Plug-in Sales and Special Deals Sticky Topic

[James Steele]

East West is having a Memorial Day Sale with 60% off libraries.

https://www.soundsonline.com/memorial-day-sale

It may be an oldie, but I wanted to dip my toe in the East West waters as I never owned any of their libraries before, so I go an oldie but seemingly versatile one on sale: Goliath.

[mikehalloran]

Some of us are big fans of the bx_limiter True Peak. A number of Brainworx products now contain this limiter including the recently released bx_masterdesk_pro and all are on sale for $39.99.

https://www.plugin-alliance.com/en/products.html

I'm not certain that I would buy Masterdesk Pro if I owned any of the others (as I do) but, if not, that's the one I would go for.

https://www.plugin-alliance.com/en/prod ... k_pro.html

Plugin Alliance has sales all the time so it will likely come around again. Still, it's a major improvement over MOTU's MW Limiter that I found useless in my virtual choirs—which is what drove me to True Peak in the first place.

MW Limiter is long overdue for a bug fix and I was able to demonstrate why to MOTU back in January.

[stubbsonic]

https://www.audiothing.net/effects/things-fold/

The demo cleverly applied it kind of tastefully on different source material. The envelope follower makes it a much more useful thingy.

[mikehalloran]

https://www.audiothing.net/effects/things-fold/

The demo cleverly applied it kind of tastefully on different source material. The envelope follower makes it a much more useful thingy.

I've been bombarded w/ email about this for a few days, now.

A bit of fun, kind of interesting and I spent more than $9 on lunch today. Oh what the hell, I probably won't respect myself in the morning.

[James Steele]

MW Limiter is long overdue for a bug fix and I was able to demonstrate why to MOTU back in January.

It makes me wonder if it’s not on their list of priorities just because MOTU understands that these days just about everybody is using some sort of third-party solution for that. I’m sure whatever algorithms MOTU is in MW Limiter using must be decades old by now.

[James Steele]

Not a plugin sale... but Acasis is running a pretty great sale on drive enclosures (NVMe, etc.). Way better prices than what I paid on Amazon not long ago:

https://www.acasis.com/

[mikehalloran]

Not a plugin sale... but Acasis is running a pretty great sale on drive enclosures (NVMe, etc.). Way better prices than what I paid on Amazon not long ago:

https://www.acasis.com/

I have an 8TB blade sitting in one of their TBU405 fanless enclosures. It normally runs slightly warm to the touch which is great. Last week, however, I migrated my NI libraries from my system drive and the 2.3TB file transfer got the enclosure quite warm—not enough io burn my hand but I was wishing that I'd sprung for the TBU405 ProM1 with the switchable fan instead.

[James Steele]

Not a plugin sale... but Acasis is running a pretty great sale on drive enclosures (NVMe, etc.). Way better prices than what I paid on Amazon not long ago:

https://www.acasis.com/

I have an 8TB blade sitting in one of their TBU405 fanless enclosures. It normally runs slightly warm to the touch which is great. Last week, however, I migrated my NI libraries from my system drive and the 2.3TB file transfer got the enclosure quite warm—not enough io burn my hand but I was wishing that I'd sprung for the TBU405 ProM1 with the switchable fan instead.

Yeah... I remember when I first transferred my samples library from my spinner to the 2TB NVMe in their fanless enclosure. It got pretty warm. Same when I later migrated it over from the 2TB NVMe to the 4TB NVMe also in the same fanless enclosure. I, too, wish I popped for the one with the fan, but so far after that initial large transfer I don't seem to be having heat issues. I do wonder how much noise the enclosures with a fan makes?

[mikehalloran]

…
I do wonder how much noise the enclosures with a fan makes?

According to their marketing:

TBU405 is base version (Tool-free Installation), while TBU405ProM1 (Tool-free Installation + Built-in Silent Fan)

I am thinking about getting another enclosure but am not thrilled by the current price on 8TB NVMe blades. I might get a 4TB for now, pop it into the TBU405 and install my 8TB into the TBU405ProM1.

Apparently, I bought the very last OWC 8TB NVMe 3 x4 blade on closeout last year. These have been superseded by NVMe4 x4 and, while faster in a PCI4 bus on a Win machine designed for it, the TB3/4/USB4 pipe cannot accommodate higher speeds.

[James Steele]

United Plug-ins Royal Compressor $5

https://unitedplugins.com/royalcompressor/

[mikehalloran]

I have a lot of upright bass VIs and the one thing that most have in common is that I dislike them. This one is different and has a number of legato figures that I’ve already found useful. In addition, it has a selection of noises that you can add—pretty cool. Requires the paid version of Kontakt.

https://musicalsampling.com/the-upright/

I’m not a fan of close-mic’d basses but this one is less ‘in your face’ than most and blends into a lot of the acoustic music that I’m producing right now. Anyway, I popped for it and used it on a pair of tracks today.

Wishing I had the foresight to make VIs of my ‘51 Kay Swingmaster S-59 and my gut strung Mittenwald basses when I could still play. I’ve cribbed something from recorded tracks but it would have been better had I sampled them on purpose.

[labman]

Had never heard of https://www.acasis.com/. Thank you for that lead! Are they driverless, and do they have a solid multi nvme unit?

[mikehalloran]

Had never heard of https://www.acasis.com/. Thank you for that lead! Are they driverless, and do they have a solid multi nvme unit?

External drives do not require drivers.

They do show a couple of multi-NVMe units but are out of stock and promising new redesigned units. The issue with multiple blades is the number of lanes. A single blade enclosure can access all 4 lanes of data simultaneously. In a twin blade box, each blade can access 2 lanes while, in a quad unit, each blade is slowed down to 1 lane. Doesn’t matter how many are actually installed, the limitations are unchanged. There are “soft RAID” workarounds from Apple and 3rd party vendors but no one recommends them for critical data. Sample drives that are kept backed up and not generally considered critical. Likewise, 1 or 2 lane speeds for samples and archive are usually fast enough.

A few companies offer hardware RAID but Acasis is not one of them — yet? If they do offer hardware RAID in their new boxes, I will be very interested.

The maximum data speed for 4 lanes is 2800 over USB4/TB3/4. 2-lane is 1500 and 1-lane is 1000, same as USB 3.2 gen2 (was USB 3.1). Apple supports 2-lane speeds over Thunderbolt 2/3/4 and USB4 only.

[stubbsonic]

I have a lot of upright bass VIs and the one thing that most have in common is that I dislike them. This one is different and has a number of legato figures that I’ve already found useful. In addition, it has a selection of noises that you can add—pretty cool. Requires the paid version of Kontakt.

https://musicalsampling.com/the-upright/

I’m not a fan of close-mic’d basses but this one is less ‘in your face’ than most and blends into a lot of the acoustic music that I’m producing right now. Anyway, I popped for it and used it on a pair of tracks today.

Thanks for the link. In one of the demos, I was hearing quite a bit of smallish room in the sound. Are the samples fairly dry? Or were they recorded in a smallish room? I suppose that's one advantage to close-micing is that you don't hear the walls as much.

As an aside, I've been playing more fretless these past couple years, and have enjoyed playing through IR's that "fake" a resonator body. It's not entirely convincing but it is satisfying & fun.

[mikehalloran]

…
Thanks for the link. In one of the demos, I was hearing quite a bit of smallish room in the sound. Are the samples fairly dry? Or were they recorded in a smallish room? I suppose that's one advantage to close-micing is that you don't hear the walls as much.
…

Based on the first demo, I never would have bought it. The second demo sold me and the third was ok. I played around with Bonus Beefy Legato till I got what I liked.

Patches
• Master Legato
• Bonus Beefy Legato
• Performance Sustains
• Body Perc & Room Tone
• Fret Slides
Features
• Legato, plucked upright bass
• Three legato articulations activated by velocity

In the YouTube video, he goes into how he doesn't believe in videos that explain everything—so he doesn't. I find that refreshing.

Hindsight is always 20-20, right? I had three nice basses incl a 5-string strung differently and could have made sample libraries with my favorite ribbon mic set up about 10' away in the church where I was working before my stroke in 2009.

My ideal tone is similar to many of Bill Lee's (Spike's dad) and Dick Kniss's (PPM's touring bassist) folk and jazz recordings in the 1960s. They both played on Album 1700, BTW, with Lee on "Leaving on a Jet Plane" and Kniss on "What's Her Name".