User Reviews for Spectrasonics Omnisphere

By muLperi
On 17th December 2008
Version: newest

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Sound

Features

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Stability

PROS
+ Lots of new and unique sounds
Well yes it does have 50 gigabytes of samples.
From that alone you should find many usable sounds.
Include very capable manipulation tools and you will definately have unique sounds.

+ Rich in features
Multi has 1-8 Parts
Multi has it's own "global" effects.
You can play Multi in several different ways.
Stack mode (split and layer parts), Live mode or just normal Multi
where every Part is assigned to it's own MIDI channel and you play one part at a time.

Part has 1-2 Layers
Every Part has it's own arpeggiator, effects, portamento control etc.

Layer has a Soundsource
Every Layer has 6 LFOs, envelopes, filters and stuff like that.
Soundsource can either be a sample file or virtual analog waveform.
So it has analog modelling synth also.

You can save your own Multis and Patches and share them easily.

+ Simple
Very simple to use and makes you want to craft your own sounds and really
get into the synthesis world also.

CONS
- Sample library almost too big
Installation took literally hours, about 6 of them. So be prepared. Hope I don't need to do that often.
Some ppl using laptops have to use external drives.
But nowadays I don't think it's such a big deal. Better lots than few.
Dunno if it could have been possible to fit them all in a smaller package.

- CPU intensive, long loading times
I have a Acer TravelMate 5720G laptop running Windows XP. Core2Duo at 2GHz and 2GB RAM.
I have been using Omni about month now, I think it has never crashed.
Many people have complained about it being unstable but not to me.
Only sometimes there has been strange peaks in sound.
Takes about 8 seconds to load the plugin. A bit slow startup and
loading big Multis can take up to about 10 seconds or so.
But I think this is acceptable considering the size of the samples and the whole plugin.

- It may be hard to find something really specific sound
I would love to have some kind of favourite-feature for sounds.
I think the browser is a bit over hyped, I almost never use those descriptive search parameters.
If I want to find kick drum, I will search "kick" and for some reason I don't find any.
Because ppl who made the search tags, were thinking differently.
Luckily you can also add your own tags and edit existing.

- No sample import
You cannot import your own samples at the time.
But Spectrasonics has said that they will not "rule that feature out" in the future updates.
And with all this content, it's not the first thing you'll probably miss.

- Bread and butter sounds
Doesn't have that many "normal" sounds like basic dry piano sound.
Some good guitars but then again, it's for new and unique sounds...

CONCLUSION
It's my "go-to-synth" at the time.
Omnisphere is definately not all-around, and not here to replace every other synths.
It's to get new and inspirational sounds, good making atmospheres
and ambient sounds. It does have good guitar samples and classic synth sounds also
and good analog modelling synth inside.
It's very simple and easy to use and good for live performances.
It has great amount of potential and with those tools and features,
I think factory Multis doesn't even show all what it can do.
I recommend if you have money to spend, if not, check also Camelaudio Alchemy.

Last edited : 17th December 2008

By erstwhile
On 28th October 2008
Version: 1.0.2

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HISTORY: Omnisphere is developed by Spectrasonics, which is owned by Eric Persing, who produced Trilogy, Atmosphere, and Stylus RMX. The software is by the same guy that did the Crystal free synth. Omnisphere replaces Atmosphere, and is supported on Mac and Windows (VST, AU, RTAS, etc).

SOUND: The sound quality is outstanding. The company is owned by sound designers, not software geeks. They tried to cover virtually every kind of sound, so it includes pads, dance, noises, textures, cinematic, classic synth sounds, voices, etc. You cannot put your own sampled sounds into the instrument, but patches can be freely shared and added.

GUI: The Omnisphere GUI supports novice, intermediate, and advanced users. Users that are not too familiar with the instrument use the Main window. The Edit window reveals lots of detail for tweaking LFOs, Filters, and Envelopes. Finally, there are Zoom windows which go into super-detail about each audio component (Envelopes, Filters, Modulation Matrix).

LIVE PERFORMANCE: Before performing, you can load up to 8 patches, then while you are performing live you can instantly switch between the 8 parts with key switching. The Stack window is also unique: you can load 8 patches and gradually fade from one to another or to many at once.

SYNTHESIZER FEATURES: Ominsphere has all the standard features of a quality soft synth: LFOs, envelopes, modulation-routing, filters, arpeggiator. Tremendous care went into the GUI layout for these features. The modulation could be a very confusing feature, but in Omnisphere it is presented in a user-friendly way, with dynamic indication of the values. The envelope GUI lets the user choose between the traditional ADSR or a modern curve-segment based approach.0 And there is a Chaos feature, obviously inspired by RMX, to randomly modify the envelope in real time.

SEARCHING: Omnisphere solves the problem of: "How do I find one sound from thousands of sounds"? by using multiple-keyword searches, which are a quick way to find sounds with queries like "classic retro analog synth" or "human voice female gospel".

PHOTOGRAPHS: The photographs that illustrate each of the soundsources are very cool, and it fun to see what pictures will pop up for when you select sounds like "Pensive" or "Static Rainbow".

DOCS: The DVDs come with only a small pamphlet that focuses on the installation process. After you buy Omnisphere you can download an HTML manual. Most useful is the dozen video tutorials which are great (a picture is worth 1,000 words).

PATCHES and PRESETS: There are patches and multis. The multis are simply 8 patches or parts, just like in RMX. Each patch contains two layers. In each layer you can put a synth waveform (sine, saw, etc) or a sampled soundsource. Each layer has its own individual filters, oscilators, envelopes, effects. The number of patches are around 2,000 now, and Spectrasonics is building more continually. You must download from their website to get all the newest ones. if you take the combination of 2,000 patches times 2,000 soundsources, that is a total of 4,000,000 sounds you can quickly generate without touching a knob. Plus, every individual audio component (Osc, Filters, Arpegiators, Envelopes) has their own individual presets.

DEMOS: Spectrasonics does not have any demos for download, so you have to hunt around for user demos.

VALUE-FOR-MONEY: Omnisphere retails for $499, although if you already own Trilogy, Atmosphere, and RMX, then they discount the price to $149.

INSTALLATION: It comes on 6 DVDs, and installation took me about 2 hours total. It was a simple installation. It takes about 48 GB of disk space.

STABILITY: The software is very, very robust. I have not seen a single crash, and even finding small aesthetic glitches is very hard to do (I cannot think of one I have yet seen). It has clearly been through a lot of beta testing before sale.

STARTUP TIME: The initial version of Omnisphere (on the DVD) had some issues with startup times (ranging from 10 to 15 seconds) seconds, but that has been fixed in the latest software update (downloadable from the Spectrasonics website) reduced my load time to 4 seconds.

CPU REQUIREMENT: Some features in Omnisphere are CPU hogs: harmonics, unison, heavy effects (by the way, Omnisphere has the full complement of Effects that RMX had, plus a couple of new ones). This CPU usage issue is no different than other soft synths. If your CPU is substandard, you may have to avoid certain advanced features. The bottom line is that Omnisphere is state-of-the-art, and it demands a state-of-the-art computer.

CONCLUSION: A very powerful, high-quality instrument that combines the best of additive synths with sampled sounds. Easy to use for novices. The variety of sounds is nearly infinite. A good value.

Last edited : 28th October 2008

By Novata
On 17th October 2008
Version: 1.0.1e

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Ok, so I get the privelage to review this synth first.

I will break this down into it's various components and then give my opinion on the whole synth.

1. Installation - When you get to install this beast, you will probably need to set aside a good four hours, depending on your DAW. It has a near 50GB library. It is easy to install, though I would recommend using internal storage preferably on a SATA drive. Once installed I recommend getting the update from Spectrasonics. There is an update button on the GUI. There are also the Atmosphere patches to install too.

2. Start up - This is quite a CPU intensive plugin, so it takes longer than your average synth to launch. Depending on your CPU, this could take up to 20 seconds, not good IMO. Hopefully this will be fixed. First launch requires the challenge/response licensing method.

3. Patches - There are 1000+ patches for instant use. These do not include the whole 50GB library either. So there are still a whole load of sounds that aren't used but are there for your own use. The patches are hugely diverse and range from a single layer synth to a dual layer sample based sound source. The categories are set into a perculiar hierarchy and not all patches are avaliable through this method. Not the most friendly function for patch searching even though you can do a manual search by typing in what you want. Though, this doesn't always get you the sounds you may be after. This could be better.

4. Sound quality - Overall, this is where Omnisphere wins. The sound that this synth can generate is very good indeed. Just load up the 'Tear your head off' patch (the first one) and play, then as you hold down the key, turn the Mod-wheel. Even without loading a sample into a layer, you can use the onboard oscillators to generate some fantastic analogue sounding patches.

5. Edit page - Beyond the simple view page and the visualiser there is the main edit page. This is the nuts and bolts of your patch creation. It has two layers, A and B. You can load a sample from the sound source library or you can use the synth mode whereby your sound is generated with the onboard oscillators. You can manipulate both in the same way and there are many ways to manipulate the sound. The modulation capabilities are extensive and can be assigned in many ways, up to 48 assignable mod settings per patch. For example, you can assign up to six LFO's to modulate the amp, filter, samplestart etc.. you can assign an LFO to another LFO if you want to vary it's speed or depth. You can change the velocity curve, the filter type and curve. Two filters per patch, HPF/LPF/BPF at different resolutions.
You then have the envelope section for which you can zoom into. This goes into the ADSR, Filter and four modulation envelopes for which you can draw your own curves or use the onboard selections. This is very easy to edit and very useful to change the whole shape of your sound. These are also assignable from the Modulation window.
There is graintable synthesis for sample sounds only, plus FM synthesis ring modulator wave shaping and multi. The multi has a unison mode or a fantastic harmonia mode whereby you can have an extra four oscillators per layer. Overall, the edit page is huge, deep and very user friendly. Amazing. 10/10.

6. Arpeggiator - This is very easy to use and has up to 32 steps for which the length, velocity, on/off on each can be set. The arpeggiator affects the entire patch, not just a layer. The speed can be set to only whole depths, for instance, 1/8 or 1/16th, you cannot set the speed to 1/8t or 1/16 .dot . The really amazing thing about the arp on this synth is the groove lock mode. Basically, if you have a midi file that runs over a bar or two, the arp will trigger on each note within that midi file, therefore it will change the style and feel of the arp to suit the rhythm of your song. This has been designed to work well with Stylus RMX. 9/10.

7. Multi mode - So, all the above can be applied to one patch for which you can have up to 8 in one Omnisphere instrument. This is where you realise the incredible power this synth has. You can have a basic stack mode whereby you play a note and 1 to 8 patches play at the same time. You can assign each patch to a different midi channel which is not stack mode.
In stack mode you can split the patches over the keyboard, or use a velocity crossfade or the modwheel crossfade. So, you can change the sound completely through the turn of your modwheel. Then you have live mode for which you can assign program changes to midi and then flick between patches on the fly or select multiple patches. 10/10

8. Effects - Each layer 1-4 fx, so each patch can have 1 to 12 fx. Plus multi has 4 aux*4fx and master out x 4fx. The effects are brilliant, ranging from chorus, delay, reverb, compressors distortion etc. Options are limitless. 10

Overall, this synth is incredible and takes a lifetime to explore. You won't be disappointed.

Last edited : 17th October 2008

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