I apologize in advance....I realize this is quite a lame question, but since I've never been in a professional studio and heard some of these power house analog pieces of equipment in use, I'd really like to know which of them are the best emulations of their intended targets. (Not the best sounding....the best EMULATION. <- Operative word - I'm really not interested in the more transparent units. I want to know which software plugs bring that analog firepower.

Channel Strip -
EQ -
Compressor -
Limiter -
Special FX -
Mastering plugs -
Reverb -
Delay -
Chorus -
Tube Saturation -
Transient Designer -


These are NOT my opinions.....just an example of what I'm looking for.

Channel Strip - UAD Neve 88RS
EQ - Algorithmix Linear Phase PEQ Red
Compressor - Waves SSL 4k Buss Comp
Limiter - UAD Neve 33609
Special FX - UAD FATSO
Mastering plugs - Sonnox Dynamics, Sonnox EQ
Reverb - Waves RVerb
Delay - PSP 84
Chorus - PSP Nitro
Tube Saturation/Tape overload - PSP Vintage Warmer 2
Transient Designer - UAD SPL Transient Designer

Sorry for such a lame question but I'm in heavy search of trying to finalize my plug-in suite for a while so I can focus 100% on making music.

So your looking for plugins that have character right?

Don't think you can go past Sonalksis, as they're modelled on analogue units. For a bit more character again, I've found that waves SSL, pultec, API etc emulation plugins are really great.

Also heard really good things about cytonic "the glue" compressor, but I've not tried it yet myself.

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Not sure what your budget is, but for reverbs it will be hard to beat Lexicon's native plugin version of their own legendary PCM reverbs:

http://www.lexiconpro.com/product.php?id=163

~$1500

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quote:

Originally posted by cryophonik Not sure what your budget is, but for reverbs it will be hard to beat Lexicon's native plugin version of their own legendary PCM reverbs: http://www.lexiconpro.com/product.php?id=163 ~$1500

Cryo ouch is that all just for a reverb....

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it sounds the same as the hardware version and you can use as many instances as you want. It is priced fairly.

quote:

Originally posted by RichieV it sounds the same as the hardware version and you can use as many instances as you want. It is priced fairly.

Not that I'm going to pay that but I'm curious now, how is it for CPU time?

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Asked someone at work and they said it is very light on cpu.

I use UAD for everything. Great stuff, full of character. Most of their plugs are liscenced by the original manufacturer. Doesn't say much more than that part of the purchase price goes to the original manufacturer, but I guess it's a bit of a seal of approval.

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quote:

Originally posted by RichieV Asked someone at work and they said it is very light on cpu.

It's not *light* on CPU, just not that heavy (as such) and bear in mind that if you are in the environment where you have plugins like this, CPU's aren't really things you worry about as your computers (lets be honest: mac prtools rigs) are up to it.

I can vouch that they sound identical to the hardware units we have the studio.

The PSP lexicon emulations are excellent as well, and cost no where near as much.

The best emulation I've used (for film at least) is the 1176 RTAS/TDM - it does exactly the same thing as the hardware 1176 - I mean it's scarily similar. Behaves exactly the same as the real deal. They did a great job on that plug.

check your pmz for suggestions.

Thanks for the suggestions. :] You guys out there feel free to add more. I'm demo'ing A LOT of software right now trying to get rid of everything I don't need and really focus on what is going to help me take it up another notch.

By "analog emulation" of reverb, do you mean something that tries to copy a spring or plate reverb? Or something that tries to copy an actual space? Most of the reverb units that producers would like to copy these days are digital, not analog...