Luna vs. Pulsar newbie questions

[frankie g]

greetings pulsar peoples...

i'm thinking about stepping into the wide world of creamware, and i have a few questions to ask... any help would be appreciated (folks around here seem to be pretty nice about that... like you all spend all day at work on this forum, and spend all night fuckin' around with your pulsars

anyways - i don't have enough money for a pulsar II... i need a digital mixing solution, so i'm probably going to go with a luna II + breakoutbox...

at some point i will probably upgrade this with an SRB or possibly another luna (because from what i can tell, i'm going to run out of DSP power pretty quickly).

**Question 1: will i be able to run the pulsar OS on a setup with 2 luna II's, or one luna II and a SRB?

right now i'm using a hardware sampler (emu ESI-2000)... i'm probably going to switch over to a softsampler (either a VST like halion or exs24, or the creamware STS-x000).

i've read the topics about sts vs. halion, etc... but there were a few things that were still unclear to me.

**Question 2: if you run a VST softsampler with a luna, will the latency be low enough to play it realtime? right now i'm using a SBlive, and the latency is unbearable, so i'm sticking to my hardware sampler for the time being. i'll trade low-latency over phatty graphical interface any day. it seems like you can play the STS with 1-2ms latency which sounds great, but there is some doubt in my mind that it's the greatest solution out there because of the shit being talked about it on these boards.

**Question 3: will i be able to run a creamware softmixer, and the STS or a VST sampler at the same time on a luna without conflicts? i'm runninga 866P3 with 256 ram, so i doubt it will be a problem, i'm just wondering HOW limited the Luna is in comparison to the pulsar.

basically i'd like to switch over to software sampling, but i'm not trying to sell my EMU until i'm sure that i can get the same performance out of a creamware setup. if worse comes to worse i can just use the low-latancy midi of the creamware to control my EMU, and just use the luna as a digital mixer and play around with the synths and stuff... from what i can gather on this board the effects are generally poop -- too bad considering the DSP architecture of the cards.

anyways - i'm rambling. please help out the new guy and answer some of my questions.

thanks a bunch...

...frankie g

[frankie g]

i forgot to mention that i intend on sequencing all of this with logic or cubase...

thanks again

...frankie g

[subhuman]

Hey frankie whazzzup

<i>like you all spend all day at work on this forum, and spend all night fuckin' around with your pulsars </i>

Uhh doh! *looking around for hidden camera*

First, although I've been vocal about the limitations of the STS4000, it really is a good sampler with the biggest advantage being convenience, ease of use, less limitations on amount of sample ram, and "hardware" latency. The sts3000 is the same thing only with less voices and less outputs. I still use it for what it's best at, loading AKAI cdroms and making quick sample-playback-programs out of my WAVs, then triggering it in "real time" just like you would on your EMU. For crazy modulations I turn to something like a kurzweil but like a few people have said, you could simply route the outputs of the sampler into a Modular2 patch and get even more flexibility.

A Luna2 (PowerSampler = Luna2 + STS3000 btw) can handle the STS3000 with all its voices and thats pretty much it. Or you could run like 8 or 10 voices and a couple voices on one of the synths and maybe a few phasers/flangers or something. I haven't had a "3dsp" system to play on, so maybe someone with a luna2 can chime in here and verify my DSP guesses here.

About the FX on pulsar being subpar... yes and no, yes, the stock devices have a pretty basic sound, but to be honest they kick the Waldorf Q's FX up-n-down and are at least as good as Virus fx. There are some totally pro sounding reverbs, so that's not an issue. Most of the effects can be controlled with midi pretty easily as well, I think the biggest complain I have is that there isnt something as "powerful & plug-n-play" as a loaded Eventide or something. Have you checked out Zorba yet? It's pretty tight, I use it on everything.

Also theres a cutdown version of Volkszampler which is a VST version of the STS3000(?) that you can get for free. If anyone knows it's limitations from the "full version" please post here.

On my 1000mhz P3 system, I can get 4ms latency easy with limited tracks (2), or 7ms with more tracks. When i'm working on mastering and playing back 30+ tracks, I use 13ms latency since I'm not composing or playing anything "in" anymore. I think this is still better than a soundblaster for that many channels.

You can run Pulsar software on 2 lunas, but I'm not sure how much the Pulsar software costs... That's definitely a factor in the price difference between 2 lunas and a Pulsar2...

[frankie g]

thanks for the feedback, man... much appreciated.

let me ask a theoretical question to y'all out there in creamland...

let's say i had a pulsar II, and wanted to outfit another computer with 2 lunas... could i just install the pulsar OS on that computer and use it with the 2 lunas as well?... or do you NEED to get the "Pulsar Plus I/O Plate" (2xADAT, Stereo XLR I/O, AESEBU I/O, and MIDI I/O/T) in order for the OS to work?

thankzagain...

...frankie g

[marcuspocus]

With a luna alone, you can put STS3000 to full voice(32) and still have room to load a simple (more or less) modular2 patch. But some Modular2 patches are so big!!! You'll need more DSP thou if you want to use reverbs. But if you have Logic, the platinum verbs are pretty good i think IMHO.

BTW, if you plan to use, let's say Vectron, YOU'LL NEED DSP.

Hope this help.

Marcus Pocus

[algorhythm]

A 1: if you buy the Pulsar OS, then yes, if not, then no.

A 2: depending on MOBO, you should be able to get 7ms no problem, which is fine for real time ( i am a drummer, and cannot notice any appreciable latency ).

A 3: a VSTi sampler and CW mixer for sure, or STS X000 and a soft mixer (ie. Cubase VST) for sure - but both a STS and a CW mixer would mean compromise of voices and/or channels/fx of mixing. this is known as "dsp juggling"


the pulsar OS is copy protected - you will need to have a ser # to install it. presumably, this must a ser # from a pulsar board. not sure if a luna # would work, as i have not tried, but i bet that it would not, but have heard rumors to the contrary (that the pulsar OS will work on any CW board). i have read that the pulsar software is US$300 . . .

- i have said this before, and shall say it again - the most cost effective and realizable CW setup is a used pulsar I and a Luna II = 7 dsp's, 2 MIDI I/O, 20 digital I/O, 4 analog I/O, Pulsar software, Luna Mixers, and ULLI drivers. Paid $825 for both, but bought separetely ($500+$325)

- i could not justify spending $300 on the pulsar software when used PI's can be had for $500 . . . 2 drawbacks - no warranty, restricted dsp expansion in the future (only 3 CW can be chained).


BTW, there is a luna on ebay . . .
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dl ... 1447648703
my $.02

[subhuman]

remember there are also sync/digital issues on p1 boards, i have to unplug my AdAT cables every time i restart my computer in order to get the thing to sync...grrr.



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: subhuman on 2001-07-25 18:03 ]</font>

[algorhythm]

there are some issues with SPDIF on PI (which I don't use, so don't care). but AFAIK, it is subhuman's problem alone that he has ADAT problems; no such problems here syncing ADAT to a digital mixer. perhaps sub does not have his gear set up properly

[subhuman]

Nah, it was fine with the 01v, I just think "older" gear like Spirit 328 and 03D might not be as forgiving... your Fostex is definitely "newer"