Has anyone gone for the monthly subscribtion? If so is it worth it?
I mean Slate is 15$ a month, and I’m not sure Plugin Alliance is any better. And if you go for both it’s 40$ monthly or 480$ yearly.
Not something I would go for but I have all the PA plug-ins I want.
1 Like
I am contemplating it… As a “heavy hitter” I get a $15 pr. month deal with them. I own all of the Slate plugins I want (consoles, tape, pres and the ML-1 mic). I don’t really like the idea of a subscription, but PA keeps coming out with ones that I like (Iron, Shadow Hills and Focusrite being the last few examples), so I might go with it even though I’m not even making $15 pr. month with my music 
2 Likes
@Hakon what are your thoughts on the Focusrite? I not had a chance to demo it yet. It should be a good one for Test Kitchen @Danny
1 Like
I’m personally not a fan of the subscription model. A large amount of companies seem to be going that direction, predominantly because it is more advantageous for the seller than the buyer. There are some buyers(heavy users) that it might be more cost effective for, but this is a small portion of the market compared to those who would benefit more from just purchasing and owning.
This is substantially more true if you consider that some companies like Waves will allow you to sell your license to others. If you no longer have a need for a certain plugin, you can make some money back selling a product you own. With a subscription model, you pay and pay and have nothing to show for it if you cancel.
3 Likes
I get you guys and thanks for the input. Love the enthusiasm on this forum.
After giving it some thought I think you get a lot of value for money. There’s an offer now of $20 monthly for all plugins. If you convert that to buying a plugin for $250 it’s the same price as the entire bundle for a year.
which equals 5 plugins in 5 years while the other option is to have all those plugins from day one. The downside offcourse that you never get to own the plugins, but on the other side you don’t need to buy a new version once the 5 years old gets outdated. And you also get way more plugins to choose from straight away.
Personally I’d love the rent-to-own option as they do at splice.com.
2 Likes
Btw which PA plugins would you guys reccomend? Why and how do you normally use it?
A very valid reason to use a subscription. The other things to ask yourself in the equation are:
- Will I use it enough to justify owning it long term?
- Can I wait until I can buy it on a sale?
- How many of the plugins on the subscription will I actually use?
I purchased the month-to-month subscription to the EastWest library because it was a good way for me to experiment with all the products. I didn’t want to sink the cash into owning a product I wasn’t confident I’d use frequently or prefer to other VI suppliers.
1 Like
never heard of the EastWest library. Will check it out, and yes I fully agree on your take on things😊
@Paul just bit the bullet on the PA subscription - I really don’t like subscription models, and can’t really justify it (thinking about income vs. expenditure re. music gear), but it was too good to pass on for $15 pr. month - I would have spent more each year for a single plug from them. I haven’t demoed the Focusrite properly yet but will report back
I won’t do it because I own pretty much ALL of the PA gear So for me it doesn’t make sense. But other than Slate and a few others PA is a goto for me for a variety of Plugins:
-Iron (Mix and Mastering)
-Subsynth (for Low End)
-Focusrite, SSL E and G Consoles (Mastering)
-The Lindell Audio stuff (Love the 345-E) (Mastering)
-ALL of the Elysia Stuff (especially Karakter and Alpha Compressor) (Mixing and Mastering)
-Unfiltered Audio (for creative work on tracks)
-Vertigo (great for drums and other attack-y, crunch-y things)
-Maag Eq4 - for Air
-Black Box HG2 (LOVE this saturator. I use it all over the place)
-SPL Vitalizer MK2T (Great enhancer in mix and mastering)
1 Like
I also wanted to add that we are testing quite a few of the Plugin Alliance “favorites” in Test Kitchen right now!