EXS 24 Logic Sampler Users Group

I just downloaded this free VST Synth earlier today and I just wanted to let 
every one who is interested to check it out! 
http://www.greenoak.com/crystal/usermanual.html

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> I just downloaded this free VST Synth earlier today and I just wanted to let
> every one who is interested to check it out!
> http://www.greenoak.com/crystal/usermanual.html

Thanks. This looks very compelling. -Jer

--------------------
Jer Olsen, CEO
MusicBootCamp.com

"We give musicians the edge!"

http://MusicBootCamp.com/
Phone: 301-962-9509
HELP@...

Paul Martinson wrote:
> 
> I just downloaded this free VST Synth earlier today and I just wanted to let
> every one who is interested to check it out!
> http://www.greenoak.com/crystal/usermanual.html

Thanks Paul. :-)

How does it compare to Emagic's ES2? I'm particularly interested in
features and CPU usage. Obviously the price is WAY better!

> How does it compare to Emagic's ES2? I'm particularly interested in
> features and CPU usage. Obviously the price is WAY better!

This is apples and oranges. The ES2 is in a class by itself. I don't think
it's fair to compare the two. The ES2 is comparable to a $750+ hardware
synth. It's a beast for leads as well as morphing sounds. I can't say it
enough, that's just not a fair comparison. -Jer

--------------------
Jer Olsen, CEO
MusicBootCamp.com

"We give musicians the edge!"

http://MusicBootCamp.com/
Phone: 301-962-9509
HELP@...

--- In exs-users@y..., <HELP@M...> wrote:
> > How does it compare to Emagic's ES2? I'm particularly interested 
in
> > features and CPU usage. Obviously the price is WAY better!
> 
> This is apples and oranges. The ES2 is in a class by itself. I 
don't think
> it's fair to compare the two.

They're both synths, right? I think a comparison would be in order, 
and I'd like to start;

I've been using crystal for a few days now, and for a freeware synth, 
I'm amazed. The editing possibilities are really great - we're 
talking about 6 LFOs assignable to just about anything you could 
think of (and a few things you wouldn't have thought off), 3 voices 
featuring 5 different waveforms, FM and resonant lopass filters. Each 
voice has 2 envelopes (filter and amp), and there's also a mod 
envelope, again assignable to whatever you want. All envelopes are 9 
points, syncable to bpm and loopable!! The most amazing thing is the 
routing possibilities; there's a whole page dedicated to mix the 
voices, including a band splitter and 4 delays.

The downside: primarily the sound. It is a lot thinner than what I've 
heard from the ES2. Something like a 25 year old synth compared to a 
modern one. Still you can do a lot of very interesting things with 
it, but for the fat synth sounds be prepared to do quite a bit of 
fxplugins work.
Apart from that, I can't really seem to make the save preset feature 
work correctly - as it is now, the parameters saves with the song, 
but not if I try to save them to a settings file - that could just be 
me not knowing how to do it properly, though.
Also, it has made my LP5W crash a few times, which is of course 
always annoying, yet somehow expectable behaviour for a freeware 
synth.

I haven't tried to play around with ES2 settings, knowing that I 
probably wont buy it anyway, but those of you who have can make the 
comparison for yourselves. I have tried to play some of the ES2 
presets, though. If you're a synth addict, I wouldn't say crystal 
sounds nearly good enough to be a proper substitute for ES2, but it's 
a nice supplement, and I've made some quite good results with it.

regards

monsdrum

I would say that Crystal is a good thing to add some weird soundscapes to
your mixes while ES2 is more for some "serious" sounds. As monsdrum allready
said, Crystal certainly sounds thinner, but it offers some mad routings of
FX and LFOs. I haven't been able to get a "clean" sound of it though - but
that might as well be a strength rather than a limitation.
Maybe time to sample that thing and do some EXS patches (to bring this a bit
back on topic ;o).

Regards,
Sascha

> I would say that Crystal is a good thing to add some weird soundscapes to
> your mixes while ES2 is more for some "serious" sounds. As monsdrum allready
> said, Crystal certainly sounds thinner, but it offers some mad routings of
> FX and LFOs. I haven't been able to get a "clean" sound of it though - but
> that might as well be a strength rather than a limitation.
> Maybe time to sample that thing and do some EXS patches (to bring this a bit
> back on topic ;o).

OK, perhaps a comparison is valuable after all. My point was really, use
both because they are two different beasts. -Jer

--------------------
Jer Olsen, CEO
MusicBootCamp.com

"We give musicians the edge!"

http://MusicBootCamp.com/
Phone: 301-962-9509
HELP@...

I agree, THE ES2 kicks ASIO!!
;)

I just got mine. The thing for me is that while it doesn't necessarily 
do anything out of the ordinary, the attention to detail and interface 
design are fantastic. This is one well-designed synth, is extremely 
efficient, and sounds phenomenal. It looks great too ( I love the 
rotating filter wheel and the little doors that close on muted 
oscillators... fun. )

On Thursday, May 16, 2002, at 08:42 AM, jddymackbn@... wrote:

> I agree, THE ES2 kicks ASIO!!
> ;)
>
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