question about EWQLSO Gold

[hummingbird]

Hi Zircon - I already have Silver & Silver XP Pro. I deliberately did not get Vista when I got the computer because my existing software only works with windows XP & I also didn't want to run into problems with a new operating system. I want to add Gold & Gold XP Pro so I have more sounds to play with. Much of my stuff is Goth .... a mix of classical elements with electronica.... and I'm also interested in new age. And pop-classical. Just need the sounds to create it. I'm frustrated with my lack of sounds to paint the ideas in my head.

[zircon]

Ah, in that case, it makes sense. I still think Kontakt 2 (later 3) is a superior option to PLAY right now, however, if and when you can put together the money for it. The ability to throw extra round robin or legato scripts on the patches is fantastic.

[davewalton]

Quote:Thanks everyone. Looks like I should just invest in the Gold bundle & forget about the Play thing for now. I can upgrade in the future if necessary. I too don't like buying new versions of things... I've seen the bad stuff that can happen when the bugs aren't worked out. Seems like $500 is a good price for the Gold Bundle. I'd love to get EZ Drummer at the same time... but with the Rally coming up, not sure if I can swing it all.HThe one thing I really focused on when I was first getting the foundations of my virtual instruments together is overall balance and "what am I really missing?". In my case I went with Silver initially because if I went with Gold then I couldn't get Stormdrum and/or Stylus RMX. That would have been a little unbalanced... heavy in the orchestral department while being too light in the drums/percussion department. Gold XP is a steal at $495 or whatever the current price is but if there's something that you feel is really missing from your virtual instrument collection, a hole that needs to be filled, that's something to consider as well. Also there's the thinking that "as long as I'm spending $500, what's another $150?". Sometimes that's true, especially if the $150 is buying something really useful that can return $$$ in the form of more forwards and deals.Just thought I'd muddy up the waters and make decision making more difficult.

[hummingbird]

thanks for muddying the waters, Dave what you say makes sense, though. Because what's missing the most from my compositions right now is decent percussion. So perhaps Stylus or EZ Drummer now is the best choice. Thanks for helping me figure out my priorities So now let me ask.... what's the difference between Stylus RMX and EZ Drummer.... and where can I buy 'em?H

[zircon]

You can pick up both of those products at Sweetwater. They are not really similar, aside from both producing percussive parts.Stylus RMX has a wide variety of samples in a multitude of genres, with most leaning towards the electronic and urban. You won't find many standard acoustic loops, and if you're simply looking to do a realistic drumline for your song, this is not what you want. However, the built in material is FANTASTIC for embellishments, flourishes, and unusual percussion. The patch organization is incredible - you can load the kicks from one loop, the bongos from another, the hats from a third, and the djembes from a fourth.The plugin itself is eight part multitimbral (so you can have up to 8 loops, components, or 'sound menus' which are like drum kits) and each part can have its own EQ, filters, multi-effects, mixing, and so forth. RMX also features a "Chaos Designer" which allows you to randomize loops very easily and create endless variations. Additionally, ALL loops sync flawlessly to tempo, and the audio engine is rock solid... I've never had ANY crashes or stability problems.Honestly I could write essays on how much stuff you can do with RMX and I still wouldn't be scratching the surface. Luckily, the plugin comes with lots of video tutorials that show you exactly how to do pretty much everything. It is perhaps my #1 favorite virtual instrument and I don't think any musician should be without it. Period!!!As for EZ Drummer, I don't personally that one, but the jist of it is that it is oriented towards 'real' drums. The primary draw is that it combines well-mixed & processed acoustic samples with a massive library of MIDI files, allowing you to very quickly set up a good-sounding backing track. This product was created in response to increasingly complicated and unwieldy plugins like DFS and BFD, which, while sounding great, take a lot of effort to set up and use properly. EZ Drummer has competitive sound quality and has a reasonable amount of editing depth, but is generally much easier to get good results with.

[mazz]

I have both Stylus and EZ drummer and they are both fantastic, for different reasons and uses. Zircon said it very well but I want to amplify something about Stylus that doesn't get discussed much and that is its ability to load REX file libraries. I have all of my REX libraries converted to use with Stylus and this opens these loops up to the whole suite of possibilites available in Stylus. I've created basslines and guitar parts in Stylus from using REX files. It's truly a fantastic piece of software.EZ drummer's strengths are, for me, the drum sounds, the mixer and the MIDI loops. The expansion sets are very good also. For more "regular" drum parts, EZ drummer is a no-brainer, particularly for the price. There are 3rd party companies (Groove Monkee for one) coming out with MIDI loops mapped to EZ drummer and ToonTrak has some new software coming out that will map any MIDI loop to EZ drummer so it opens up a whole universe of possibilities. The mixer allows tweaking of the drumkit sounds from totally dry 70s to super "roomy" sounds and anything in between. The mixer isn't as flexible as bFD but that's a good thing when you need to get the job done quickly! The thing about EZ drummer in contrast to Stylus is that most of the loops have more fills and intros available which is a good thing when creating drum parts meant to simulate a real drummer. Stylus has some great expansions like Backbeat but even there on some loops the quantity of fills is smaller. In a pinch, I'd rather burn through a list of fills to find one rather than micro-tweak the MIDI notes in a Stylus track.To summarize: Apples and Oranges.Mazz

[sgs4u]

I have both Stylus RMX and EZdrummer as well Vikki. Mazz' and Zirc's description of the 2 programs are very perfect. They've been very thorough. But I don't know if they are taking the type of music you make into account. No offense, you masters! I have listened to a lot of your music, and I do wanna make a suggestion. Perhaps the type of music your make, may be better suited to Stylus, than EZdrummer. I find Stylus much better for inventive rythms, especially electronic stuff. It also has tons of looped patterns, you can trigger easily just by holding down any note (you can't trigger entire patterns with only one note in EZdrummer), and individual midi drum patterns as well. EZdrummer is great when you want to create a very realistic drum track, that sounds like it's a real drummer. But to really make EZ drummer tracks sound like a traditional drummer, it will depend on your ability to think like a drummer. There are zillions of fill patterns & stuff in EZdrummer, so it's very possible.My opinion, is that Stylus will get you further down your road with less work. Especially if you start learning how to use parts of loops for different sounds, like Zirc said. Trying to edit individual hits in Stylus is a little more time consuming than EZdrummer, when Stylus is being used in pattern mode. Ezdrummer doesn't have all the awesome percussion, it's mostly great sounding real drums. I think most of your songs will benefit more from the increased options Stylus has. They are Apples and Oranges, but ya can't make Apple Pie with Oranges... For the stuff I'm doing right now(country and traditional R&B), EZdrummer is actually better. Combining them is truly TOO MANY options for me to think about, I'm dizzy. If you wanna PM me, I can explain more.

[matto]

Steve's making an excellent point here.EZ Drummer is a great choice if you do a lot of music that requires realistic sounding "real drum kit" parts. Styles such as country, rock, modern rock etcIf you don't do a lot of these styles then I wouldn't put EZ at the top of my list.I don't own it personally, I use a variety of other things for "real" drums, but even if I did I'm sure I wouldn't use it on every track given the mix of styles I'm doing.RMX is a great choice for really everything else. It is probably my most used piece of software, and it's quite rare for me to do a cue that doesn't have at least one RMX part in it. If you do get it you should consider supplementing it with the excellent "Liquid Grooves" expander which opens it up to yet and entire new world of more "organic" grooves which are in relative short supply in the core library it comes with.As others have said, the grooves in RMX are phenomenal, but what you can do with them is even more mindblowing.

[mazz]

Very clear, Steve and Matto. I wasn't recommending one over the other but I agree, for most of what Vikki's been writing and submitting, Stylus is a better choice. It is in every one of my templates no matter what I'm working on. Even if it's a more standard tune and EZ drummer is the main drumkit, Stylus is good for congas, tambourines, cowbells, etc. Being a bit of a pig I have all of the expanders and they are all fantastic but Liquid Grooves gets a lot of use in my stuff as well.Stylus!!!!!!!Mazzus

[mazz]

Quote:If you're planning on buying it, the upgrade to PLAY will definitely be worth doing. The big thing about PLAY is that you can load a whole orchestra on one 64-bit machine, as opposed to a stack of machines with the Kontakt Player version. Yeah it's a little buggy now, but they'll get it together. And they just released a new version today; I haven't installed it yet, but I'm sure it's better.Nick, are you talking about the Play update of the 10th of October or a new one that was sent to you ahead of us civilians? If it's the latter, do tell!! Otherwise, the release on the 10th did fix a lot of the isses in Digital Performer as far as Play interferring with other windows and keystrokes. Thanks,Mazz