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Which is Your goto VI for analog synth sounds?

Dual 4 Oscillator instances of ZebraHZ.

I own a few vintage beasts and instead of dragging them around for gigs I use ZebraHZ.

You need to drive the filters and I prefer hardware FX.
But my dogs will hunt.

As for Omnisphere it does digital synths really well.
The D50 presets in the Hardware upgrade made me laugh they were so good.
But its filters and EGs dont compare to ZebraHZ for snappy fat bastards.

If u-He made a hardware 6 Oscillator version of Zebra they could finally retire and free our brotha’ Howard from the Castle Dungeon.
 
Dual 4 Oscillator instances of ZebraHZ.

I own a few vintage beasts and instead of dragging them around for gigs I use ZebraHZ.

You need to drive the filters and I prefer hardware FX.
But my dogs will hunt.

As for Omnisphere it does digital synths really well.
The D50 presets in the Hardware upgrade made me laugh they were so good.
But its filters and EGs dont compare to ZebraHZ for snappy fat bastards.

If u-He made a hardware 6 Oscillator version of Zebra they could finally retire and free our brotha’ Howard from the Castle Dungeon.


I am by no means more than a preset and tweak presets of various synths user but I played w/ some very serious synth players back in the day
(they worked with Herbie,Bowie,Laswell, Michael Jackson etc.......) there’s something about what U-he puts out that routinely captures the hardware that most soft-synths imo don’t quite capture.
For me U-he is simply amazing from the products to the way they operate,
their transparency w/ customers is as good as it gets.
And yes the Genius aka Howard is a total freak of nature,for me he’s a bigger part of the U-he magic than most people understand.I’d venture to guess he’s part of the design team well beyond the presets.
Like Prince he’s so uniquely talented he only needs to go by his 1st name.
I’d also guess HZ would agree,lol

I confess I’m a U-he fanboy and if I could ever meet Howard I’d shake his hand ,give him a hug and buy him a drink! 😍
 
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I can get good sounds in the box with most softies but the big difference for me is how do they sound on powered cabinets, without native fx.

ZebraHZ holds it’s electricity and doesn‘t dissipate like so many other ones and zeros do.
I’ll post a snippet of a live vid in December as the group is getting a production company to record and sync it with a Midas Console.

Theres many scenes where Im using a discrete audio SE-02, Omnisphere and ZebraHZ in a multi zone configuration.
As I‘ve said Omnisphere does the D50 better than the D50.
Its doing a tweaked version of the Heaven preset in the upper zone, lower Zone is the SE-02 doing a Tom Sawyer sound with a layer of ZebraHZ using a timed Filter Sweep that climaxes at the end of the 8 bar section.

ZebraHZ sounds exactly like an old ARP2600S with it’s sizzling balls on accurate Envelopes.
When mixed with a real Analog synth you can’t even tell it’s a soft synth.
People actually comment on the sound thinking it’s another racked analog.

Diva actually can do that too but doesn’t have the extra drive the XMF Filters combine with KeyTracking. If it did I would have got Diva, but that 4th Oscillator on Zebra makes the difference.
 
Can Serum do warm-ish sounds? It seems to be used for harsher stuff...

Initially, Serum is very cold and sterile. That's its purpose. The purest and highest definition - no analog emulation (as opposed to U-he).

But what is "analog emulation", if not EQ, harmonic distortion, wavetable modulation, and non-linearities of pitch and volume?

If you spend some time EQing, using harmonics exciters, warping wavetables, adding random pitch movement with the chaos knob and what not... You can make Serum sound like anything.

Here's an example of pretty "organic" sound I made 100% in Serum.

 
U-He Hive 2 can be pure wavetable, without analog emulation. Or you can use an oscillator and a wave. Or two oscillators. Very flexible.

After comparing Serum, Spire, Dune 3, and Hive 2, I chose Hive 2. All of those are great synths, that's for sure. Hive 2 and Dune 3 were the most flexible, and I had a hard time choosing between them. If all I did was in some specific genres, I'd have chosen between Serum and Spire, instead.
 
I can get good sounds in the box with most softies but the big difference for me is how do they sound on powered cabinets, without native fx.

ZebraHZ holds it’s electricity and doesn‘t dissipate like so many other ones and zeros do.
I’ll post a snippet of a live vid in December as the group is getting a production company to record and sync it with a Midas Console.

Theres many scenes where Im using a discrete audio SE-02, Omnisphere and ZebraHZ in a multi zone configuration.
As I‘ve said Omnisphere does the D50 better than the D50.
Its doing a tweaked version of the Heaven preset in the upper zone, lower Zone is the SE-02 doing a Tom Sawyer sound with a layer of ZebraHZ using a timed Filter Sweep that climaxes at the end of the 8 bar section.

ZebraHZ sounds exactly like an old ARP2600S with it’s sizzling balls on accurate Envelopes.
When mixed with a real Analog synth you can’t even tell it’s a soft synth.
People actually comment on the sound thinking it’s another racked analog.

Diva actually can do that too but doesn’t have the extra drive the XMF Filters combine with KeyTracking. If it did I would have got Diva, but that 4th Oscillator on Zebra makes the difference.

what filter model you use replace Arp2600S? more than likely Zebra is my next softsynth anyway. after this softube modular. and after these with current synths i mainly need then samples i think and learning synth progrmaming even more.
 
what filter model you use replace Arp2600S? more than likely Zebra is my next softsynth anyway. after this softube modular. and after these with current synths i mainly need then samples i think and learning synth progrmaming even more.

Its a combination of XMF and ZebraHZ Filters.
Zebra2 and ZebraHZ have really precise digital oscillators.
To get them to really get bigger like Diva’s Oscillators you saturate the sound using XMF Filter Drive. I tried used Distortion FX and it’s nasty digital crap IMHO.
So get the big analog type sound inside the 4 OSC + XMF Heirarchy, then run that fat shit through the Diva Filters.

John Graham is correct that Diva as is is the best analog u-He offers.
However, ZebraHZ is equal is terms of powerful analog quality, and IMHO better because of the 4 Oscillators.

You have to spend time getting the right sound so yes it means sitting down and rolling up your sleeves.
Diva gets you there on the first preset.
Actually the 2600S sound I referred to was inspired by the Diva preset called “beauty” IIRC.
I was just about to buy Diva and instead went with HZ.
To get the sound I use with ZebraHZ it would require a dual instance of Diva that would double the Oscillator count.
 
u-he's Diva is by far the best I have. Miles better even than their excellent ZebraHZ; Diva crushes it. I never would have believed you could get rich synth sound like that from a computer.

Hey John have you tried Repro by U-He?

Urs has stated in forums a couple of times that the modeling is even better than the one in Diva.

Here's a video comparing it to the real thing:

 
I wouldn’t start with Diva or Zebra necessarily if trying to learn synth programming. You can, but that’s diving in the deep end.

My first recommendation would be: buy a physical analog synth with as many 1:1 controls as possible. Behringer Model D or the Roland SE-02, etc. etc. if you don't already have one.

When making music (I don't really do orchestral but aspire to), when I think "I want a synth sound", the first one I turn to is Hive 2, unless I have a specific type of synth sound in mind (e.g., Moog, Prophet, Juno, etc). I probably use Repro more than Diva, but I don't own Zebra. I'm not deep into programming, but starting with more straightforward synths and hardware has made it easier for me to understand a given preset and more easily modify it to achieve what I want.

For soft synths, my second recommendation would be to start with either U-He Repro or Synapse Audio the Legend. Or both. Though starting with Hive 2 wouldn't be bad either, because it scales pretty well and is so easy to add LFOs etc. with drag and drop.

But maybe you're already beyond starting with more straightforward synths, in which case Diva (Hive 2? 😁 ) would be another step toward Zebra.
 
Hey John have you tried Repro by U-He?

Urs has stated in forums a couple of times that the modeling is even better than the one in Diva.

Here's a video comparing it to the real thing:



I have Repro too, but I've been mostly on a large-scale project for this year that has been acoustic / orchestral, so have hardly touched the synths for a little while.

I'll spend more time exploring Repro -- thanks for the tip.
 
Hey John have you tried Repro by U-He?

Urs has stated in forums a couple of times that the modeling is even better than the one in Diva.

Here's a video comparing it to the real thing:


I'm huge fan of Repro. Here's the thing now though... you can buy Behinringers actual analog pro-1 for $350!!! I kind of want one of these haha.
 
well, that may sound unpopular but I often end up using ReFx Nexux 2 with expansions, which fits the mix like just a few others to me. Such a plug-and-mix beast.

Sometimes I also use Arturia Collection, U-He Repro, Tal-Uno-LX. Synthmagic stuff also gets into for more ambient'ish electronica
 
u-he's Diva is by far the best I have. Miles better even than their excellent ZebraHZ; Diva crushes it. I never would have believed you could get rich synth sound like that from a computer.

I do love Diva, but I may have to respectfully (emphasis on the respectfully) disagree that it's better than Zebra or even ZebraHZ. I think both kind of have their own thing that they do well.

Diva is pretty classic when it comes to oscillators and types of modulation it can do. It's got LFO's and a couple different flavors of ADSR envelopes. Classic. (There's a lot of other stuff it can do I'm glossing over too, I realize).

ZebraHZ has got a lot more options for modulation between the 4 X/Y pads and the MSEG stuff. I haven't set this up on TouchOSC on my ipad yet, but I plan to this weekend. The arpeggiator in Zebra is more advanced than Diva's as well. It's got more different oscillator shapes to choose from too, I'm pretty sure. Edit: Debateable. I missed the digital OSC section of Diva.

I will say, I think Diva comes with the better factory presets, but there are some GREAT 3rd party sounds for both HZ and Diva. I actually just did a demo for Heartwood Soundware's new HZ patches, and there are some great patches he's got in there. Super useful for action/tension kind of stuff. I don't think he's as well known as a guy like The Unfinished is, but his sounds are just as good (though they fulfill a different purpose for me). They're also a really solid bargain.

Anyhow, I love all of the u-he stuff. HZ is a little more complex to program from scratch I think than Diva or Repro is, but they're all great synths capable of some great sounds.

Love the tracks, by the way John. The Kingsglaive stuff is top notch.
 
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I do love Diva, but I may have to respectfully (emphasis on the respectfully) disagree that it's better than Zebra or even ZebraHZ.

Fair enough; I have 50-100 ZebraHZ instances in my basic template, and only a handful of Diva, so maybe I'm "voting with my feet" in agreement with you?

And thanks for the kind words, Steve.
 
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