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Acoustica Pianissimo plugin?


SHaka40

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http://www.acoustica.com/pianissimo/index.htm

 

Am I the only one who had never heard of this product? It only uses 250MB of samples (of a Steinway D), but combines this with some modelling technology. I had stated in the V-Piano thread that I think the "samples + modelling" approach could offer the best of both worlds as far as recreating piano sound in the future, so this kind of peaked my interest. I'm downloading the demo right now. The mp3 samples on the site seem to be drenched in reverb, which is often something that manufacturers do when they have an inferior quality sample to try and hide the flaws. But maybe (hopefully) this is an exception to that trend. I'll go out on a limb and predict that it won't sound even close to the EastWests and Ivories of the vst world, but it could at least provide an option for those with older computers or some of those inexpensive, less powerful little VST-hosting rack boxes we're seeing pop up more and more often that can't handle the massive sample libraries (perhaps compete with Truepianos or Pianoteq?).

 

Oh yeah, did I mention that you can download it for under 70 bucks?!

--Sean H.

 

Yamaha MOXF8, Korg TR76, Novation X-Station 61, Casio PX-320

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UPDATE:

I've been playing the plugin for about 5 minutes now, and it actually sounds pretty good. It has adjustable hammer noise (more on this later...), and tones controls which include velocity curve (five different settings), sympathetic resonance (haven't played with this yet), chorus (I was able to get some pretty good upright/bar piano sounds by cranking this...), and simple 3-band EQ (Low, Mid, High).

 

My biggest complaint so far is the hammer noise. Now, I admit that I hardly ever get to play real acoustic grands, so maybe my recollection of basic piano mechanics is a bit off, but shouldn't the hammer noise occur on the attack of the keystroke, and not the realease of the key? Again, maybe I've got it wrong, but it feels wierd to here that sort of thunk on key releases (and the sound is definitely "hammer noise" not the "key-release" sound that some vst's feature). Also, while the basic timbre of the hammer noise is pretty authentic, there is a substantial amount of static when you really crank the hammer noise up. You can literally hear where the sample is triggered and where it cuts off because of this static. This isn't really a deal-breaker because the extra noise is really only noticeable when the setting is cranked up to about 70% which is unrealistically loud hammer noise anyway.

 

EDIT:

Unfortunately, what I said about the noise when the hammer sample comes in is also true to some degree with the piano sample itself. When you hit a key, or especially a chord, and hold it down, you can hear kind of a static/hum as the sample is played. It eventually fades as the note fades, but it is definitely noticeable. I'm not sure how noticeable it would using monitors or in a live situation though (I'm using headphones). I said the hammer noise wasn't really a deal-breaker, but if this isn't fixed it could definitely be one for some people. When I'm actually playing a piece, I really don't notice it at all to be honest. It's only when I'm listening critically for it, and especially when I play soft ('cause the piano sound:noise ratio is lower I guess) that I can hear the noise floor. It wouldn't stop me from buying it, but I'm not an excessively nit-picky person when it comes to this sort of thing (probably because I've never played Ivory, etc, so I don't have that standard to compare it to). I still want to download the Truepianos demo because it is the most direct comparison. I don't really remember Truepianos sound well enough to have a definitive preference yet. Assuming that the noise I'm hearing is either fixed via update, or not present in the full version, then my gut feeling is that TruePianos will not be 2-3 times better than Pianissimo (it costs 2-3 times more; not to even mention how much Pianoteq costs) so perhaps it is a better value overall.

--Sean H.

 

Yamaha MOXF8, Korg TR76, Novation X-Station 61, Casio PX-320

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Pianissimo is a wonderful program, with a realistic

and playable piano and a very enticing price point.

The fact that it is not processor intensive

is a big plus. I will be providing some of my

performances for Acoustica's web site really soon!

In the meantime...check it out.

 

FL

www.franklucas.net

It's been so long, you're welcome back my friends......to the show that never ends!!!
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I've tried out the demo. I'm impressed enough by the sound and the price that I'll buy it soon. I did some work on a Fats Domino tune I'm doing on a personal album, and it worked great.

 

I found out about it within the pages of Keyboard Mag.

 

"In the beginning, Adam had the blues, 'cause he was lonesome.

So God helped him and created woman.

 

Now everybody's got the blues."

 

Willie Dixon

 

 

 

 

 

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The name threw me off. For a sec I actually thought it was only pp samples of a piano!

"I'm so crazy, I don't know this is impossible! Hoo hoo!" - Daffy Duck

 

"The good news is that once you start piano you never have to worry about getting laid again. More time to practice!" - MOI

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Hi !

 

I downloaded the trial yesterday nite and compared it w/ NI Akustik piano and Steinberg The Grand in VST plugin mode and I compared Pianissimo w/ NI Akustik Piano in standalone mode too.

 

I used a older 2.4 GHz machine for the comparison and different hosts including Chainer and Cubase SX3.

 

I don´t want to talk about the sound here, they all sound different and are usable, but Pianissimo needs far more CPU than the other competitors on a single processor 2.4 GHz machine w/ WinXP SP2 audio optimized.

 

I also found a bad sounding sample in Pianissimo, B below middle C,(B2) sounds thin at all velocities.

 

All in all, Pianissimo sounds pretty good to me, especially at this price. It sounds warm and has charme.

 

I´d see it as a addition to the other apps available, but not the one-and-only "must have" piano emulation.

 

I have the lowest CPU w/ the heaviest patch of "The Grand", followed by NI AP and then Pianissimo,- so all the promises on low CPU on the website is actually just only advertising.

 

Maybe this isn´t obvious on faster machines so much.

 

 

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If I use my internal sound card and the PC speakers, I have no issue with CPU usage. But if I use my Tascam US428, that's a different story.

 

I'm running dual P4 3Ghz with 1MB ram. I am using a lot of VSTs, though. I'll have Pianissimo, Organized Trio, Mr. Ray, and several instances of Korg M1 legacy running at once, but through the sound card, I can get them all running without overtaxing the CPU.

 

"In the beginning, Adam had the blues, 'cause he was lonesome.

So God helped him and created woman.

 

Now everybody's got the blues."

 

Willie Dixon

 

 

 

 

 

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Hmm, Thanks for the reviews. I've been interested in this plugin since reading about it in KB. Unfortunately it's Windows only :(
Instrumentation is meaningless - a song either stands on its own merit, or it requires bells and whistles to cover its lack of adequacy, much less quality. - kanker
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