Snow or TI 2 desktop ? Please help me choose

[fantom_x]

Hello,

In my country, Romania, I have a Virus TI keyboard, I’ve been playing it since 2007. I can do about everything I want, as far as sound and goes, with it. Now, since I temporarily moved to Toronto, Canada, I cannot afford to buy the TI 2 desktop yet - I ‘ve been thinking about getting the Snow. I miss my Virus at home a lot and I cannot live without it, but I don’t have enough money yet to get a new Desktop TI 2.

The problem is that, while the keyboard / polar / desktop versions have approximately 2500 ROM patches, the Snow has only 512 ROM. Moreover, the Snow ROM / RAM banks have only 64 patches, instead of 128. Not to mention that Snow’s polyphony is much lower and it has only 4 multitimbral parts (and that would be a disadvantage, as I use the Virus Control with the Logic Express 8 DAW a lot and I would run out of multitimbral parts in no time). The 25% more processing power of the new Desktop TI 2 wouldn’t be that much important for me, as I took my powerful MacBook Pro with me and my computer can withstand a lot. My questions are:

1) Suppose I want to replace an entire ROM / RAM bank in the Snow (by using the Virus Control – as both types of memory are flash, they can be rewritten with the help of the VC) with a one that I like, say ROM-B – I consider it to be the best bank of all. How can I do that, taken into consideration that a ‘normal’ Virus bank has 128 patches and a Snow bank has only 64? If I ‘download’ the bank from the VC into the Snow, does it automatically split, or how ? (one 128 patch-bank is gonna become 2 64-patch banks?)

2) In my country, at home, I reprogrammed lots of patches, either presets or from scratch and I saved them both in 2 RAM banks and, with the help of VC, on my computer. I also have those banks saved on my Mac. If I want to ‘download’ / replace a RAM / ROM bank from the Snow with those banks of mine, how could I do that ? Is it possible ? And if it is, again does it split or do I have to ‘pre-split’ it or how?

3) I played a Virus TI Polar 2 a couple of days ago, but it had OS 2.7.5 installed (after unpacking it, the dealer didn’t have the time to upgrade the OS). The TI Polar 2 with OS 2.7.5 has exactly the same patches as the TI Polar. After upgrading to OS 3.0.1, are the ROM patches the same, or are they different / changed ? If yes, how ?

4) If I get the Snow and update it to OS 3.0.1, will I have the same patches / will I be able to ‘download’ in the Snow the same patches as on a TI 2 Desktop ? In OS 3.0.1, will the patches be also be different / changed ?

5) If I buy the Snow and upgrade it to While the Snow has only 512 ROM patches, the VC has all patches, I presume. If I want to save an edited patch on VC (that the Snow didn’t previously have), either on a ROM or RAM bank, is that possible ? Or do I have to save the entire bank ? If that’s possible, can I randomly save patches from where I want in the VC and completely replace a ROM / RAM bank in the Snow with the patches that I want ?

The Desktop has way more knobs, while the Snow has but a few. Obviously, if I buy the Snow, I’m always gonna use it in the ‘Expert’ Edit mode. I’m not interested in the ‘Analog’ part of Filter 1 or the ‘Character’ part of the Effects block. I’m also not interested in the Desktop’s outputs (the rear side). The problem here is:

6) Considering the number of knobs that the Desktop comes with and the lack of real-time control that the Snow has, what can specifically be done / programmed on a desktop that would be impossible on a Snow? What can the Desktop do that a Snow could not ?

Thanx a lot for help,

Cheers

[Soarer]

I'm also new here and I have the same choice to make so I'd also appreciate if anyone would answer some of the questions.

For programming sounds how is the Snow compared to the Desktop? Much faster and more intuitive with all it's knobs or is it really easy to just use VC for this?
Of course the Snow is the easiest one to transport. What about the Desktop TI2? Is it big and heavy to carry when you also have to carry your laptop and audio interface etc.?

Does the Snow run 4 complex patches well?
Do you think there's going to be a Snow 2 in a near future?

Oh, and the Virus will be my one and only synth i.e. the center of my studio.

Thanks

[Soarer]

Found some answers here:

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/elect...honeymoon.html

I think I'll have to go for the TI2 Desktop. Hope it's reasonably easy to take it with me.