So i recently came up with some money (wohoo) and want to spend it on synths and stuff to fill up my empty studio. I already have a decent pair of monitors and room treatment, but i don't have any hardware synth and i want to fix that (they look like so much fun).
Anyway what would you get? they all look great and powerful. I know some people will say hurr durr you should get what your lacking, and what style of sound you want.


So before they say that: I really like the idea of step sequencing/arp, so i can tweak a sound while i play with the synth, i'm more interested in racks than synths with keybeds and i'm not really that interested in getting a modular system.
And genere (so you know more or less the sounds i'm aiming for): Trap, House, Trance. Also drum machines! (I really like the A4)


Some of my options: A4 + moog minitaur/waldorf pulse 2, Moog 37 + Roland Tr-8...


TL;DR: What hardware synths would you get if you had 2500 dollars?

 

Was just thinking,in this day and age,I think none anymore,I would rather use money to upgrade my PC and buy some good plugin,have all ITB benefits and save up overall.but other way,would look at Korg MS-20 Mini,Arturia MiniBrute SE,maybe even some Moog,but I doubt that,than JoMoX MBase 11 for kick drums,but again,I seriously doubt I would spend money on anything analog or even outboard in this day and age,plugins are so great today,flexible and cheaper.

 

I'm also totally over HW. I used to lust for it, but now that I've experienced the benefits of having a solid ITB setup, I never want to go back to that mess of cables, noise, MIDI, recording etc.
Just gimme Diva, Oddity and Monark and I'm happy
Having said that, if I were to go and buy an analog today, I'd save up some cash and buy a Jupiter8 on Ebay.
But if I had to buy a newer synth, I'd go for a Moog OR a Prophet '08.
Actually, I think I'd go for a Prophet, yes.

To the OP; Roland's new AIRA boxes are *not* analog, they're essentially plugins in a box.

 

I just love this synth.
Yes, that would be my only piece of HW now.

 

DSI Prophet '08 module
Alesis Andromeda A6 (maybe second-handed)
Roland Jupiter 6 or 8 (maybe second-handed)
Moog Voyager RME
Korg MS-20 (maybe second-handed)
Roland TB-303 (maybe second-handed)
Arturia Minibrute

VA-hardware synths: Clavia Nord Lead (new ones or Nord 2X Rack), Waldorf Q/microQ (old ones but virus-like, nord-like sounding), Waldorf Blofeld, Novation SuperNova (another good one synth), Roland JP8080/8000, Virus TI (I have Virus C only).

Guys, if you want new Rolands, they are not good as were. AIRA TB-3 emulates TB-303 worse, than AudioRealism ABL (plugin emulates closer than hardware TB-3 by Roland) - there is site exists with tests. Don't buy this siht! It's marketing only like "modern tb303 gadget pad with sensor display, retina hd display and blah blah blah without a real tb-303 sound", it's a toy only. d16 Phoscyon does it better too. New Korgs, Rolands, Casios, Yamahas are 100 times worse than 70-80-90-s ones.

 

Our Russian Soviet "Moog": Polivoks/Polyvox (Поливокс) is a synth of my dream as well. If you find it - it'll be good for new disco/electrohouse/complextro etc. Crazy electro sounds! Soviety and Russian Moogy warmth!
Rarity

 

prophet 2, analog keys or sub 37 moog are the three i want....

 

if you want a synth that can produce any sounds you want, for all the electronic genres, with the big + of being able to seamlessly control everything from your daw, you should go with a Virus TI Desktop. you can put it 10 feet away from you, a simple usb cable connected to your pc, and you will be able to control everything, load-save presets or full banks, as midi files, automate everything.. and have up to 3 sounds sent through 3 independent stereo outs.

of course, others synths will give you different kinds of sounds, like prophets, waldorfs, etc... but the integration with your daw, its 26 soundbanks of 128 sounds each (it means the virus ti alone can have on its memory around 2500 sounds !!, and also, there are at least 100 commercial soundbanks for it (or maybe more, but less known), it will be a pleasure to just add one sound to slot 1(there are 16 different slots on the daw app), for example, a bass, then, slot 2, you click on another sound, like a pad, and it's loaded on slot 2, then, another sound on slot 3... (there are only 3 stereo outs... it means that if you use like 10 slots-sounds, some sounds will use the same audio out... but it's not a problem, when you need a track, you just export 1 slot and mute the others that are using the same midi channel or audio out)...

other synths, like the waldorf, will require lots of tweaks, before you can produce a single average bass or pad. on the virus, in 10 seconds, a simple detuned oscillator, a little delay, and you already have a killing lead sound.

when you save your cubase-live-etc project, the virus sounds are saved, even if your were using 10 different tracks with 10 different virus sounds... it will save everything. and for the soundbanks, you can easily send a bank to the virus memory, or load a sound from a .mid file, that you will put in the soundbanks folder, on your computer.

for anything house-trance-edm, you can't go wrong with a virus ti desktop. with the 2600 factory sounds, and all the soundbanks you can find on internet, you will have 3, 4, 6000 sounds, or even more... you may live 120 years, you won't be able to test them all...

one day, i would like to grab a roland integra-7, but roland haven't made a pc editor, yet ! there's a guy from japan that has made a pc editor... but roland made everything, the ipad app, the editor, for mac only, like the money from the pc guys stinks...
pff, how much it costs to roland, to grab a dev, and convert the mac code to pc code, and release that fking editor for pc as well ? we're talking about 1 or 2 months.. or even less.. i am sure there are many many pc guys, that haven't bought the integra-7, because there was-is no pc editor. and i guess roland made some kind of deal with, and they can't make a pc editor before a couple of years.. ?

back to the virus ti....
if i were you, i would save those 2500$, because i have a feeling, access music will release a new virus, in 2015. the virus ti is almost 10 years old. it's time for a new model, with more power, 16 independent outs, wavetable import, maybe an hybrid with 16 pads and a sampler...
i don't think access will only release a new synth in 4 or 5 years... since the ti came out, there have been many other synths, like the new waldorfs, new prophets, the new nordlead 4 is out, too.. and this one has always been the main competitor... IT'S IMPOSSIBLE to not have a new virus ti annouced next namm, in march 2015, with a release in june-september...

my advice : grab omnisphere, zebra and diva, and save your cash for 2015. you will thank me later

 

Yeah the integration and everything is a pain, but they are a great source of inspiration (i rather tweak a real knob) and fun. Plus i'm thinking of maybe buying the Analog four or a nord lead and a Op-1, the op-1 seems like portable fun and looks irresistible.

damn, i meant Hardware synth, not only analog

People have been saying that for quite awhile now...

Anyway i'm really tempted to buy the virus ti2 (or maybe a second hand ti ? There's not much of a difference between the two)

 

Yeah that's the point of hardware.
People comparing software to hardware don't get it. "my Diva sounds more analog than your Moooog"

You've mentioned TR8 + Moog Sub37 and that is a sick combo that would give me lots of happiness ^ ^
I remember trying the Sub Phatty for a good hour in the store with a smile on my face. And the Sub37 seems to be the step above...

Just give a try before you buy anything. That's music, not maths... there's feeling involved rather than specs.
Good luck

 

Whatever works for you in creative way than,I get more creative with plugins,can do more,different stuff for different people,if you want to have little creative lab,than get yourself cheaper second hand little of everything,do not go all in for something like Virus TI 2,get C or desktop TI 1,or you can get second hand something like Virus C,Nord Rack 2X,Moog Minitaur and others,money left to buy something more,but again,maybe you can have fun with anything else,there are so many plugins doing so close Virus,Nord,Moog and others it is really just matter of wanting hardware,personally I would skip most of the usual suspects and get something unique or something that can not be found that easily in software world,like good ringmod or some nice creative toy.i would recommend Native Instruments Reaktor.

 

if i had the money, i would love to have a prophet 12. but unless i win the lottery, that's not gonna happen.

 

Yeah, i tried all i could get my hand on but my local store doesn't have that much. Still i loved every synth they had!

Hella cool, too bad it's discontinued. Can't find one for a decent price, and when buying vintage synths there is always the risk of something breaking down with no repair.

Thats the main issue i'm thinking, Getting one big synth (virus or prophet) or buying several smaller ones.

 

I am big believer in less is more,but in this case in more is better,would take fewer smaller ones with C or TI over Virus TI 2,bigger sound palette covered,one thing fast becomes boring,so you start getting another to kill the monotony of life,it is hardware,there is no updates and it is basically it,not like Reaktor,which is crazy,but I guess you have your picks in software world and you want something to squeeze in hardware,get one than,squeeze it really good,but if you feel you can squeeze few more thing with same passion,get few more things instead,tricky stuff,personal too,you maybe have some personal taste and some piece of gear is just what you need,who knows.

 

For anyone considering a Virus Ti I'm just gonna warn you that the USB integration is not all it's cracked up to be. At times it can be a MASSIVE workflow killer when dealing with errors and routing it inside the DAW. The OSX 10.9 version of virus control was still in beta when Yosemite was released this week. Using a Macbook Pro with limited USB ports has also proved to be a bit of a PITA as access recommend you give the Virus it's own port rather than connect it to a hub with any other devices.

That said, it is great sounding digital-analog synth, very versatile and able to cover a wide variety of sounds but be prepared for some compromises due to the USB 1.1 hardware.

 

the andromeda is definitely one synth i would love to have.

one thing i hate with synth manufactures, is the preset numbers. the virus ti has 26x128 possible banks. the virus c has 8x128 = 1024 presets. but today, on +2500-3000$ synths, we barely have 512 slots for sounds. i mean, come on. a 2mb smartmedia card can store like 12'000 presets, on the jp8080. is it that complicated, to put some memory on these expensive synths, and allow 20-30- even 50 soundbank slots, each slot with 100 or 128 sounds. is it that expensive, FFS ?

i mean, it's not like putting an extra stereo out, or adding twice the polyphony... or having a color touch screen... we're talking about a simple 1mm chip, that must cost 0.50$ to integrate, to store and load a few bytes of data..

a simple question for those who have the chance to have both virus c and ti... is it me, or the virus c sounds do sound much warmer, less "plastic" and artificial, even with less effects... is it pure craziness, or the virus c sounds better,warmer, etc, than the TI ? any opinions ?



regarding the virus ti 2, it's true, every year, it's the same,,, "next year we'll get a new virus synth"... but it starts making a LOT of years... also, pretty much every band, every keyboardist, already own a virus snow, which is probably better for the scene than the big 61keys, i guess the virus ti sales aren't as good as the first years... when nobody had it. now, everybody and his dog has one. 2nd factor, during all these 10 years when access music has only sold the new virus ti, plenty of fantastic synths were made, like the new prophets, the new moogs, even small moogs for those who don't have tons of cash, but will still be able to get the moog sound...during these last 10 years, specially with daws like live, people moved from almost 100% hardware, to 100% all in the box... that's a big change, for hardware makers... maybe a good change.. or not..

and finally... access music... it's not like they have 50 different products. they have a virus ti, virus ti, and also.. virus ti. with all the people going 100% in the box, and with all other manufacturers making fantastic synths... access REALLY needs to come up with something great. their total integration(the TI) was an excellent thing. they need to release a new synth, that will connect to the daw via usb, and also some kind of hybrid Maschine system included.
those Elektron boxes are fantastic, can work great Live, can generate sounds, can be used as a drum machine, etc. i think the next virus ti 3 should be a mix of Polar, with a big screen, 16 pads, a arpeggio-sequencer, beat maker, a full synth, with wavetable loading + other synthesis techniques, and, who knows, some kind of DSP card, that would be used to generate sounds, and could also run vst plugins. if i'm not wrong, the virus ti uses the same shark chips as the UAD cards.many years ago, those chips (1000 items ordered) costed much less than 100$ each. when we see the dual shark on the virus ti, and the almost 3000 euros stores were selling them...
the new virus, in order to have a chance of being integrated on the hundreds thousands "all in the box" studios, i wish it was an even better synth than the virus ti2, with more polyphony, 16 independent stereo outs, 16 pads, a maschine-like hardware interface, and the possibility to load vst plugins directly on the synth, so the computer cpu doesn't suffer too much.

when we see a MAschine, which is basically a 1000 euros usb controller with 16 pads and some knobs... with absolutely no audio out... and still, people buy it like cakes, i wonder how a virus-like maschine, with sound creating capabilities, and a few extra featurers, etc, would sell.

so yes, i really believe 2015 will be the year of a new virus synth. also, i haven't mentioned the fact that SOFT synths today, can generate sounds as good and warm as a piece of hardware. i am sure an omnisphere vsti can sound much better than a roland integra-7 hardware, a motif xf, rolands, etc.

we'll see

 

Looks like you're gonna have a hard time deciding

If I was in your shoes (which I'm not) I'd start breaking down by answering several questions:

1) Will I play live or mostly studio?
2) Will my set-up be ITB or OTB?
3) What do I have to include in my budget other than the synth(s)?
4) Mono or Poly? Drum machine?

And the list goes on, but you should do your own in that spirit.
Avoid used stuff if you're not ready for maintenance.
When in doubt, don't buy, save your money... consumerism is a tricky bitch that YOU have to dominate, or she will strapon your a..

Hope it will help.

 

Okay after a loooooot of thinking, i'm down to 2 options

- Moog Sub 37 + Virus C

- Virus Ti2 + Sub phatty (or maybe a combination of other synths, maybe and op1 they seem cool)


What i'm going is for a good poly synth for pads and whatnot, and then i want a good mono synth.

What do you guys think?

Edit: the viruses are second hand (only way to stay in the budget)