While I currently have and like the Arturia V, it looks different, has more settings, sliders and sounds totally different to the hardware. I am trying to find a VST that looks like the original 2600C/P models (the grey/black faced versions) to recreate some drum and percussion sounds from a demonstration video of the hardware. Attempting to recreate the sound with what settings I could do on the Arturia V, it sounds nothing at all even remotely like the hardware.

Are there any VST plugins that model after the original hardware mentioned?

 

This guy here is probably what you're looking for:

Way Out Ware TimewARP 2600
https://www.wayoutware.com/twarp2.html

AIR Music Tech
https://www.airmusictech.com/virtual-instruments/time-warp-2600.html

 

I have learned before that most of the plugins recreation will always change the range of either filter envelope or the cutoff because the hardware has some weird behavior that they deemed unusable on plugin. It's the control you got, mouse vs actual hand, for automation etc. Copying exact settings on them will not guarantee one to get in the ballpark of the settings on the real hardware. Not to mention all the different sort of filter design used for the models, lawsuits era and whatnot. Model P alone has 4 variations which I believe had some major component changes between them, as example VCO chips, changing manufacturer of certain parts and some other things which make them sound different to one another and all the models before and after them. As far as I know, there's no exact 2600P plugin recreation.

Anyway another ARP2600 plugin is Cherry Audio CA2600 that offers 2 type of filters, the infamous lawsuit era and its replacement which has more gradual slope. Maybe that could give you greater range of sounds possible. There's also an Octave CAT recreation from them that I really like, that sound like an ARP synth, maybe it can serve as an alternative. Also there are some ARP Odyssey emulations too that maybe a more closer alternatives.

2600:
https://cherryaudio.com/products/ca2600

Odyssey:
https://www.gforcesoftware.com/products/oddity3/
https://www.korg.com/us/products/software/kc_arpodyssey/

Octave Cat :
https://cherryaudio.com/products/octave-cat

 

Last edited: Nov 14, 2023

Arturia is/was awesome
and an odysey is not a 2600

 

I have the SONiVOX/Way Out Ware Timewarp 2600, Cherry Audio CA2600 and the Arturia ARP 2600 V3.

The SONiVOX sounds best to me, but has a horrible user interface, and is the least stable of the three (crashes on rare occasions). Also beware that older SONiVOX software can make a giant mess of its installs on Windows. (installing locked VC files in the root of your drive etc.)

The Cherry Audio has a nice user interface but sounds less good. Rocksolid and low on CPU.

The Arturia sounds the least good of the three, and i'm also not a fan of Arturia user interfaces with their zillion png files.

 

Thanks will check these out.

I'm not expecting a 1:1 copy, but like with drums sounds, if I can get somewhere close and then tweak to my liking it would be great.

 

About Cherry Audio: their premise is good, UI is well designed, promotion videos are cool, they are a small company of passionate people, it's optimized for low CPU usage, it has everything you'd dream of... except for the sound. It's alright; that's all it is. When you compare their mercuries to Roland Cloud's jupiters counterparts, it's kinda sad, really. The good thing about them is that they've tried to emulate synths that not many others have, like the Jupiter 6. But when it comes to famous machines like the ARP 26000, I'm sure there are better options out there.

 

Last edited: Aug 29, 2024

this has absolutely no bearing on the usability

most of them are great fun, the arturia had more of the whacky behaviour + if you use some of the Kush amps or
Acustica taupe you get the necessary bite and hair back, that most vst synths sometimes lack

 

I guess you saw Marinelli's videos
He is palying on the original ARP2600
Wow listen to that bassline sequence really aggressive & deep

 

Please...
It sounds so bad, compared with any other 2600 ---- Not to speak about comparing it with the real one. I was lucky enough to play a real one for 2 years. So I can compare.
The Oscillator definition have nothing to do with the real one. The filters also lack of "lush" and a long etc ...
Air Music Tech, again, have done a more or less, unfinished plugin ...

 

What is your favorite soundwise, Oly (once you have used the real thing)?

 

Yes the Arturia is not even close, i watched a youtube video & wanted to create the kick they got on the HW but i couldn't get in the ball park. I'm not one to say HW is better than SW i just think the emulation is poor.

 

On my 24" Full-HD monitor (100% scale) the labels of the 2600 V are readable when i resize the window to 200%, but then it's 3200px wide and 2000px high. Some labels of the 2600 V are barely readable when i resize the window to 100% (1600px x 1000px), and unreadable when resizing to 60%. When i place the plugin on my second (laptop) screen which is 15.4", things get a lot worse of course. However, installing V-Collection 9 takes 623.870 Files, 19.840 Folders on my system, >90% .png files for these, at times unreadable interfaces.

@ TS this is the TimeWarp, maybe you can see if you can dial in those drumsounds with it. Bear in mind the installation proces is tedious and the plugin doesn't resize, so on 4K monitors it's close to unusable.

@Olymoon I can't compare them to the real thing, but i totally believe what you're saying.

 

maybe you need glasses

 

Honestly, I dont have one, because as I said several times before in other threads, I don't expect any plugin to faithfully reproduce an original synth. At least the synths I had, none , even the best plugins can be compared to them, the same goes for analog consoles.
So I use and judge plugins for what they are, not for what they pretend to be.
But into the ones I've tried, The Arturia ARP 2006 V is one of the best. It fails in the VCF resonance parameter, which introduce more high frequency than the real one. Also it's better to use the VCO into 4' and 8' range, under it becomes to loose veracity compared to the real one.
Yet, it sounds very good.

 

Last edited: Nov 15, 2023

some people like to hate for gifs, pics and or lack of them.
Surprisingly even weirder: old plugins

 

I dont like Arturia's policy as a brand either., not only about their non sense way to do the plugins GUIs, but also about their costumer policy for their hardware. But it doesn't mean that I cant speak objectively about the sound of one of their plugins.

 

full disclosure, so im going for the synthy drum depeche mode sound of the early days, in case anybody wondered. 2600, k55, 808, linn... that sort of thing. the 2600, from the original song, videos and sound examples, is massive. Its what I am trying to recreate.

 

THEY WHERE TOTAL ASSHOLES with their HW releases
but their synths sound very good, but you have seen those odd comments
i mean we are not talking about waves or Kjaerhus

the 2600 is a monster, terrific synth
i´ll have to test a behringer before they are gone

 

Eventhough i'm not a fan of any of the three vst's i mentioned, and never use them, dialing in drum sounds should be rather easy with any of them.