EFFECTS in Cubase SX3
 

How do you rate the quality of the effects in SX3?

What dedicated software effects package should I look at if I want decent (similar to Lexicon MXP1) reverbs, delay, chorus, phaser etc etc. I think i would prefer to use effects within a host as to hardware. Dont get me wrong, I like hardware....but im thinking of changing the way I do things...

Any ideas guys?

Cheers

DS

the steinberg plugins are rated avarage minus compering to some of the plugins out there,
about what plugins to get,thats up to your budget.

i would mainly look at a good channel strip plugin and a decent delay and reverb plugin.

I find roomworks and the magneto useful sometimes. The rest are poor substitutes TBH. The 'mastering' tools are truly crap IMHO for the task - useful for single inserts at best and I dont really like any of the compressors. For comparison, I think the mclass stuff in Reason v3 is way way better - shame they aint made available as a plugin suite.

They are all useable - but expect them to steal character rather than add. TBH - I think they are far worse then even the cheapet and nastiest hardware I have used - I mena go buy a loads of cheap behringer stuff second hand and the result will be way better.

I recently added a UAD-1 ultra-pak and 'precision multi-band compressor - very pleased with the results so far, though I havnt polished a track with them yet.

A number of people here swear by the TC powercore plugins as well - Ive not used them, by they are definately on my 'for consideration' list.

Sony Oxford mastering suits apparently has a very good rep as well.

For general stuff - theres loads of really useful characterful plugins in the ultra-pak.

I guess as with anything - yr pays for what yr gets - I do think that steinberg were a bunch of lame ass cheap skates when it came to the plug-ins they bundled with SX3. You get more useful plugins with tracktion v1 ffs. That and a whole bunch of other things have made me very cynical about steinberg...

I absolutely hate Steinberg's reverbs. Metallic, ringy, harsh, eugh.

The only thing I use is the VST Dynamics channel (it has gate, compressor, saturation and limiter all in one plug). The reason being that the compressor in VST Dynamics is the only software compressor that I can get to easily "pump".

Ideal settings to get hardware VCA type compressors to "pump" would normally be a hard-knee, with very high ratio, average attack (say 20 to 40ms, to let the transients of the drums through to add punch), really fast release, and finally a low threshold (but high enough to allow the compression to return to 0 dynamic reduction on the tail end of the "pump"). Apart from the VST Dynamics plugin, most other software compressor don't seem to want to pump, why's that then?!

Again contrary to Khazul, I quite like the Mastering Edition multiband compressor. Seems to add a nice and immediate "processed" quality to stuff running through it. I use it in synchrony with the free Endorphin compressor by DigitalFishPhones, and they seem to work really well together. I only tend to use these on already mastered commercial tunes, though, to give them a "radio broadcast" feel (CD masters sound so sterile. I prefer to hype them up a bit. :) ).

Magneto can be nice on various channels when mixing (i liked it on pads/strings), to give the tape-saturated effect.

I would recommend checking KVRAudio.com.

They review and provide links to allsorts of VST/VSTi. Might as wewll start with some of the free ones and see for yourself what you may or may not need...

Timo

LOL - Ive managed to tame roomworks sometimes and have found it useful - and then sticking really brutal compression after it - but I have to agree on your general statement. I cant use it on its own.

On the dynamics - yes - it does pump easily - but it leaves everything really plastic I think. I do sometimes use it for squashing reverb laden sounds until I find something better - TBH I just dont like the end result - it has the dynamic control Im after but somethiung gets lost in translation thats Ive never been able to put my finger on.

On the multi-band dynamics - the presets I think are truly horrible - no amount of tweaking gets rid of that nasty plasticy processed sound.

Your use of it is perhaps appropriate if you want instant FM squash :) I wouldnt run anything of my own through it - just hate the damn thing too much :)


I use a behringer DSP1420P for when I want an instant processed sound for monitoring when I'm recording. Useful for pumping out a lively sound when your recording and want to hear bit of a pumped up dance floor sound.

roomverb isnt worth the high cpu use it requires,a waste of resources IMO. :D

i would advice looking into impulse reverbs if your looking for "that" (lexicon,tc,eventide) hardware reverb sound.

altiverb now also supports pc,worth giving it a look :P

The reason why I switched from SX2 to Logic 7 was that I wanted to use logic's plugins. Compared to SX, you get 10 times the plugins which are also alot better and there's about any kind of plugin available. I could praise logic's plugins (especially some of the new synths and fx plugins) for a long time but I guess logic isn't an option here...

MPX1 is really hard to replace with native software. I use both TC Powercore PCI mk2 and UAD1. The powercore can replace the MPX1 with reverbs and there are lots of great plugins available for it. UAD1 is more about analog emulation of some classic compressors and it's great for that (the best software comps which I've used). The most hard part is to replace the modulation effects, phaser and chorus. UAD1 has 2 roland choruses and they are the best and almost only software choruses which I would use. However, logic's phaser and chorus are usable too.

I don't know much about new native plugins because I don't like them very much. I run every possible thing from hardware anyway (including 3 dsp cards).

But you will miss the MPX1 for sure. I still miss my TC M-One. It also had some good modulation effects. I have planned to add some budget fx units into my rack at some point and use them as send effects from my DAW.

The eq on each audio track in sx3 sounds quite bad, high boosts normally shrill any sibilance on vocals, where as a good plug in eq high boost is more natural and requires less de-essing.

Yeah DS....Im afraid it's true. The plugs that come with SX are not very good at all.

I do use Magneto, Da' Tube, and a couple others, but at the moment I am using mostly TC Works plugs (Native Bundle)

High on my wish list is a UAD-1 card...