Plug-in Sales and Special Deals Sticky Topic

[cuttime]

This begs the obvious question:

Would you say it "RAISES the obvious question"? "Begs the question" is one of those phrases that enough people have used incorrectly that its meaning has changed.

It's a moot point these days.

[monkey man]

Moot point. There's another one!

This begs the obvious question:

Would you say it "RAISES the obvious question"? "Begs the question" is one of those phrases that enough people have used incorrectly that its meaning has changed. So there's no point in being pissy about it (yet, here I am).

Thank you, Stubbsy! I actually dwelled on the word choice for a moment, but a decent alternative didn't spring immediately to mind. I seriously didn't want to buy into the trend; I've been guilty of that on more occasions than I'm comfortable with.

I'm amazed I didn't think of "raises"; to my mind it's the most-obvious-and-appropriate word to have used. Edited with a sense of accomplishment, brother! Thanks man.

Those videos with a vocal or cello won't reveal the weaknesses of a reverb the way a percussive track will.

Amen to that. There's a DP video of a fella comparing a hardware Bricasti unit to the equivalent IRs in ProVerb. Utterly useless, 'cause in addition to the fact that the acoustic guitar played constantly with no pauses (how are we supposed to hear the tails?), the 'verb was mixed at least as low as one might've in a final mix, probably much lower. I struggled and strained, but learned nothing.

At least there was a bunch of percussive demos of VVV on Soundcloud, so I got to hear it on my crappy Mac speaker. Definitely does the grainy '80s-'verb thing pretty well. Could be handy in helping something to pop(!) out of a mix. I must say 'though, and this is obviously only based upon what I heard from the Mac speaker, the plug, at least based upon the algorithms I heard, was quite harsh-sounding. Sometimes that's what you want 'though. It won't be often in my case, but at that price it might be worth having.

I've always had such nice luck with my lexicon mpx-1s reverb. (I'm regretting selling it). It's one of those reverbs that once I dialed it a little, I didn't feel like hiding it as much as other reverbs which I almost felt ashamed of.

This, for me, is one of the main attractions for pretty much all of Lex's algorithms. It's not nearly as critical to get the 'verb mix absolutely right; there's plenty of wriggle room 'cause it's tough to overdo it, IMHO. To my mind, it's like a great tube-mic (and appropriate tube processing) vocal sound, where it seems as if there's a much-wider target range for the final mix level. Perhaps it's just a typical characteristic of super-pro gear, especially analogue-based stuff. The fact that the Lex algo's fall into this category speaks volumes(!) about their quality IMHO.

Thanks again, mate.

VintageVerb has more 'stuff', while being able to reproduce the original Lex stuff quite well.

On the topic of the deal though, SparkVerb for $99 is an amazing deal. It's a very quick to use plugin where you can get good results from minimal effort. If you wish to delve in then you can.

I suggest watching this ~9minute video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wC0-3rZWbMY to get a feel of how efficient the workflow is with Sparkverb.

Thank you, Robert!

Much appreciated, mate.

[bayswater]

Moot point. There's another one!

No flies on you.

[monkey man]

... except for when I don't wash my hands after flingin' poo, Stoivo.

OK, so does anyone know if the Lex site accepts PayPal? I could only see a credit-card option. If I didn't know any better I'd say it looked as if they were catering only to the well-heeled, high-end-audio crowd... but I know better than to say that.

I put in a request for clarification, which will apparently be responded to within 24 hours. Failing a timely response I may have to go with Sweetwater after all; I was simply hoping to cut out the middle man, so to speak. A gesture of my love and respect for the brand, if nothing else.

Now, my humble opinion about SparkVerb:
IMHO, whilst it is capable of smooth, classy, pro-sounding results, I'm underwhelmed with the tonal variety on offer. To my ears, it sounds like a single algorithm; one "sound", if you will. Sure, it can be bottom-rich, warm in the mid range or crisp in the high end. It can be more fluttery or as dense and smooth as you like, but, again it sounds very samey to me, as if it's a single algorithm that's affected by nothing more than damping and density levels, along with EQ.

That said, the Freeze function, at least, is something a little out of the ordinary, and helps set it apart from the crowd. The "Universal", graphically-based preset-morphing function does little for me other than to drive home the fact that one is merely mixing the aforementioned parameters up, all within a single algorithm. IOW, it reveals just how limited the character variety on offer truly is.

If I'd paid $200, I'd have rated it my most-useless-and-disappointing plugin purchase yet. At $100 it will reside in my folder as nothing more than a novelty that I might call upon once in a blue moon. I can see it's being handy occasionally for EDM, but if that style is your bag, I'd recommend Black Hole over it any day of the week.

There. I'm not big on negative reviews, but those are my honest initial impressions, and because I love you guys, I shared 'em.

Sooo... c'mon Lexicon. I's a waitin' for a re-titty-sponse...

[billf]

OK, so does anyone know if the Lex site accepts PayPal?

Sweetwater accepts PayPal. Also, AudioDeluxe accepts PayPal and has the Lexicon bundle discounted to $232 USD (with code HOTSUMMER).

[monkey man]

Oh yes, I assumed everyone else would accept it, Billy; I see it as bad business practice to do otherwise.

Hmm... I wonder what AD is doing the combined PCM bundle for; could be an option, brother.

I saw on the Lex site that they've had one Black Friday 50%-off deal (2014 I think), and at least two Summer deals like the current one, so waiting for Black Friday doesn't seem like the safe bet I was hoping it would be.

Thank you for the heads-up, matey, and I hope you're well!

[monkey man]

Thank you so much again, Billy!

Only one tiny problem now - I can't find a link to download the files!

Searching...

[monkey man]

OK, it looks like they're just slow processing the order (I hope); I thought download links would appear straight away. Oh well.

You know, I think I'm beginning to see why so many of you guys are addicted to buying plugins. Man, Audiodeluxe is insane to browse from the products list. So many excellent prices, and so much... stuff!

Oh how I wish I was a little better-off financially. Straight off the bat, I reckon Polyverse's I Wish, Waves' Aphex Vintage Aural Exciter, API Collection and MaxxVolume, McDSP's FutzBox Native v6 and PSP's 608 MultiDelay would be things I'd buy without blinking, especially at the prices they're at now. The 608 is $49. FutzBox is $74. Aural Exciter $89. MaxxVolume $69... and on it goes.

This is torture for someone like me! Thank you so much for putting me onto AD, Billy. Yeah, thanks a lot, bud. NOT, you bastard!

James, I completely sympathise with your problem, and so too with the rest of my fellow 'Cornies. I just hope and pray that I'll be able to adhere to my prescribed-and-honed M.O. of sticking to only a few reputable companies, avoiding cross-over features and maintaining (and building first) a lean and mean collection. Music will have to be the focus, and I fear I'm extremely susceptible to f-arounditis. Choice-overload will be the end of any creative drive I'm able to muster once this incredibly-long journey towards producing product has been completed.

For the record, I've just been set back 13 months due to the wholesaler's having gone under... with my lay-buy for the AVB system... over a year's worth of sacrifice, and only the final instalment to be paid. I've not said anything about it for fear of self-sabotage as there's still hope (not much, really) of flushing the critter out of the bushes (he's located inter-state), but I don't want to scare the natives...

Oookay. That's my contra-titty-distribution for the day. Phew!

Love you guys, and will see you soon hopefully. Thank you again Billy, Stubbsy, Robert and Terry for helping me out. Oh, and think hard about whether or not you need SparkVerb, folks... IMHO for now...

[billf]

OK, it looks like they're just slow processing the order (I hope); I thought download links would appear straight away. Oh well.

AudioDeluxe does the licenses and download links via email, and does it manually. So it can take about one day, but I've purchased quite a lot from them and never had an issue.

You know, I think I'm beginning to see why so many of you guys are addicted to buying plugins. Man, Audiodeluxe is insane to browse from the products list. So many excellent prices, and so much... stuff!

Oh how I wish I was a little better-off financially. Straight off the bat, I reckon Polyverse's I Wish, Waves' Aphex Vintage Aural Exciter, API Collection and MaxxVolume, McDSP's FutzBox Native v6 and PSP's 608 MultiDelay would be things I'd buy without blinking, especially at the prices they're at now. The 608 is $49. FutzBox is $74. Aural Exciter $89. MaxxVolume $69... and on it goes.

This is torture for someone like me! Thank you so much for putting me onto AD, Billy. Yeah, thanks a lot, bud. NOT, you bastard!

Welcome to the Plugin Club! The secret handshake instructions and your membership card are in the mail.

[Phil O]

Roxio is running a sale on Toast 14 Pro. $75.

[mikehalloran]

Roxio is running a sale on Toast 14 Pro. $75.

Cult of Mac regularly carries it for $49.
https://deals.cultofmac.com/sales/roxio ... ium_043016

I don't know if it includes the BluRay plugin that's included when you buy it from OWC for $59.
https://eshop.macsales.com/item/Roxio/R ... aQod8DkOdA

I still use it. With the changes to Disk Utility and iTunes, I like that Toast works the way it's supposed to. 14.1 appears to be relatively bug free (unlike vs 11–12).

The video portion is available from the App Store, too.

[millahjovich]

It seems XLR is doing a 50% off sale on XLN plugs. I've had Addictive Drums 1 for years and liked it. You can get Addictive Drums 2 right now for $99.95 and then when you add it to your cart, the price drops to $79.20. This might only be good till July 7... that's what it was at AudioDeluxe.

[Phil O]

Cult of Mac regularly carries it for $49.

Wow. Thanks, Mike.

[Shooshie]

This begs the obvious question:

Would you say it "RAISES the obvious question"? "Begs the question" is one of those phrases that enough people have used incorrectly that its meaning has changed.

It's a moot point these days.

I beg you one question and raise you another! I've got a moot flush! (or is it a straight moot?)

Shoosh

[Phil O]

I prefer a cup moot when begging.