I found this great comparison of Waves Codex vs Serum on KVR

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5896544

 

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Cracked or not, Serum is definitively not the new holy grail of VSTs, even if the fanboys may beg to differ.

It's a nice synth with a great GUI and a lot of potential for future updates, but right now there's better stuff available both soundwise and concerning innovation.

 

No, I don't think so. Nobody who's seriously into music production wants to reopen a virtual synth all the time, and many other devs offer demos that give you enough functionality to properly evaluate their products, but have some twirk (like soft noise, crackle, popups etc.) which are annoying enough to give you a reason to buy it one day.
When I get the feeling that a dev has really done some magic and the asked price is appropriate, I'm more than ready to purchase the object of desire, for the single reason to support the designer and developer crew. I just hesitate buying it blindly because it wouldn't be my first WT synth and although it looks fantastic (reminded me a bit of CRX4), I'd like to work with it for a while first.

 

Have to agree.. its not exactly making me crap myself with astonishment.. Nice.... but I can def. wait on it.

Then again, Omnisphere has all the sounds, (9000)... and sound shaping capabilities Me and my invisible army could\would ever need. :dancing:

I'm glad I'm not the only person here who finds this offputting.

 

I agree with your philosophy on this release, but I dont recall Audioz doing this sort of thing before. Maybe they have and I've missed it, but in general most people dont hold back on releasing stuff.

I have raised this point before about delaying releases from smaller developer's to enable them to at least make some money before the world gets it for free, met with jeers in fact, and that was from some Audioz members who didnt seem to give a toss, they just had the mentality that everything is fair game. They totally overlooked the fact that if the small companies have no sales, then they wont make future products.

I can appreciate why you are holding this release back, but it needs to be applied across the board really, and not just on one product that everyone is going crazy for. If you are going to hold back 'Serum' then you need to be holding back quite a lot of other stuff from smaller developers, but that does not seem to be happening.

Why is Serum/Xfer given more prominence than other small Devs?

 

I don't think people are going all Diva fanboi on this, it appears to be a competent, interesting synth, with very intuitive modulation and sound sculpting capabilities. It seems that the complexity (or simplicity) of sound can be easily automated in a way more musical, or requiring less work, or using less "external" stuff (again pointing to lfo tool etc), ... I don't think people have locked the topic that synthesis is now DONE with it, no way, ... seems like a natural successor to things like massive to waldorf to prophet vs etc from what I have seen... and it's nice when a "musician"/"producer" makes an instrument.... they know what they use and how, and how end users would probably like it, rather then the lab coat "roland"/"yamaha" approach (which has yielded some obviously valuable results as well)...

I think that people are mostly lathered up in the fact that they can't get it for free (cause lord knows the deserve it), and it's like a girl who has no interest in you... you want her more... if you had her, you might be, "meh".....

but I have watched some videos of codex, and good luck to them with that vs. serum... i'm not saying it's bad, as I haven't played with it.... i just think that their design team fumbles all over each other with certain decisions and it shows... it certainly does not possess the immediate "vivacity"... but I will explore it more... I am from the old school of wavetable synthesis, and it was a weird landscape... i personally in my music liked the crappy aliasing and almost random nature of it's results, but I am definitely keeping my eye on Serum to see how it develops, as it seems like a smart product, with loads of room for improvement easily implemented (he DID do cthulu, he can kick most arpegs ass....)....

 

Perhaps we should have community votes on 'good guy' devs.. and let them get their chance at making money too...first 2 weeks or so after a release.

I cant think of a single reason why not... considering its been done here.

 

I speak for myself, but it's surely not the first time I wait to release something.
I have lying on my desktop ready releases for i.e. Sinevibes, small indypendent Mac only dev that make kick ass creative effects.
He release 2 new products last month and I'm waiting some time to release it. Airwindows too, I decided not to release it at all. i will probably release just a few, not the whole bundle, take it as advertising to make people know about it. (his stuff is really known by only a niche).
R2R recently waited some weeks before releasing TokyoDawn/VOS SlickEQ GE. Then it's also a matter of a bit of war with devs, I don't care too much if a dev think to be a smartass.
If i.e. I'll be able to crack stuff from StevenSlate or some other business oriented scumbag, I would release it even before it's out publicly,
and sleep very well at night.

I surely respect more someone like Steve that put an almost inexistent copy protection and just ask crackers to give him a chance with messages in the code.
I can list lot of cases. Some devs are also known to be totally ok bout their stuff being warezed the very day they release initial version of it. They just see it as advertising.

I'm a bit of a fanboy on Serum I must admit, just cause it's the most intuitive wavetable synth I ever tried and I find easy to get what I want from it in no time. And it sounds killer.
But I'm not blind on anything else, I like it, I lived without it until yesterday and I can live without it. I use also other synths, this is not a all around for everything. But I love it.

 

Well said copylefter, as it obviously is a slippery slope... (and you are right about sinevibes btw, niche products, but very interesting stuff),

.. and ha, Steven Slate and whatever the name of that deutchbank from ableton with his big "glue compressor" reveal for Live 9, ... those guys remind me of Tom Cruise in Magnolia or bad Tony Robbins type hustlers....who then fly out on their helicopters to the unmitigated zeal of the end users who will end up being paid beta testers for some problematic products....

but again, for some reason I am just fascinated like a moth to the flame on this polarizing subject and the problems//arguments/philosophy defining issues it is raising. I guess I have no life...

 

You find it so insane that people who work their ass off 24/7 to bring you goodies sometimes have access to stuff before you?
And I mean 4-5 people, no more. 2 of which already have it legit also, me being waiting for a payment to buy it too :dancing:

 

I deleted that message and I never said the things you are mentioning,saw irony there like Pilzy said.I do not use cracked software,sorry,that people are not working for me or I owe them anything.

 

Waves Codex is like all Waves synths : dull.
Same trouble than Spectral Linplug...but even duller

Serum is aggressive like Spectral (good point for Spectral), but with more PUNCH.
There are two things i can't resist to : punch (dynamic, attack...) and richness (aggressive, full of harmonics audio spectrum).

Serum get them both. But it is not the only one
[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw74hKcyNow[/media]

 

Duda is a cool guy, who happens to be a genius during his free time.

I bought Chtulu, even if it was out for free, even if i was short on cash (no as much as i am now, though). this little app is a little revolution on the arpeggiators side, and more specially, on the part where 99% of people do struggle the most : creating coherent melodies and fantastic sounding chords. one simple "bachorale" preset, one finger, and one can generate fantastic chords and sounds.

Chtulu was the pillar and inspiration for many other chord generators, even those that come with some daw's.
just like lfotool has inspired most apps, a la cableguys volumeshaper, sidekicks and other sidechain apps.


give Duda some cash, and a dozen talented developers and sound designers, and in one year, a new native instruments will be out, with some great new effects and instruments.

 

I totally agree. To be honest, this thread makes me sick. It's like "oh we're thiefs, but we're good thiefs, we will wait a while before we steal!" Lol!

WTF, seriously? Stop acting like you're doing someone a favour.

Firstly - we all know what sort of site this is, and we've all use cracked software. So, no offence to Steve Duda, but what makes this guy so special? I'm sure he's really nice and all, but a ton of the other VSTs that you have cracked have also come from small companies. I wonder if they're reading this and wondering why you cracked their software, but make out like Steve Duda deserves a break. Why didn't they deserve a break too?

Personally, I'll be using the cracked version of this synth for a while, until I make my mind up about it. Someone said that the demo is limited to 20 minutes.. seriously? No thanks, I'll take the unrestricted demo. And I may not even buy it, as I hate that sort of attitude from a developer.

The guys at Reaper have the right idea. They let you actually try their software for as long as you like. Can't say fairer than that.

 

Actually, WE ARE *yes*
You will understand when you'll see months without a single release from main teams probably. *yes*
Agree about reaper, you're right on that. Don't wanna get into the double standards debate, doesn't apply here, and I'm sick of it.

Before you forget, if and when you will be saying no thanks to limited 20mins demo and demoing it with "unrestricted demo" as you call it,
it will be for only one reason: we'll be actually doing you a favour. *yes*

Peace and good night

 

Silly thread..... truly. This discussion may even do more harm than good.

1. On the warez scene the most prolific defense against copyright infringement is the site isn't hosting any illegal files, just offering links. That defense has been a tough one and is hardly surefire, but the fact is you wind up with a problem one day, and it's all you've got.

With a thread like this, you're basically admitting you have a lot more control over releases then would generally be admitted to, and potentially causing yourselves a problem. It's just not very smart. You're basically publishing an admission that you control what does and doesn't come out for downloading. You're no longer just a link aggregator, now you're in charge.

2. While the concept of withholding a release to allow a particular developer more time to sell his product prior to there being an available warez version theoretically sounds like a nice thing to be doing, its actually nonsensical on a number of levels.

a. For one, you're sending a message to all the companies that sell music software that you can control these things 'for the right person'. How's it going to work when they start coming to you with offers of money not to release stuff? Why not, if you have the abiltiy to control this stuff, right? And who is really going to be determining for everyone else who the "right person" is? Suddenly its no longer a matter of things being released whenever the heck they're released, but rather they're released when particular people at AudioZ think its o.k. to do so. That's an awful lot of control to be publicly acknowledging, particularly when 95% of what comes down the pike here is illegal.

b. You might even be taking responsibility for something that's just not all that damaging to these companies anyway. I have always argued that 99% of the people downloading stuff here, and all the other sites like it, were never under any circumstances going to be buyers. If it wasn't free, they wouldn't be downloading it, and they would probably never be using it either. Sure, some of the guys here buy stuff, but I'm convinced its a very small percentage of the overall picture. By presenting the reasons you've offered here for not releasing this particular software, you're nullifying that argument, instead claiming we are buyers and that the AudioZ releases exert control upon software sales. DUMB. It's one of those, 'why didn't I keep my mouth shut?' deals. Some of the people here should know better than that. I know coming up with statements like that makes some people here feel like they're very important, but beyond that its meaningless.

c. The thought that somehow you can play nice-nice on this level with developers is in my opinion a losing proposition. These guys want people that release this stuff, and people that download this stuff, dead or in jail. Plain and simple. Any assertion that somehow you can 'work it out' with them, and, no less, they will appreciate you, is bullshit. Ain't never going to happen. You honestly think they appreciate you withholding a release? You would have to be conning yourself into thinking that people that are cursing the day you were born are somehow becoming "partners" with you in their map of sales and promotion! Ain't never gonna happen. And that fact alone makes the whole concept of this sort of 'release timing' just plain goofy. Really, you must be kidding yourselves. If what I hear argued on this forum was actually true, the developers would all be releasing their work for free after its been out for sale for a few months. I don't see that happening, and until you do there's zero truth to this whole delayed release business, and even less truth to the fact that any developer actually appreciates it.

My conclusion is that the only people that should be deciding when something is or is not released are the people that did the work to crack it and that's that. All other notions of control are just about ego.

 

Glad i never installed it :D