Why are Zebra's oscillators nearly aliasing free and Virus Ti's not?

  • These images I copied from another forum, I didn't do the testing myself.
    But here you can clearly see that Zebra Saw oscillator beats Virus Ti's hands down in the aliasing department.


    Virus Ti (thru virus control using USB inputs):


    [Blockierte Grafik: http://i55.tinypic.com/34zivzs.jpg]


    Zebra:


    [Blockierte Grafik: http://i52.tinypic.com/2eogoie.jpg]


    Now as my TI Snow synth is a whole lot more expensive than for example Zebra, I surely expected it to have better oscillators than any Vst synth out there.


    So would it be possible to upgrade the oscillators in future updates?


    Btw here's how the Virus C Saw oscillator looks like (thru FF800), quite different from the Ti, strange not!?


    [Blockierte Grafik: http://i53.tinypic.com/11ah9gi.jpg]

  • i would like to know what preset has been used in visualizer?
    and what sort of patch setting in virus was tested by visualizer?


    Just a a clean sawtooth patch.
    Both being identical of course.


    Since when are Zebra's analog modeling oscillators wavetables oscillators?

  • One thing is for sure, Zebra sure does sound bloody PHAAAT! :thumbup:


    I'm praying Access incorporates some Multi-stage Envelopes...

  • IMHO Zebra sounds phat, but flubby. There is not such a soft synth in the market that can beat the virus in terms of crispiness and fatness. But this is a forum about synthesizers and not cars. The purpose of a synthesizer is to produce music and not being compared with another one in terms of "horsepower" and "torque".After all, minimoogs oscilators were the most unstable but the most musical. This unstability was so humane and thats one of the points of music after all, To make us remember that we are humans. So much clinical approach to music results in tasteless music. Didn't meant to offend someone, you can always have fun with the oscilloscope, but the ear and the brain are such different beasts...

  • While I agree with the above post that we, perhaps, shouldn't become too clinical in our analyses, synthesizers certainly represent a fairly cerebral/technical take on music making. What I find the most curious is the difference between the TI and the C. I'd also be interested to know if the hypersaw was tested, as I have read that it aliases much less (I know that I prefer it to the classic oscillators).


    In terms of the whole Virus vs. Zebra thing, I was tempted to switch at one point as the TI desktop literally costs ten times as much. I was nearly pushed to the edge when I found out that Viruses were only used as controllers for Zebra during the live performance of the Inception soundtrack (URL for non-believers: http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/…=0&postorder=asc&start=15). However, after demoing Zebra quite extensively, I have come to the conclusion that the Virus sound cannot be replaced. This is by no means a shot at Urs, I use some of his other products but they are complementary to the Virus not replacements.


    Additionally, within the same test pointed to by the OP (which can be found at KVR: http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=4339837), the results show that the TI supposedly aliases more than any of the other tested synth, including Reason's. This just reconfirms that tests aren't everything, because to my ears Reason's synths are generally lacking.

  • In terms of the whole Virus vs. Zebra thing, I was tempted to switch at one point as the TI desktop literally costs ten times as much. I was nearly pushed to the edge when I found out that Viruses were only used as controllers for Zebra during the live performance of the Inception soundtrack (URL for non-believers: http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/…=0&postorder=asc&start=15). However, after demoing Zebra quite extensively, I have come to the conclusion that the Virus sound cannot be replaced. This is by no means a shot at Urs, I use some of his other products but they are complementary to the Virus not replacements.


    you should ask yourself how much is real in such videos anyway. do you hear three keyboard players playing simultaneously? i don't. i hear an orchestra and i see tons of equipment. what you see is a movie premier, not a classical concert.
    there are some really nice moments on the inception soundtrack with incredibly crafted sounds. and i'm sure that various synth have been used, probably the virus as well, in fact, when you read the hans zimmer interview on our website and you keep in mind that there are about 20 viruses floating around at Remote Control where it was all done, chances are pretty good ;)
    as for the aliasing, the interesting part is which virus oscillators are up for comparison. the "old" ones, the classic models, especially the sine, yes - those are not aliasing free. we kept those in the original state from +13 years ago. but the new oscillators (for instance the wavetable oscillator) are aliasing free. so you have both options.
    best, marc

  • Yup, all good points Marc. And again, at the end of the day I don't think these tests matter too much. IMHO I have never found any other synth that can come close to the lushness of the Virus' pads, aliasing or not.