I think vst emulation of virus will be higher quality, because:
1. VST emulation might be either 32 or 64 bit float, so higher dynamic range, less quantization noise and truncation. Or in the worst case, if they completely emulated chips, it will be same as virus, 24 bit internal, i don't know. So, same or better, digitally. But synth by itself has its own noise when I switch it.
2. Hardware VirusC synth has DA converter, quality of those earliest 2000s years, so, extra filtration, extra aliasing, 24 bit, truncation, digital noise, subtlest crosstalk, IMD/THD, blah blah. Also, from Virus C DAC it goes to cables/connectors, result is wire analog noise/hiss, hum, interference, other cable stuff. Then these cables go to your 24-bit ADC converter/soundcard. Again, its noise, IMD/THD, antialiasing filtration, still unfiltered aliasing if bad filters, 144dB theoretical dynamic range (usually it is way less), crosstalk etc etc...

VST may be way cleaner, more transparent, less noisier, not affected by synth's DAC, wires/connecters, ADC converter audio-interface. Imagine it as a full synth completely ported right into your DAW; a code from digital hardware, chips and components, all the circuit. No need to emulate Virus sound by spire, sylenth, z3ta, vanguard, hive, synthmaster etc anymore.

 

It would be nice if the plugin could run multithreaded. But since it's emulating one chip I doubt it. Maybe if you assign each voice to a separate emulated chip.

 

No VST is going to sound as good as the DAC's in the Virus TI for example. Ask anyone who owns a TI and has actually tested the TI's Analog outs vs the Spdif digital outs. Code isn't everything ,and the Dac's are alot of what makes them sound so special. Fwiw I own a TI2 and Spdif digital outs don't do it any justice imo. Especially when you connect it to a great interface capable of high end AD converters to capture the synth as it's meant to be. Not trying to downplay this effort, but lets be clear, I also own a powercore virus B and it's evident that code alone doesn't reveal what makes the hardware as special. cheers!

 

Last edited: May 21, 2021

I personally disagree and this video is the reason why.

Listening to both the Korg M1 plugin, and the actual hardware, the hardware is definitely a bit musical and preferable imo. it's a bit warmer, darker and more punchier whereas the plugin sounds more neutral and treble'y on some patches, which is probably because of the converters (or lack their of). I'm personally a fan of the former, but ymmv and you can warm it in the mix anyway. The drums on the vst are unfortunately poor and sound like there is a giant filter on it. That aside though, the patches are so ridiculously close that I'd find it hard to want to shell out hundreds of dollars for the hardware. What clinches it is having ALL of the cards onboard which might be rare or expensive if you're trying to track them down one by one. All for about less than $100 makes the plugin a complete steal.

Time will tell, but I feel it's going to be the same with any of these DSP synths. Yes, they'll sound 10% different, less warm, punchy, etc because it's a plugin going straight into a DAW rather than converters that are machined and assembled. But we're talking about splitting hairs. These are digital synths running through digital filters and they have the exact ROM files. The "raw" sound will be completely identical and compressors, saturators, etc will get you any warmth or fullness that's missing.

Will that make it sounds 100% like the hardware? No. But at that point, does it matter? u-he Repro1/5 and the very best analog emulations don't sound 110% like the hardware they model -- because of differences between exact units, age, etc. But the soul of the synths are successfully captured.

It's especially the case with all these DSP synths, many of which have no plugin available at all to-date. While I don't mean to take away your experience with using the hardware and do agree that there will be a hair difference that may never be captured, I think everyone will be more than grateful that these plugins exist, even if they don't sound 110% identical.

 

You got it!
Not necessary as real box. It could be VST with emulation of audio paths from popular devices - synths, samplers, etc. Like some kind of IRs, I dunno.
I've dreamed about this for years

I think, Roland did something like this in Cloud with their ACB/ABM technologies

 

Anyway, why you all complaining.
It will be the first plugin Virus you get as an exact copy from hardware, without DAC and need to digitize, open source, free. A freebie powercore-style. Maybe it will not 100%, but 97 or 99% or 99.995485869%. But who fuck cares? Teens? Trap kids? Trance House fans? We even haven't work with it yet, heard a several demo only. I think if it is same, people still will say it is not exact, "I miss the noise from wires, aliasing from my converters etc", - if you want this, make a loop from your plugin and your converter like this: DAC - wire - ADC. Will be way closer to extra shit you miss.

 

For the God sake, nobody is complaining about missing this feature in this Virus emulation) It will be heavens gift as is) Espesially for free)))
I'm tracking it from beginning of this thread with crossed fingers, with gratitude to this noble guys)
As being said, Waldorf/Nord/Supernova also will be great addition

And still, some kind of independent plugin with audiopath emulation will be useful in many tasks.

I'm not sure if it helps, but here a lot of dumps and roms: just google for "dbwbp"

 

Last edited: May 22, 2021

Is there an audio demo available? link plz.

 

Yeah, it's definitely far off from any sort of demo yet, even though this project seems to be moving quite fast all things considered. The GUI needs to be finished, all the parameters mapped out, the emulator itself running at higher speeds -- more work ahead for sure.

 

Most of the ALU instructions for the JIT have been implemented now, some of the team are busy with real life stuff at the minute (normal jobs)

GUI is pretty near finished, then it’s a case of coding the knobs/other elements of the GUI to communicate with the Virus ROM, but we may release a headless version first that will work with VirusHC

Work has started on some of the Waldorf ROMs, MicroQ/MW2

 

Is Waldorf Q planned?

 

Yes eventually

 

Amazing! The only word i can find to describe this project is "a-m-a-z-i-ng" ! Wish you all the best !!!

 

Now you're speaking my language!

While it does make a bit more sense to just start with the Q since it's got a few more features over it's little brother like the sequencer, PPG filter, etc, I do want to stress as a huge aficionado of this particular synth and twice owner of the MicroQ (both blue, though I wish I had one in yellow ) that the MicroQ and Q sound identical to each other. The Q was powered by several Motorola chips, while the MicroQ was powered by a single souped-up chip. The Q has got a few tricks over the MicroQ like a Sequencer to pair with the arpeggiator, Xphorm morphing between patches, Filter Routing interpolation i.e you can morph smoothing between Parallel and Serial which gets you some interesting modulation effects versus the MicroQ where there is just a simple button to select either Parallel or Serial and nothing in-between...but the sound-quality hasn't been reduced at all. Ironically, the MicroQ has way more voices - the Q has 16 voices and be bumped to 32 with an upgrade, but the MicroQ's maximum number of dynamic voices is 75. More than one user has preferred having a MicroQ to the Q, so it's a bit more like apples and oranges versus a flagship versus the budget edition.

The insane price of the Q, something I've never been able to get my hold on, has more to do with the real-time layout and all those knobs which is admittingly more performance friendly like how the Novation Supernova was repackaged into the Novation Nova (which I also owned). The Q rackmount typically goes for over $2000 dollars on the second-hand market which is as expensive as whole keyboards, with the Q keyboard usually going for $3000 . It's insane, even as a fan, but I've never believed this huge price gorging over a used MicroQ (which typically goes for $500) was because of a huge bump in the sound quality. It's all in the layout with the MicroQ being more a tone-generator for studio-use and the Q being more of a centerpiece performance instrument.

It's a bit redundant if the Waldorf Q is also going to join the DSP synth line-up for this project eventually, but I only stress as the MicroQ isn't a cookie cutter version. It's a tiny yellow beast, with or without the Q, and patches sound practically identical.

I'm really excited to see them both in due time!

 

Last edited by a moderator: May 22, 2021

Nah we don't complain, I said is an amazing news, and I only added the concrete concept of the sound that at the final stage has to be processed by something called converter that giving it a special character, and would be amazing to emulate it too.
We love to discuss about AD/DA, Synths, electronic gear and so on....it's what the best we got here after sex (lol)! Is a simply speaking about in the respect of other ppl. ;)

 

Man: how u can't hear the big difference in a character in a same patch in a Q and a microQ?
I was one of the first in Europe to to get em from the old Waldorf guys, differences are like night and day by the converters quality in first, then all the rest u said-- filter routing, filters, morphing, fx quality and type, filters PPG auto oscillation resonance..
Basically the synth structure is the same but the sound isn't, as u can see the final converter quality stage is really important.

 

This is the exact reason why the MicroQ has been chosen next, I’m not sure how a CPU would handle several chips being emulated at once. It may turn out that we can’t do the Q at all due to how many DSPs it has, but I’m sure we will find out sooner or later

 

Hats of for this massive effort, You guys ROCK!