For me software wise this is what I've found to be essential:

Vanguard (au synth)
Predator (au synth)
Zebra (au synth)
Korg Legacy Collection (au synth)

Some NI or Arturia stuff is always worth having.. to taste, perhaps the moog modular or jupiter 8v emulation, FM8.

Battery3 or RM4 as a perc sampler

EXS24 Logic's built in sampler is perfect for all other sampling.

Logic's built in synths and fx(eq/comp) are also highly usable for a lot of cases.

Nexus is fine for a rompler.. but doesn't allow much flexibility.

Keep building ur sample collection.. raw source material is invaluable, you can constantly re-use and mangle it and come up with new loops or fx from it.

FX wise Logic 8's space and delay designer are pretty solid and will get you started.
More than that you'd really either want to get a top-notch hardware reverb unit or perhaps UAD/POCO. I can highly recommend pretty much everything that the UAD has to offer, although I don't like it's reverbs except for the plate140... it has fantastic eq's and compressors.

Other things to look at.. WaveArts bundle, Sonnox native.. most of the PSP stuff.

I have no knowledge of Logic whatsover, but what you need 'could' use is pretty standard nowadays, there are a couple of topnotch plugins that could really do the job.

Zebra is an excellent synth, the Nexus is cool to, but it's a rompler and that's IMO pretty shitty. I could give you a couple of synths that I use and what I do with it.

First, I must say, I haven't seen you named a audio-interface. That should be the first thing you need to buy, get yourself a good quality audio-interface, the standard 'soundcards' aren't really up to the job.

Ow yeah, and you will probably have the ES2 synth onboard with Logic (don't know if the standard version has this one too), you should pretty much get alot from that synth!

Okay, well here pretty much a list of plugins I use the most:
- Novation V-Station; pretty good for all types of trance sounds, I get almost all of my basses out of this baby.
- Refx Vanguard; awesome synth, you can do almost anything with this on, from asswhooping leads to crazy mofo FX's.
- Spectrasonics Atmosphere; ROMpler, yeah, but it has amazing pad, strings and atmosperical sounds (and a lot more).
- Lennar Digital Sylenth 1 (or 2); pretty amazing synth, very versatile but I haven't really dug in to it yet.
- Sonalksis Bundle; really awesome compressor and EQ, I even prefer them above the Waves bundle.
- Waves RBass; really beefs up thos low freq's, use it on you kicks and with the right adjustments it will do magic!
- Sonnox Oxford Reverb; really good reverb, I usually go for the presets, really good sh*t!!

I could name a lot more but this is pretty much it, plugin wise. Nowadays I tend to use my Virus for every sound I need.

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logic all the way

Well if you're using Ableton then you will have no problems. It works the same on PC and Mac.
If you have tonnes of good VSTs already and most of which seem to have AU versions, why do you want to go to Logic?

Logic is good but seems like you're already set up well.

Then again, Logic Express is dirt cheap and had you bargained a bit you probably could have got one of the Apple sales people to throw it in for free for you. Haggling, the lost art

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quote:

Originally posted by Fledz Then again, Logic Express is dirt cheap and had you bargained a bit you probably could have got one of the Apple sales people to throw it in for free for you. Haggling, the lost art

How do you haggle with a public corporation ?

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Just as easily as you do with everyone else. They will usually have more room to move as well as they buy in much more bulk and therefore their profits are higher.

Management is always authorized to make deals if they deem it positive for the long term status of the store.

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quote:

Originally posted by Fledz Haggling, the lost art

true i didn't even think about that

i'm not particularly happy with ableton as a sequencer, i always wanted to get into cubase on my pc, but my comp's too dodge, and wanted to use logic cause it's cool

i'll still be using zebra on the mac for sure, but was wondering about morrrrre can never have enough soft synths sitting in my plugins folder, and as i said i'm pretty much only using zebra lately, because i don't like nexus very much cause it's so inflexible

oh and i'm just using the AI of my Novation Xiosynth, 49 key, which I forgot to mention i had

sounds like vanguard's a go tho, thanks heaps for the help guys

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Don't forget Ableton though. A lot of people use it Rewired with something else whether it be Reason, Logic, Cubase or whatever. Reason being that Live is just so damn fun to play around with and you can get good ideas using it much easier and quicker than you can on linear sequencers.

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i have a few mac/logic questions again:

1. how is the file structure of logic projects? can u "include" all your samples so the whole project is only 1 file or is it full of files and folders and what not everywhere and a bitch to backup? (i love how reason does this part, one file, easy).

2. does mac has some kind of remote desktop that can be connected to another PC in the network so I only need one screen, mouse, keyboard in my setup? Need PC for alot of other stuff than music prod but i dont want two screens and two mouses, two keyboards and shit like that.

3. can wav-files, reason project-files and mp3s be moved back and forward between computer and mac without getting corrupt? Lets say over nettwork... Do they find each other when diferent HD-setup? NTFS and whatever mac got.

quote:

Originally posted by Fledz Don't forget Ableton though. A lot of people use it Rewired with something else whether it be Reason, Logic, Cubase or whatever. Reason being that Live is just so damn fun to play around with and you can get good ideas using it much easier and quicker than you can on linear sequencers.

I've found it to be pretty good, i suppose i find it a little basic, and hard to personalise (except the colours ) which is what i like from what i've seen in logic, lot's of built in editing stuff, and good FX etc

i deffinitly won't be forgetting ableton tho! i was playing with acapellas for funsies and it's so cool in ableton how the warp function works, altho it took me ages to figure out
i don't like tutorials or anything, so it took ages of me thinking ableton was stupid before i realised I was the one to blame for not getting the warp function down...
ableton's great but yeah, wanna move on to some hi-tech shit

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Now that macs use the dual core processors, Logic 8 takes advantage of that REALLY nicely. I swear by logic and always recommend it. Ableton is great too - i know loads of people who produce in Logic and then export for live shows in Ableton.

Logic 8 with Reason 4 ReWired just works seamlessly and you have SO MANY synths that way, that you don't need to spend much more. Logic 8 comes with 40gb of samples...omg

Logic used to be around £700 in some shops, but it's nearer to £300 now. If you're a student or work in education (or have friends in either of those...) then check http://www.apple.com/uk/education/shop/

Just gna try and answer Palm's questions:

1) Upon file creation, logic will create a root folder and actually self-copy all your .wavs etc to THAT folder, that you are using in your current tune - The efficiency caught me really off guard. It does this as you go and also when you import .wavs to your Audio Bin.

2) Mac+PC usually = Schools and colleges HATE mac suites coz you need a new server, technician and network for the macs LOL!!!! I use my PC separately and transfer with a USB key. Annoying... BUT you can get some software that lets you install Windows on a mac.

3) Again, this is hard as the network just may not happen - the only way round it may be using an upload service or buying some web space?? Reason files and Refills work on both platforms nicely. No worries there!!!

cheers guys,
Bushi

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