Discovery

What can I say about the discovery? Some of the KVR members know how much I love this synth. It is easy to use and sounds incredible. The discovery is claimed to be a Nord Lead 2 emulation. How close it sounds to a Nord I have no idea because I never played a Nord Lead. But when I demoed the Discovery I just had to buy it. Building sounds from scratch is a breeze and most of the presets are excellent with little need for tweaking. I discovered how to make most of the sounds great by simply adjusting distortion, filters, chorus, phaser, modulation wheel options, and the amazing delay. The delay is simply one of the greatest delay effects I have ever heard. Not only is the base effect great but it tricks your ear into believing there is some reverb in there too. Oh and the modulation wheel parameters never get boring. You can sync the filter, fm amount, 2nd osc, lfo 1, or morph as many knobs at the same time using just the modulation wheel. Do you love arpeggiators? I do. The arpeggiator comes with all the basic up/down/random etc. modes which makes it boring right? Wrong! There is also a gate effect that will trick out the arpeggiator to whatever you want. Anything else? There are also four layers in the synth. You can morph one layer to another, layer four arpeggios together and morph them all at the same time, and do literally millions of combinations of non-stop synthesizer bliss with this gem. I've tried so many soft synths, but discovery is still on top for me because of its' ease of use and sound quality. It sounds great dry, and amazing with effects. If you need a synth with gut wrenching power and nuclear blast sound, look no further. But it can even be sweet too. Pad sounds are a challenge though. But for basses, leads, sound effects, and strings you won't be lacking. If you need a synth that is in a class of it's own, then discovery is what you've been looking for.

the preorder 2.4 offer makes me want to try this synth, i knew that this vst is a nord lead emulation, supporting the sysex import of patch from nord lead and a massive collection of 2500 preset.
i was not very impressed by a VA synth with only 2 osc but when i tried this synth i was very suprised by the quality of the sound very warm and deep, usefull for any bass sound.
the two facts that makes me bought the discovery is the layering feature, it is the possibility to layer 4 patch so it gives you a massive sound produced by 8 osc !!!
this is not a little synth as the two osc feature lets you believe !
the second very cool feature is the morph possibility, it allows you to morph between two layers, i think it's the only synth with this feature, very great to produced evolving sound.
the only drawback is the fact that it eats a lot of cpu but it should be considered normal when you use three or four layers.
furthemore this problem should be resolved with the release of 2.4
it's a synth which deserves to be known and i hope that this review will help.

This is definitely one of the best VA synth plugins around. I wish I had tried it sooner.

UI: Well laid out. One complaint is that some of the toggle/ increments are unneccesary or annoying, such as having to click the tiny green led next to Gate or Delay to page the panel. Would be simple to allow clicking the title to perform the same function, and a bit more intuitive. Stepping through oscillator types is also a bit inefficent as well as being inconsistant. Clicking the led next to oscillator type does not switch to that type, which doesn't make sense considering how the Gate/Delay page button works. These are minor gripes, and once acquainted with these quirks, patch creation is a breeze. Morphing is extremely easy to use, and the way morph parameters are presented is truly an innovative approach.

Sound: Awesome! Absolutely no complaints here. It can range from soft and sweet to loud and grating, which is exactly what I had hoped for.

Features: Excellent array of features. Morphing is an excellent feature that Discovery does extremely well, and allows for great expressiveness in performance, as well as being eay to use and visualize. Being able to utilize up to 4 layers is a great method for creating complex patches. The morphable trancegate is awesome, and the filters are excellent.

Documentation: Covers the basics and includes bookmarks. Two thumbs up!

Presets: A vast array of presets are included with Discovery. The sheer number shows how flexible this synth is.

Customer Support: KvR forum exists.

Value For Money: Skip eating out for lunch 15 days in a row and Discovery can be yours. I'm extremely pleased with it, and would gladly buy another at the same price if it were hardware.

Stabilty. No complaints!

Last night I "discovered" DSP's evolving flagship synth aftera favorable review in SOS. I am very surprised there has not been more "buzz" about this synth, as it is excellent. Although nominally a Nord Lead emulation, Discovery has many timbres well covered in an extensive preset library. The bad news? It can be pretty cpu heavy.
I've resolved to live with cpu hogs if they sound right, and the resampling in Ableton Live 4 makes this resolution easier to live with. Many patches come in at 5% on 3 ghtz cpu, but some take up to 25% and more. The Discovery is very stable, and the handsome blue gui is well laid out and the patches are reasonably easy to tweak. There are many great arp patches in the presets, but I haven't figured haw to program the arp yet. Highly recommended.