Acces Virus TI Snow

[Guest Lube Saibot]

I bought this baby thinking it would become my main workhorse synth. Needless to say, it hasn't. Besides the TOTALLY SHITTY integration (see what i did there eh?)- which required me to buy an extra usb card just to have enough usb bandwidth to run it properly + i still fucks up once in a while + i can't REALLY use it in projects directly because it would mean i'd have to send every other track to a delayed buss and that really fucks with my OCD.... besides ALL that, it has a very weird presence and character to the sound. Weird as in unsavory. It's not as bad on the analog 12db filter with the character FX turned off, but still... there's a really thin feeling. Yeah sure, i rattles my whole fucking house when i turn the subosc all the way up, but the freq response is still shitty. It sounds very disjointed and distant. -> That sums up my vocabulary for describind this very subtle timbral flaw. And yes, i did try to bypass the USB outs and just use regular line out and it sounds identical.

 

On the other hand, i love the FX, the routability, and the wavetable fuckery it's capable of. I can work out patches that fucking DESTROY anything i could do with Massive.

 

On the other other hand, i hate the hypersaw oscs and ALL THE FUCKING BUGS. And all the patchbanks released for it suck ass. AND on a side-by-side comparison, ZETA+ and Sylenth1 BLOW IT OUT OF THE FUCKING WATER. Which is weird, considering both are supposedly MODELED AFTER THE VIRUS.

 

I dunno whether to stick with this thing for the wavetable madness or just sell it and have the proceeds go to my "One day i'll own a Moog Voyager" fund. Or am i doing something ?wrong? Or is it because it's a Snow? Could having just one DSP card instead of two be that much of a problem?

 

Fuck. Illuminate me guys.

[kcinsu]

sounds like you just don't like the virus sound.

 

did you listen to demos/mess with it in a store before buying it?

 

i personally love it's sound.

[kcinsu]

also, did you download the latest update for it? could iron out some of those bugs you are experiencing.

[acid1]

"thin" ?

 

I suspect you aren't doing it right.

[kcinsu]

well, he said he's listened through all the presets.... if they all sound thin to his ears... well, then that's his take on the sound.

[Guest Lube Saibot]

lol omfg you're not getting it.

 

It's not the presets i'm dissapointed it. Presets are fine. I don't\can't really use presets though much, sorry. I just said the additional patchbanks are shit, except maybe a few exceptions in the Richard Devine soundset. And the particular abrasive sound of the virus i was WELL AWARE of before buying it, from several demos and from several songs i know employ the virus.

 

I have a problem with the way the SOUND COMES OUT.

 

Since this thread is already getting derailed a bit, let me add this: I'm hoping someone here has already encountered my predicament and has overcome it. So... if you're blissfully content with the sound quality from your virus, or can't even tell the difference between warm and thin outside of "does it have low freq content derr?", please refrain from posting in this thread. If you can help, kindly do so. If i'm doing it wrong, tell me in what way. If you wanna wave your dick around, go to DOA. Thank you.

[acid1]

I find the Virii sound to be almost too digital and almost slightly bit reduced. It kind of has this "blocky" phatness to it, but I would never describe that sound as thin. I've used spdif, usb, and the analog outs to connect it to my machine and had luck with all of them. Personally I prefer the phatness of the analog outs over the accuracy of spdif. However, I find the USB outs to be just as effective taking only a small hit to quality.

 

I do notice the Virus comes in a bit low in my sound card, and thus have to compress or amplify the signal a bit but thats not the case with all soundcards as its not an issue on my friends Digi. If you read the Virus manually it specifically says that if you use the Virus in (for instance) Ableton to throw a utility in the chain.

 

None the less, I hardly believe someone can learn the entirety of the Virus based on a few days with. See if you can figure out how Ed Rush and Optical made Alien Girl on it (or download the older patch banks if you want to cheat).

 

Finally I wouldn't be so quick to make fun of DOA, tons of people over there have and know about the Virus, perhaps ones patient enough to learn it themselves and not waste time crying to the internet about their inability to find the I-WIN button on their new synth.

[Guest Lube Saibot]

 

Ok. Have a nice day you resplendently-endowed trollking of synthesis. I will humbly leave your fortress of assumption and resume my I-WIN-button-triangulation-based production technique.

[kcinsu]

uh, I think you're missing my point.

 

there is nothing "wrong" with your virus. my comment about the presets was implying that it wasn't a lack of sound design skills on your part... that even when you listen to the presets, you find the "output" of the virus to be unpleasing... not necessarily the synthesis engine itself, but it's fidelity. well, sorry, but there is no trick to it... it sounds the way it sounds.

 

I WAS trying to be helpful, but you're being a little shit about it, so fuck off. enjoy your $1200 investment.

[candlestickmaker]

HAHA I DON'T OWN A TUBE AMP

[acidphakist]

I have a TI desktop and it's the most important part of my 'fleet'. The sounds are lush and diverse, and the total integration makes working with it a breeze.

 

I suggest you update your drivers to the latest and greatest, and it sounds like your computer needs some updating too (you didn't have USB2, oops!)

 

In my humble opinion, you now own the greatest synth on the market. Learn to love it.

[Guest pantsonmyhead]

run it through a nice preamp or something

my friend runs his virus through a moog filter and it sounds instantly warmer/phatter

virii are very sharp and crisp sounding so a little dirtiness often makes the sound easier to swallow

 

 

edit: having read your response to other useful information i'm prompted to ask if you tried removing it from your asshole before plugging it in?

[Guest Lube Saibot]

Kcinsu, your two cents WERE helpful. Tone it down.

 

Acidphakist, i DID have USB 2.0, oops! I ended up buying an extra USB card because the onboard one didn't have enough bandwidth for my virus and mu edirol ua-25 usb soundcard. Every driver is up to date, firmware is up to date. Might i enquire what your setup is that you get flawless, bugless total integration?

 

Thanks for the input pantsonmyhead. What does your friend use, BiFilter, the UAD Moog filter, a Moogerfooger, what?

 

edit: having read your edit i'm :facepalm: ing a dent in my forehead. My only comment that would even begin to warrant a fucking EKT bitch solidarity parade was directed solely at acid1, and visibly prompted by his "useful" "crying over the internet" bullshit. I do believe i didn't start this thread going "hai guyze how you make breaks like the aphex twins?", so the whole "IWIN button" BS was completely uncalled for. If people here have a hair trigger for abuse their time would be better spent defacing bathroom stalls with racist sharpie doodles (which is a shame really, acid1 actually opened my eyes a bit before completely gagging on DOA pen0r).

 

Alas, you pick what side you want.

 

Have a nice day EKT, i apologize, dead thread.

[acidphakist]

Lube-

 

My setup is ghetto and probably SHOULDN'T work. I had to buy a PCMCIA usb2.0 adapter for my old Thinkpad.

 

I'll admit the drivers magically stopped working one night, but when I upped from 2.7 to 3.1 on the Virus it started working again.

 

I hope you get that sucker working with Total Integration because it makes creating, storing and loading patches WAY easier.

 

As for toning down the harshness of the TI in general, I usually use some creative high pass filtering, coupled with Izotope Trash. As a last ditch effort I might dub to tape and back...

 

-AP

[Guest Lube Saibot]

Lube-

 

My setup is ghetto and probably SHOULDN'T work. I had to buy a PCMCIA usb2.0 adapter for my old Thinkpad.

 

I'll admit the drivers magically stopped working one night, but when I upped from 2.7 to 3.1 on the Virus it started working again.

 

I hope you get that sucker working with Total Integration because it makes creating, storing and loading patches WAY easier.

 

As for toning down the harshness of the TI in general, I usually use some creative high pass filtering, coupled with Izotope Trash. As a last ditch effort I might dub to tape and back...

 

-AP

 

What DAW(s) do you use man? Specifically what DAW do you use when booting up the Virus? Also what kind of Virus do you own?

[acidphakist]

I have the Virus TI Desktop. I use Ableton Live 6 to load it.

[Guest Lube Saibot]

I have the Virus TI Desktop. I use Ableton Live 6 to load it.

 

See i knew i'd get flak from it for using FL Studio. So all the total integration issues probably stem from that. I'm beggining to suspect, based on what i've been talking to some friends and from some conclusions drawn here, that all the other problems and bugs stem from it being a Snow. Because everybody who has zero problems with it seems to have either a TI desktop, either a TI2 desktop, or in one case a TI Polar.

 

It would be incredibly frustrating that Access would employ this "you get what you pay for" shit. The whole point with the Snow was that you'd get a bit more than what you pay for. I don't give a shit about multitimbrality or polyphony, i barely ever use two patches on it simultaneously or play chords on it, but it'd be nice if it behaved like its bigger siblings.

[Guest pantsonmyhead]

Kcinsu, your two cents WERE helpful. Tone it down.

 

Acidphakist, i DID have USB 2.0, oops! I ended up buying an extra USB card because the onboard one didn't have enough bandwidth for my virus and mu edirol ua-25 usb soundcard. Every driver is up to date, firmware is up to date. Might i enquire what your setup is that you get flawless, bugless total integration?

 

Thanks for the input pantsonmyhead. What does your friend use, BiFilter, the UAD Moog filter, a Moogerfooger, what?

 

edit: having read your edit i'm :facepalm: ing a dent in my forehead. My only comment that would even begin to warrant a fucking EKT bitch solidarity parade was directed solely at acid1, and visibly prompted by his "useful" "crying over the internet" bullshit. I do believe i didn't start this thread going "hai guyze how you make breaks like the aphex twins?", so the whole "IWIN button" BS was completely uncalled for. If people here have a hair trigger for abuse their time would be better spent defacing bathroom stalls with racist sharpie doodles (which is a shame really, acid1 actually opened my eyes a bit before completely gagging on DOA pen0r).

 

Alas, you pick what side you want.

 

Have a nice day EKT, i apologize, dead thread.

 

 

acid1 has alot of good points

and this is motherfucking watmm, snarkiest bunch of cunts on the internet...these guys make dubstepforum look like a hawaiian welcoming comitee complete with coconut boobs and leis

 

alls i'm saying is that it's super obvious you're lashing out because you just sank a grip of cash into something you either didn't research well enough or isn't the right fit for you

if you aren't after polyphany or multi-timbral syntheses(access synths strongpoints)you'd probably do better with another synth

 

moogerfooger btw

now chill out the fact that these guys are trying to help you is rare as it is

[acidphakist]

I drink your milkshake. I DRINK IT UP.

[Guest Lube Saibot]

Kcinsu, your two cents WERE helpful. Tone it down.

 

Acidphakist, i DID have USB 2.0, oops! I ended up buying an extra USB card because the onboard one didn't have enough bandwidth for my virus and mu edirol ua-25 usb soundcard. Every driver is up to date, firmware is up to date. Might i enquire what your setup is that you get flawless, bugless total integration?

 

Thanks for the input pantsonmyhead. What does your friend use, BiFilter, the UAD Moog filter, a Moogerfooger, what?

 

edit: having read your edit i'm :facepalm: ing a dent in my forehead. My only comment that would even begin to warrant a fucking EKT bitch solidarity parade was directed solely at acid1, and visibly prompted by his "useful" "crying over the internet" bullshit. I do believe i didn't start this thread going "hai guyze how you make breaks like the aphex twins?", so the whole "IWIN button" BS was completely uncalled for. If people here have a hair trigger for abuse their time would be better spent defacing bathroom stalls with racist sharpie doodles (which is a shame really, acid1 actually opened my eyes a bit before completely gagging on DOA pen0r).

 

Alas, you pick what side you want.

 

Have a nice day EKT, i apologize, dead thread.

 

 

acid1 has alot of good points

and this is motherfucking watmm, snarkiest bunch of cunts on the internet...these guys make dubstepforum look like a hawaiian welcoming comitee complete with coconut boobs and leis

 

alls i'm saying is that it's super obvious you're lashing out because you just sank a grip of cash into something you either didn't research well enough or isn't the right fit for you

if you aren't after polyphany or multi-timbral syntheses(access synths strongpoints)you'd probably do better with another synth

 

moogerfooger btw

now chill out the fact that these guys are trying to help you is rare as it is

 

This was no impulse buy man, i saved for a year, read tons of threads on the virus, read reviews, listened to endless audio samples, heard cyberworm's virus sound samplepack, listened to songs with virus leads etc. Polyphony is definitely not a virus STRONG POINT, especially as the more complex your patches get the polyphony trade-off is consistent. The things i bought it for did not disappoint, as i mentioned in the initial post. All the wavetable-derived synthesis variants are wonderful, the little bit of FM doesn't hurt either, the routing is wonderful, and the effects (especially the reverb and delay) are amazing. My issue is with wholly unadvertised buggy total shitegration bullshit. It seems i'm not doing any of the mistakes suggested above, so what the fuck?

 

The reason i even started this thread is that, way before i bought it, i'd seen a thread (on gearslutz i think) where a guy was adamant about the Snow sounding like a plugin through USB and great through line in. I dismissed it as usual analog>digital overdouchebaggery, but after experiencing a lack in definition (identical in both USB and line in) myself, i thought i'd ask. This is really my biggest and only real problem with the Virus. And it bugs me that it makes me turn to it less than i'd like to.

 

On the WATMM snarkiness subject... puh-lease. I've seen ridiculous fucking questions being given extremely kind and overly helpful answers over time here on EKT. If "how is idmz formed?" can be met with constructive assistance, so can a slightly more knowing inquiry on gear. I just happened to get the shit end of WATMM on this thread.

[ascdi]

So .. you are using it with FL Studio? That sucks. Not because FL Studio sucks (I like it), but because you're probably not going to get a whole lot of help from Access when it comes to fixing compatibility with a "non-mainstream" DAW. Fact of life, I guess.

 

Personally, if I spent a bunch of cash on something like that and ended up underwhelmed by it, I'd ditch it. It's too pricey an object to settle for less than 100% satisfaction, IMO.

 

Anyway, I have a Virus B, which may sound a bit different overall, I'm not sure. But to me, it is definitely a "dark"-sounding synth. And honestly, it really doesn't sound that "good" to me, in a bread-and-butter way. The strength of that synth, IMO, is definitely all the unique features that can make it sound ZOMGZ crazy or whatever, like all the weird diode clipper shit or whatever and wacky dual filters and growly decimator and all that shit. But to me it's not a synth where you're just going to dial up a simple subtractive lead and zone out to how "good" it sounds like a Moog or anything. Just my opinion.

 

 

EDIT: Basically what acid1 said about the sound, now that I go back and read it.

[Guest Lube Saibot]

So .. you are using it with FL Studio? That sucks. Not because FL Studio sucks (I like it), but because you're probably not going to get a whole lot of help from Access when it comes to fixing compatibility with a "non-mainstream" DAW. Fact of life, I guess.

 

Personally, if I spent a bunch of cash on something like that and ended up underwhelmed by it, I'd ditch it. It's too pricey an object to settle for less than 100% satisfaction, IMO.

 

Anyway, I have a Virus B, which may sound a bit different overall, I'm not sure. But to me, it is definitely a "dark"-sounding synth. And honestly, it really doesn't sound that "good" to me, in a bread-and-butter way. The strength of that synth, IMO, is definitely all the unique features that can make it sound ZOMGZ crazy or whatever, like all the weird diode clipper shit or whatever and wacky dual filters and growly decimator and all that shit. But to me it's not a synth where you're just going to dial up a simple subtractive lead and zone out to how "good" it sounds like a Moog or anything. Just my opinion.

 

 

EDIT: Basically what acid1 said about the sound, now that I go back and read it.

 

The shit i get for using FL i gladly eat up. Taking the bad with the good here, tbh, as after trying out every DAW for a few months or so each i found that FL fits my workflow the best by a landslide. A friend recommended that i do my Virus bussiness in a more compatbile DAW... i'm considering that.

 

It's not like i'm buying this shit.

 

 

The decimator is the tits. So is the rectifier and all the new folds they added with OS3.

 

This isn't really what acid1 said as it's actually genuinely pertinent to my initial inquiry. You make a really valid point, as i find myself only finding it at fault when in simple detuned saw patches n shit. Hmm.

 

I'm definitely a nitpicking motherfucker, but still... The satisfaction is definitely not 100% there. I think i'm gonna keep it though, if only for the "ZOMGZ crazy" shit, as i pretty much hate all the alternatives for those kinda sounds.

[acidphakist]

Lube it up...have you tried some chorus and distortion to phatten your sound, yet?

[ascdi]

Sounds like a solid decision. I agree with all the people here about spending some more time with it. I mean even the simple stuff like rise & fall times on envelopes were worth investigating for me .. I found those really essential and unexpectedly musical.