Congratulations, Opero. I interested to see what your choices are
Additionally, I am still anxious to learn more about UAD plug-ins in context with sound design and generating/augmenting sonic textures. I have realized that Slate Virtual Mix Rack is a beast for this purpose - and I’m left wondering - what UAD Plug-ins would best perform under extreme sound design duress?
The mission? to produce the highest quality, fattest, most sonically screeching, timbre wrenching, textured and powerful sounds
Wow! Great job on collecting recent UAD sales. We need to make some analysis of it as well
Time to time they’re going to send you $25 and $50 coupons. Coupled with sales - you can get some plugins really cheap. Bundles (like get 6 plugins for xxx dollars) work well for the recently released plugins as they don’t make big discounts on those - recently released expensive ones from UAD are VoxBox, API 2500, SSL 4000…
it’s funny…i can’t tell you how many times that i put the Shadow Hills in the mastering chain…only to take it off…i love the look, the design (especially the 3 flavors of transformers) but it has a flat, 2 dimensional sound that i don’t like…it robs something in the ultra high end…and although i never owned one, i have used the hardware and it does not have that effect. i really think it’s an issue with the coding or maybe not enough internal upsampling…i am not really sure.
And if you have the Slate, Soundtoys, Izotope, Fabfilter bundles, what would you pick if you had 13 plugins to pick from UAD ? 3 isn’t enough for me, because I fund other excelent like VSM 3, Culture vulture, Harrison…
For the moment I have chosen this :
ATR 102
Studer
Fatso
Vari Mu
VSM
Culture Vulture
BAX EQ (mastering)
LA-2A
Vox Box
That’s it for the moment, I’m going to try the Harrison EQ now, Pultec EQ, Fairchild, etc.
The Passive Massive, I unfortunately didn’t get the results, I wasn’t impressed and it’s maybe normal because it’s not like a Harrison
What are the differences between the 1176 from UAD and the 1176 from Slate ? Is it complementary or does the Slate ones do the job ? I didn’t plan to buy the ones from UAD for this 10 plugins bundle but I need to be sure
What about the new Api 2500 vs the Waves one, I compared them with the default setting, there is for me a tiny difference (Waves more plastic), but does it worth to buy the UAD I’m not sure.
I’ve updated my 10 UAD bundle plugins list to buy :
Harrison® 32C / 32C SE Channel EQ
Teletronix® LA-2A Leveler Collection ( I saw a difference between the Waves so I take the UAD)
Thermionic Culture Vulture
Studer® A800 Multichannel Tape Recorder
Vertigo Sound VSM-3 Mix Satellite
dbx® 160 Compressor / Limiter (the Waves one is really not close to the result of the UAD)
You will be able to get it for $40 or something silly like that in one of the many Plugin Alliance sales.
I bought the VSM-3 and never used it, I don’t like the sound, I guess I bought it because I listened to the hype. I know we all like different sounds but I would give it a good demo before buying just to make sure…
I’ve tried it a few days, I would say Trash 2 does the same job, but the VSM has a different sound, more “hardware”, it works differently. I have to test it more, it’s a good idea. If I can find it for $40, for sure I’ll not buy it through UAD, but his price Is $300 now on Plugin Alliance. As I don’t know how does operate Plugin Alliance with their sales, I’m not sure, and if I understand well your sale was in a bundle ?
Black Friday and Christmas sales are the best but I have seen big sales throughout the year.
I bought all my PA stuff during Christmas sales a couple of year ago and the prices were rock bottom, I know they did the same last year but I didn’t buy anything then.
So no bundle, I could pick only one ? If yes I’ll wait, I still have my Trash 2 to add some saturation on the mid range and fat up sounds with Trash, culture vulture and Vytalizer ( I already own vitalyzer, it has a low end boost also). I have to buy Inflator but it’s price is low, it would be better to pick something else… maybe the SSL G series compressor or the new 2500 Api compressor. Both have their Waves version, which I have…
There is the Vox Box but I didn’t see something interesting
No bundle, when I bought mine, it was a different plug-in reduced each day, so I bought individually, what I didn’t realise is that they were all available at the low prices at the end of the sale period, so I could have got even more discount since they offer even more discounts if you purchase several at once.
I like the SSL G Bus, but the Glue is very similar sounding if you have that?
Have you considered any of the Reverbs or new SSL E-series Channel Strip or Neve 88RS?
$40 worth to wait.
I only have the Waves versions at the moment. You mean between Waves or between the G Bus and Glue of UAD ? I compared 2-3 times the new SSL E of UAD to the one of Slate, and honestly I didn’t see enough difference, I prefer to stay with Slate with the Console (lighter for the Channel Strip). For the G serie, I have the Waves at the moment, not a such big difference between W and U. Neve 88RS is not a priority, I prefer the SSL side, but the EQ of Neve is interesting. I also have the Neve EQ of Slate and I hope it would do the job for the moment. Same for the 1176 series. I didn’t tested the Reverbs on UAD, on considered that having all the Valhalla and the Verbsuite with the impulse expansion pack would be enough… but maybe I’m wrong
Its a tricky one trying to avoid overlaps, Valhalla are so good with reverbs, I tend to use them over my UAD ones but I would recommend trying the AKG BX20 spring reverb, it just sounds gorgeous and it is my go to for all spreing duties.
I would always go native if the plugin is averrable natively and save your DSP for UAD developed or exclusive to the UAD platform plug-ins. The VSM-3 uses a lot of DSP, this is either due to a bug, which I have heard people speaking about on the forum or because it is not optimised for the UAD platform.
What are your thoughts of Verbsuite? I have been meaning to check it out and heard good things.
Interesting, I would tend to put forward my DSP which is an octo with a maximum of plugins and tending to save my CPU which I dramatically need during the production process (playing live, all the midi instruments live, buffer size etc.). I’m looking for having the Altiverb, but I’m interested about the AKG (which I’m going to test soon) and the Dimension D. I have Verbsuite but to be honest I still didn’t use it but I’m sure I’ll soon. In fact, 3 weeks ago I was a big noob on everything touching mixing and mastering, I just learned during 3 complete weeks the mixing foundations and advanced. 3 weeks before I still was putting some reverb on the insert hahaha, but now never again.
It has been only 1 week I’ve bought my UAD stuff and tested the plugins, to resume I’m a big fan because I hear the sound like it was a real hardware and this makes the difference. So, I should now and in the future buy everything, even if I have the same on Waves, because I know that the way it works, it’s not the same.
Instead of taking the VSM-3 I should maybe take the Neve 1073 or 1081 (I only have a Neve EQ on Slate that’s it) or the API 2500. the 3 are not cheap and it should be the occasion to take expensive versions and wait other sales for the other plugins which costs less
Good point, if you need to reduce CPU load then using the UAD versions of native will be your friend. I just suggested using native plug-ins natively because some of the UAD plug-ins are serious DSP hogs, BTW turn ‘DSP Loadlock’ off in the UA Control Panel and this will save DSP on modules you are not using e.g. if you just using the pre-amp of something but not the EQ or compressor.
Yeah, Mixing Foundations is great, are you continuing with Next Level Mixing? Danny goes into much more detail on the mixing process, best thig I ever did, doing that course.
What style of music do you produce?
I purchase everything UAD now (analogue emulation wise) I think they sound the best and sound most like my hardware but I started out on UA so don’t have much overlap, well apart from Waves but I get all them included in my bundle, which I had for over a decade
The plug-ins you have picked so far are top UA products I use all the time and highly recommend
Dimension D is awesome, I am sure that will come as a bundle as a ‘one pick’? The RE-201 is awesome as well, the new versions are the same code just with a new GUI and name, something to do with Roland licensing…
I’ve already watched the next level mixing, but I need sometimes to come back, because I still don’t control at 100% the mixing. I’ve already began the mastering courses but I’m in rush, I have to produce now
I produce Pop, Rnb, everything which could be commercial, and you ?
It’s a shame that Altiverb cannot be tested during a period of time, but this is my goal, to buy Altiverb. I tested Verbsuite today, I unfortunately don’t like a lot for the moment the convolutions proposed. Reverb is one of my weak points so I have to be patient in order to know how to control reverb very well, and maybe it’s why I’m not impressed with Verbsuite… I prefer for the moment the Valhalla ones. I begun to test AKG reverb, I like it but I have to continue to test it.
I am a mastering engineer but am planning on producing a bit of house music this year, although I said the same last year haha.
It is one of there older plug-ins but I recommend trying the UAD Neve 31102, especially on vocals, Danny demonstrated this a couple of months back and damn it sounds so smooth and rich. It doesn’t sound ‘vintage’ either like the 1073, which is not always the desired tone.
I still haven’t purchased Altiverb yet, I have been threatening to do so for a while but like you I always seem to get the desired results through Valhalla.
I was the same with NLM, I learned loads during the course and being able to ask Danny questions was priceless but I kept going back to the videos and over time more and more of the techniques sunk in.
