new Sonalksis filter...

[taylor]

anyone seen this?

http://www.sonalksis.com/index.php?section_id=102

certainly LOOKS enticing.. will have to try the demo.. doesn't look like it actually has a resonance AMOUNT.. just a 4-setting switch.. hmmm..

anyone give it a spin yet?

 

[bmanic]

IMHO this is the lamest product sonalksis has ever released. Smells very much like a money scam, something like \"Shit! We're running out of funds! Need to quickly program something lame and sell it for tons of cash.\" Come on, for 149 euros you can buy FabFilter Volcano which is vastly superior both sound and feature wise. I really wish sonalksis would have put their effort in getting that gate plugin out as there truly is no excellent gate in the world of plugins.

Oh well, here's to hoping that they pull their act together. :roll:

Cheers!
bManic

 

[Eric Dahlberg]

Thanks for the link! I'm pretty blown away, it's smoother & more natural sounding at low resonance settings than the filters I put it up against (everything from CamelPhat, Naive, Bi-Filter, & Cambridge to the filters in Minimonsta & the Powercore Virus). Even the Sonalksis EQ doesn't have such smooth filters (I'm feeling a bit jipped by that right now ).

That said, the lack of a normal resonance control is a bummer. The High & Rude settings are too crunchy for me, at least on the material I used it with, while the Medium setting isn't resonant enough. $199 seems like a lot for such a sparse plug-in, too, but I guess that's to be expected from them.

Any idea if it can respond to CC messages?

 

[TomW]

I really wish sonalksis would have put their effort in getting that gate plugin out as there truly is no excellent gate in the world of plugins.
Cheers!
bManic

Amen! I could really use the gate right about now too - they did seem to mention a few product releases at the same time-ish but they are pretty far of with predictions.

I have to say PSP Nitro does the filter things for me, wonder how it compares in sound as Nitro has the Sonalksis beat all round for features and flexibility IMO.

I also don't quite like the vague description of their new 'adaptive resonance' technology - sounds like a sham to me, and something that could easily be achieved by controlling freq, res and sat simultaneously in Nitro for example.....

Tom

 

[Eric Dahlberg]

Something not mentioned in the manual, cutoff is controlled by mod & the other functions are controlled by note values. This is a bit unfortunate, it'd be cool to be able to use the note to cc midi plug-in to make the filter keytrack but everything else ends up getting controlled at the same time. Is there a way to strip away the notes after they hit note to cc, using transform or track fx, for example? Also, is there a good envelope to cc plug-in?

 

[bmanic]

Eric, I'd be extremely interested in what you think about FabFilter Volcano. If you like the sonalksis I'm pretty sure you'll love Volcano. It has Midi Note following filtering, Midi triggable LFO and Envelope and true self-oscillation (yes, it will oscillate by itself and go on for ever even if the host has stopped playing and there is no input). As for smoothnes, I think the \"Gentle\" and \"Smooth\" filters in 48dB mode in Volcano are superior to the Sonalksis filter.

Cheers!
bManic

 

[Eric Dahlberg]

Hi bmanic,

I actually tried the Sonalksis against Volcano already but didn't want to get into a flame war over it. Volcano is very good & the more flexible of the two, of course, but it still sounds very different from the Sonalksis filter. Regardless of preference, the cool thing about the Sonalksis is it doesn't sound like any of the other ones out there.

The big surprise for me has been the Frantic Filter. It sounds smooth yet still has tons of character (the Sonalksis is fairly character-less) & is the most versatile of the filters I tried. It has a lot in common with Volcano but I personally feel the Frantic Filter sounds better.

 

[bmanic]

Fair enough. This is about different tastes any way. I do agree with you that the sonalksis filter sounds different to anything else but my main argument is the amount of money they charge for this very simple filter and the silly marketing technology blurb. Frantic too is for sure extremely good, imho it's also in a totally different league than the sonalksis filter.

Cheers!
bManic