A few questions from a long-time user.
 

Hello, I've been using, programming, performing with an Access Virus KC since the day they hit the shelves. Since that day, I've found myself fighting to get away from the cliche "Virus" sound, (i.e. heavily detuned sawtooth trance leads, 12-stage phasing, etc). I'm sure veteran users ov the Virus know what I'm referring to. I'm not knocking it at all, I'm just saying that I've been trying to exploit the full potential ov this synth and I've gone to great lengths to do so.

That said, I'm curious as to what you all think ov the following C series features:

• The Moog Emulation Filter: I love the sound ov this in 2-pole mode with hard saturation. Do many ov you find yourselves using this filter type more often than the Virus filter? When you do employ the use ov the Moog filter, is it for the purpose ov self-oscillation or do you find other purposes for its use? How close do you think it actually comes to emulating the ladder filter in Moog synths?

• Pure tuning OR equal temperament tuning?: Which do you find yourself using most often and why?

• Analog Boost: How often do you employ its use? How does it differ from an EQ boost with a fixed Q?

• Punch Intensity: How effective do you think this parameter is? Is it anything more than a DC offset pop or is it a way to introduce an exponential bend to the attack portion ov the amplifier envelope?

• What are some ov your favorite modulation routings?: This is a fairly simple question. Is there anything you come back to time after time?

I hope this isn't information overload for any ov you. I just thought I'd stimulate discussion.

Hey Rasp, welcome!

Very interesting questions. I have an Indigo (b-series) so I don't have the Moog filters (grrr), but the Indigo can do all the other stuff you mention.

Pure-tuning: I'm always swapping between settings (pure, natural, or temp), as it depends on the patch. I think it's a great shame that the parameter is a "global" setting as opposed to a local one that you can save with the patch itself, but I think there may possibly be memory size issues that forced that implementation. (Having a local puretuning parameter for each patch would add additional bits/bytes to the patch, which cumulatively...).

In the main I tend to keep it on the Natural (middle) or Temp setting, but Pure is handy for polyphonic patches that use a lot of distortion or resonance, and Temp is great for injecting slight free-flowing randomness to mellow patches to make them less sterile.

Analog boost: I tend to whack up the intensity to full, and then sweep the frequency until it complements the patch, then I reduce the intensity. I've no idea about the techicalities of it (such as whether it's a standard semi-parametric EQ, or if anything else is happening). Generally I don't tend to have the intensity too high though, or it has a tendency to sound a bit muddy.

Punch: Very effective! Even Korg has copied this feature for their Radias. It works in a psycho-acoustic way. The simple pop gives the impression that the patch is louder or more powerful, great for percussive or bright stuff. Obviously useless for anything with a slightly longer attack.

I believe it's a single-cycle pulse-wave. That's how Korg described theirs, and looking at the waveforms it works similarly.

Mod routings I'm always using the usual amp and filter env to velocity, and the LFOs for subtle tuning or filtering or PWM. I also like to play around with the ADSR timings depending on velocity, a common one being to subtly extend the amplifer/filter release or decay time the harder a key is pressed. Random gets used a lot, for subtle PWM, panning, chorus, or envelope amounts etc so it sounds different every time you hit the keys. Occasionally I'll have a little FM amount to velocity with Osc2 oscillator-sync'd to Osc1 for more aggressive stuff. I usually reserve Knob #1 to control two or more parameters at the same time for obscene/crazy stuff using the matrix. Knob #2 I usually leave as is for effects wetness. The mod wheel usually gets used for the standard filter cutoff, adding noise, phaser/chorus depth, or unison detune. Nothing out of the ordinary.

MoogFilters. I soooo wish my Indigo v1 had this capability, as the 1-pole sounded evil on [Ben Crosland's OS v6.5 video (7mb wmv)] from Namm a few years back.

Cheers :)

Favourite modulation routing
 

My favourite mod routing is to (and this is for the punchy ones) set

Attack 0
Decay 18-ish (you'll tweak this later)
Sustain 80-100
Sustain Slope to its max negative value
Release 0 - experiment

Now, set up the modulation:

Source: Amplifier envelope
Destination: Amplifier decay
Amount: -3 - -10 area

Next, fiddle with the decay knob. I found that doing this you can have your patch sound almost as if you're triggering a sample. It will always stop abruptly after whatever value you set decay to.

On many occasions it also works great to lock the osc trig phase at 32. However, if you get that (which I call it anyway) "cheap softsynth-sound" on the attack, then turn it off unless you're after that. I do this on patches that I want to have stabby and punchy.. When I was new to the virus I always set A0 D0 S127 R0, wanting LOUD! STABBY! patches. It is much for effectful to do more of a A0-5 D18-30 S80-100 R0-10 thing. And then give the decay a touch of modulation by the amp env itself, and you give it more character. You probably need to compensate by either increasing the patch volume, or lowering the other elements.. Having this envelope setup will also sound better when compressed a bit, as it has that small decay to work on.. imho :)

All the parameters needs tweaking against each other, of course, but I think this should serve as a starting point.

Thank you for the prompt, educated responses. I'll have to try some ov those mod routings out sometime.

I'm at work right now, otherwise I'd post some ov the more interesting ones I've come up with. I'm really into playing parts that have a sequenced sound to them so I have a lot ov patches that utilize things like S+H LFOs that employ trig phase on things like filter cutoff, channel volume or sustain amount, and wave select, etc. . . Next time I'm at home I'll post some ov them. I also have a great deal ov patches that emulate the ProphetVS (i.e. Pretty Hate Machine era NIN-esque sounds).