velocities show similar distortion.

I wrote to L&S, and got a reply saying they realized what I observed during post-production, but told me that I should accept as part of its character. That's means there won't be any bug fix.

Bought Synchron CFX right after. It might be slightly more "clinical" in comparison, but the quality, consistency, and versatility of Synchron CFX is surely leagues above.
 
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It's not 2017 but very recently:
Light & Sound Concert Grand...

Very nice tone and character... that's why it was almost an instance purchase.
But once I started to dive in, I found out more than acceptable number of keys are with distortions @ high key velocities (ringing noise that is too loud that makes the overall tone sound like a prepared piano). It would have been more acceptable if it was consistent, but neither samples @ lower velocities nor the neighboring keys @ high velocities show similar distortion.

I wrote to L&S, and got a reply saying they realized what I observed during post-production, and told me that I should accept as part of its character. That's means there won't be any bug fix.

Bought Synchron CFX right after. It might be slightly more "clinical" in comparison, but the quality, consistency, and versatility of Synchron CFX is surely leagues above.

This.
 
It's not 2017 but very recently:
Light & Sound Concert Grand...

Very nice tone and character... that's why it was almost an instance purchase.
But once I started to dive in, I found out more than acceptable number of keys are with distortions @ high key velocities (ringing noise that is too loud that makes the overall tone sound like a prepared piano). It would have been more acceptable if it was consistent, but neither samples @ lower velocities nor the neighboring keys @ high velocities show similar distortion.

I wrote to L&S, and got a reply saying they realized what I observed during post-production, and told me that I should accept as part of its character. That's means there won't be any bug fix.

Bought Synchron CFX right after. It might be slightly more "clinical" in comparison, but the quality, consistency, and versatility of Synchron CFX is surely leagues above.

That sucks man!
 
Met Ark 1...this is more something to get really big really quick (the Viagra of libraries WHEEE!). But I already had EW Symphonic Choirs Platinum, Strezov Storm Choir, Requiem Light, EW Hollywoods (which can be made to sound at least as big with engineering patience), and Iceni. That said, I would have been nuts over this library had I purchased it before anything else. Would be nice to resell. Nothing against the library (it's freaking excellent, people), I simply already have the tools I need for what it does. A waste of tax return (not to mention the time I labored with the manual and videos), it's more a toy than a tool, and I rarely have time to play with it.

HA!
 
It's not 2017 but very recently:
Light & Sound Concert Grand...

Very nice tone and character... that's why it was almost an instant purchase.
But once I started to dive in, I found out more than acceptable number of keys are with distortions @ high key velocities (ringing noise that is too loud that makes the overall tone sound like a prepared piano). It would have been more acceptable if it was consistent, but neither samples @ lower velocities nor the neighboring keys @ high velocities show similar distortion.

I wrote to L&S, and got a reply saying they realized what I observed during post-production, but told me that I should accept as part of its character. That's means there won't be any bug fix.

Bought Synchron CFX right after. It might be slightly more "clinical" in comparison, but the quality, consistency, and versatility of Synchron CFX is surely leagues above.

If the patch is not locked, I assume you can remove offending velocity layers and stretch the nearest velocity (or borrow the neighboring keys) to at the least massage the issue.
 
It's not 2017 but very recently:
Light & Sound Concert Grand...

Very nice tone and character... that's why it was almost an instant purchase.
But once I started to dive in, I found out more than acceptable number of keys are with distortions @ high key velocities (ringing noise that is too loud that makes the overall tone sound like a prepared piano). It would have been more acceptable if it was consistent, but neither samples @ lower velocities nor the neighboring keys @ high velocities show similar distortion.

I wrote to L&S, and got a reply saying they realized what I observed during post-production, but told me that I should accept as part of its character. That's means there won't be any bug fix.

Bought Synchron CFX right after. It might be slightly more "clinical" in comparison, but the quality, consistency, and versatility of Synchron CFX is surely leagues above.

What a shite response.
 
SA LCO is my hammer I'm still trying to find a nail for. Tried using it for screwing but it doesn't fit. Tried using it for sawing but it doesn't sound right there either. Every time I think I have the perfect project for it it just doesn't sound any good and gets jettisoned after 30 minutes of trying to force it to be something it's not. I'm sure it will sound great for what it's perfect sound is supposed to be, but I'm not sure I know what that actually is anymore. Could just be my mixing, but I can't get this working with anything else except as a (very expensive) 'weird note' motif tool. I'm really, really hoping I'll crack the enigmatic, mystery of this one one day and it'll work for what I need. In the meantime it's on the tool shelf gathering dust next to Masse. Still pretty grateful these are both Kontakt instruments. Great design and usability from Spitfire one way or another. If someone were to offer me my money back but keep them in Play I'd tell them where to go. This is one of many things Spitfire have got right.

Regarding the Albion One complaints, I do find I use it less nowadays, but it's still the best patching tool out there (way better than Masse imo). Weirdly I had some fast legato string runs in a score a couple of years ago that I wrote with AO that I found impossible to replicate and beat with a full divisi on top using the higher end libs. Ended up keeping it in there because it just worked out of the box....which begs an interesting question I might spin up a new thread for :0)
 
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SA LCO is my hammer I'm still trying to find a nail for. Tried using it for screwing but it doesn't fit. Tried using it for sawing but it doesn't sound right there either. Every time I think I have the perfect project for it it just doesn't sound any good and gets jettisoned after 30 minutes of trying to force it to be something it's not. I'm sure it will sound great for what it's perfect sound is supposed to be, but I'm not sure I know what that actually is anymore. Could just be my mixing, but I can't get this working with anything else except as a (very expensive) 'weird note' motif tool. I'm really, really hoping I'll crack the enigmatic, mystery of this one one day and it'll work for what I need. In the meantime it's on the tool shelf gathering dust next to Masse.

One takes that risk whenever buying a niche library.

I wish I'd gotten a straight answer about Met Ark 1 and its not being necessary when one has certain other libraries (and some good engineering knowledge). Seven hundred US I wish I could have demo'd first...but I wish more there'd been a resale option.
 
Met Ark 1...this is more something to get really big really quick (the Viagra of libraries WHEEE!). But I already had EW Symphonic Choirs Platinum, Strezov Storm Choir, Requiem Light, EW Hollywoods (which can be made to sound at least as big with engineering patience)
I'd have thought Wagner would prefer the instant "Wheee!" though.
 
If the patch is not locked, I assume you can remove offending velocity layers and stretch the nearest velocity (or borrow the neighboring keys) to at the least massage the issue.

Thanks for the suggestion! It is not locked. Some keys have as few as 5 velocity layers. Probably it's better to borrow from the neighboring keys, but often the number of velocity layers are not the same. So it's not as straightforward but certainly worth a try.
 
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