Anything Like McDSP AC-1?

[Suntower]

Yeah, another guy who saw the Charles Dye video.

And I gotta give to the guy... The mixes sound fantabulous (at least for the material he covers.)

And the McDSP AC-1 -does- seem to do great things in his hands.

But correct me if I'm wrong, the way he uses the AC-1 seems to be -suspiciously- like simply running a PSP Mix Saturator or UAD-1 1176LN across the bus, nicht wahr?

So I guess my question would be: Never having used the AC-1, are there tools in the UAD-1 (or if not other VST plugs) that do much the same thing?

TIA,

---JC

 

[Akis]

If I remember correctly, Charles Dye had suggested the Sony Inflator as a possible alternative @ the Gearslutz forum.

 

[Suntower]

OK, well.... Assuming that I was:
a) Sick and tired of PoCo
b) Unwilling to spend that kind of dosh on -anything PoCo
c) Fully trusting in UAD-1's offerings

...any other suggestions? :mrgreen:

---JC

If I remember correctly, Charles Dye had suggested the Sony Inflator as a possible alternative @ the Gearslutz forum.

 

[seti808]

yes it is time for the uad-1 tape emu to come out!!

Charles put that tape emu plug on the 1st plugin slot for every track
and on the main buss too.

He said that was a big part of his sound.

I have tried voxengo tapebuss which is ok
but doesnt seem to be as good as AC-1.

What about color tone?

We need a AC-1 equivelant badly!!!!

 

[Ericcc]

yes it is time for the uad-1 tape emu to come out!!

Charles put that tape emu plug on the 1st plugin slot for every track
and on the main buss too.

He said that was a big part of his sound.

I have tried voxengo tapebuss which is ok
but doesnt seem to be as good as AC-1.

What about color tone?

We need a AC-1 equivelant badly!!!!

I agree about colortone....this HAS to be for PC as well soon or I die

 

[taylor]

color tone pro is amazing!!

just put the Neve Portico 5042 impulse on your tracks and slap the Studer (straight) impulse across the mixbus..

tasty

 

[seti808]

color tone pro is not for pc yet?

So it color tone pro as good as AC1?


Does the neve protico impulse come with it?

 

[taylor]

i don't have AC-1.. as i'm running VST and AU host.. so i can't use it... but i'm pretty sure they run on different technologies.

colortone is convolution based. the Pro version ($69 or some ridiculous low price) comes with over a dozen impulse responses... all the names you'd expect from gear.... but, the sweet part is, you can make your own impulse responses and post them to the colortone forum.. so far there are 50 or 60 up there... and they're all free.. including the Portico ones (both the tape and the mic pre)

i like the portico one so much i'm considering buying a real Portico...

and no, no PC version yet... but the PC users are screaming, and tritone digital is listening... so, it'll come.

color tone pro is not for pc yet?

So it color tone pro as good as AC1?


Does the neve protico impulse come with it?

 

[xist2005]

Unfortunately that 69$ was just months ago, now it's doubled!

 

[olafmol]

and no, no PC version yet... but the PC users are screaming, and tritone digital is listening... so, it'll come.

these are plugins developed in max/MSP, so they can be recompiled for all kinds of platforms... that's where the pluggo runtime environment comes into play.. it's simply a commercial decision for them right now not to release colortone pro for PC platform, not a technical one

Olaf

 

[taylor]

still a steal in my book..

Unfortunately that 69$ was just months ago, now it's doubled!

 

[Eric Dahlberg]

and no, no PC version yet... but the PC users are screaming, and tritone digital is listening... so, it'll come.

My understanding is they're avoiding PC's because of Hydratone getting cracked. What sets it apart from any other convolution plug-in, anyway? The Colortone Free is a subtle effect at best, "colortoneless" much of the rest of the time.

 

[Trebor Flow 2]

I've watched MILAR and now use Sony Inflator on the stereo bus, on our other rig HD2 we have AC-1 and the Inflator when set up correctly does a very similar job.

The problen with colour tone pro to me is I don't like the idea of passing my whole stereo signal through a convo plugin as convo plugins always seen to flatten out the dynamics in a detreimental way.

just my 2 peneth

Trebor

 

[beubbo]

...and the Inflator when set up correctly does a very similar job.

Trebor

Hi Trebor,

Could you elaborate a little ? What are those settings ?

Thanks in advance !
B

 

[Ericcc]

and no, no PC version yet... but the PC users are screaming, and tritone digital is listening... so, it'll come.

My understanding is they're avoiding PC's because of Hydratone getting cracked.

Well...the Mac version crack is floating around the net as well.....same as the McDSP..

 

[sontrinh]

i think that software vendors don't realize that if they have a good product, the product WILL be cracked... hell, there was even a crack for UAD and Powercore stuff a while ago. besides, with simple data and math, you could easily prove that not porting to PC is a bad idea. anyway, the only hope is the product is good enough that people WILL buy it.. which is why we all buy UAD-1s//

but back on to the subject.,. what about hardware equivalents to these plugins?

 

[Sirius_black]

colortone

hI to all

there's a beta version for pc of colourtone...

http://www.tritonedigital.com/forum/vie ... c&start=45

Have a nice day!

 

[pipelineaudio73]

I always though AC-1 sounded like a really crappy version of Magneto. Neat that you can do dual mono though

 

[pipelineaudio73]

ibut back on to the subject.,. what about hardware equivalents to these plugins?

VariMu? It doesnt attempt to do all that goofy fake mix buss/tape/tube saturation though. I think CD takes some serious liberties about speaking for engineers on that commercial

 

[Trebor Flow 2]

Hi Beubbo

To similate AC-1 - I set up Inflator like this:

With Inflator bypassed set your kick and SD so that they are peaking at
-10dB on the mix bus.

Then activate Inflator use these setting s for a mild \"console saturation emulation\"

Input +3dB

Output -4dB

FX 33%

Curve 0

Clip - off

The key for me is to have no more than two lights come on (on the FX meter) on the loudest bits. That way you are not smashing the dynamics but adding an AC-1 type FX

Then you can increase how much you are driving your \"virtual console\" by first increasing the curve to 10% or higher and by inceasing the FX to up to 66%

The Charles dye settings are FX 66% and curve 33% but to me this is just too much, distortion.

I use the bypass button to put Inflator in and out and ask the question is the FX adding more than I would expect a console to colour the sound - even a large format console only subtly colours the sound - so you only want Inflator to ad a subtle colour - I find the above settings to work really well and the mixes I'm doind now sound really analog and powerful.

I also use Sonalksis 315 compressor on the mix bus after Inflator and Voxengo Tapebus on the track inserts of the Kick,SD and toms but not the OH and rooms mics (which I like to keep clean)

I have a Sonalksis patch that (don't tell anyone) sounds better than the new Waves SSL G384

Some dude on the Gearslutz forum posted a file using a \"real G384\" and a file done with the Waves SSL emulation AND the original file.

By using phase nulling - we were actually able to get a deeper null with the Sonalksis than the WAVES SSL !!!! Then when we blid tested the Sonalksis against the SSL hardware file we failed to pick the hardware 50% of the time. The Sonalksis really is an amazing and versitile software compressor - highly recommended.

Hope this helps - as ever YMMV

Trebor