Receptor - IMPRESSIVE

[burningbusch]

So I picked up a Receptor (160GB and 256MB RAM with 2GB on order). My experience to date has been extremely positive. It's a little geeky to work with, e.g. loading new plugins and getting it connected to your computer. I haven't run into any major issues and it has been performing remarkably well.

 

It has 16 slots for instruments. You can just simply set up as 16 MIDI channels, but it's really a lot more powerful than that. For example you might have a multi-timbral sampler like Kontakt in one slot and then assign various sampled instruments to different MIDI channels from within Kontakt. The new snapshot feature in 1.5 makes for an extremely versatile and CPU efficient system.

 

My plan is have the following initiated and available during a live performance:

 

B4 II

Atmosphere

Trilogy

Kontakt (Scarbee, everything else I need)

Mr Ray 73

FM7

Pro-53

Minimonsta

Oddity

SampleTank 2 (guitars, basses, etc.)

Ivory

+++

 

Right now I'm running B4II, FM7, Minimonsta, Oddity, and Mr Ray 73 with FXs comfortably on a 256MB machine. CPU load appears minimal. I already own everything save the Minimonsta and Oddity, so it's not costing me much more than the hardware.

 

Sonically unbeatable, IMHO.

 

Busch.

[Sergievsky]

Damn. I gotta stop going to this forum...

 

Ivory... pls let us know how it is. Thanks for the update. Oh, and is the HD 7200rpm or 10k?

[InfoSal]

The plug-in installer for Ivory is being released. You should see it on the Plugorama website on Monday.

[NoahZark]

GAS Attack!! HELP!!

 

Noah

[Sergievsky]

They have that Colossus/Receptor promo again. Man, if I didn't have too much gear already...How good is Colossus?

[Phil Aiken]

Originally posted by burningbusch:

 

My plan is have the following initiated and available during a live performance:

 

B4 II

Atmosphere

Trilogy

Kontakt (Scarbee, everything else I need)

Mr Ray 73

FM7

Pro-53

Minimonsta

Oddity

SampleTank 2 (guitars, basses, etc.)

Ivory

+++

 

Busch.

I think you are erring on the optomistic side. Once you start getting into large sample libraries on Receptor, you really need to choose your battles. Native Instruments DFD streaming is not that robust, and my experience has been that I need to use sample libraries that can fit into RAM. I made 16 bit versions of the Scarbee Rhodes and Wurly libraries - use 1 per gig and use

either Mr. Tramp or Mr. Ray 73 for the other piano. (All through Scarbee VKFX)

Other than that, my set up is similar, with B4, Minimogue, M-Tron, Rhodes and Wurly all loaded up and ready to go.

You could easily do this with 16 instruments if they are not sample intensive, but unless you have better luck with disc streaming than I have, you will not be able to have Ivory, both Scarbees, Trilogy et al loaded at once. YMMV....

[burningbusch]

Beethree, you are correct.

 

I'm going to pull it back to what I really need for each situation. I play in several different bands and each has varying needs.

 

After reviewing B4II, I'm going to be using the original B4. I have a sound dialed in that I'm really happy with and haven't been able to duplicate that on the new version. maybe in time I will.

 

The Scarbee Rhodes sounds terrific but you really need the 12v version. I agree that DFD is spotty (I've reported that to Muse) especially with things like EPs and pianos. I love the fact that Mr Ray 73 is modeled and NO velocity split points. It just plays so great. It's my Rhodes of choice. You need to EQ it and fool with the controls a little bit. Scarbee is more accurate but consumes either a lot of RAM or heavy DFD. I fully agree with the Scarbee FX. Mr. Tramp, probably yes. I have some smaller Wurly libraries that might suffice.

 

I'll load Trilogy only when I need to kick left hand bass.

 

I'm still not a fan of Ivory for live use. I tried it again through my Roland SA-300 and got similar results to every other stage speaker. Ivory sounds great through my ADAMs and through phones, but I think it lacks the direct punch you need out of a stage ac. piano. I've tried other libraries, e.g. VinAudio C7 and thought it sounded much better. In the end, I'll probably just use the onboard Roland RD700SX/SRX-11, which works.

 

Mainstays for me will be: B4, Atmosphere, Mr. Ray 73, FM7, Minimonsta, and Kontakt. I will probably use Sampletank 2 as it has some nice el. guitars, great soprano sax. I'll load Kontakt with the necessary libraries, the essentials that I need, the best of the best. My dealer warned me about DFD. Since I got the full 2GB of RAM it's working much better. With some sounds it seems to work flasslessly. Others, it's an issue. The nice thing about Kontakt is that you can DFD it on a sound by sound basis--it's not global.

 

Busch.

[Phil Aiken]

Originally posted by burningbusch:

 

The Scarbee Rhodes sounds terrific but you really need the 12v version. I agree that DFD is spotty (I've reported that to Muse) especially with things like EPs and pianos. I love the fact that Mr Ray 73 is modeled and NO velocity split points. It just plays so great. It's my Rhodes of choice. You need to EQ it and fool with the controls a little bit. Scarbee is more accurate but consumes either a lot of RAM or heavy DFD. I fully agree with the Scarbee FX. Mr. Tramp, probably yes. I have some smaller Wurly libraries that might suffice.

 

Busch.

If you have 2 GB of RAM, and have a way of batch converting the

samples to 16 bit, the Scarbee Rhodes 12V lite will fit into RAM - so no DFD......

 

I like Mr. Ray alot through the Scarbee VFX also. I usually use it, and save the heavy sample use for the Scarbee Wurly. THe difference between the Scarbee Rhodes and Mr. Ray, while significant, is less than the drop off between the Scarbee Wurly and Mr. Tramp. At least to me.

 

I think Mr. Ray through Scarbee VKFX beats the Nord Electro Rhodes - but I have only played the latter from it's own keyboard, which doesn't suit me very well. It DEFINITELY beats out Lounge Lizard. Not bad for donationware!!!

 

Sorry to hear your opinion of Ivory. I'm considering it for solo piano gigs. Everyone who has tried it that I know of says it works incredibly well on Receptor. In bands I use a digital piano as my main controller, so I just stick with that for piano.

[Jazz+]

I'm geting confused reading this thread. Are you guys concluding that for live playing the Mr. Ray trumps the 16 bit Scarbee RSP '73 ? I thought the Scarbee Rhodes was supposed to be much better.

 

I play solo/duo digital Rhodes gigs and the reason that I wanted to get a Receptor was to be able to have the best sounding- respoding digital Rhodes, which I thought was supposed to be the Scarbee RSP '73. I thought I read that Mr. Ray didn't have enough dynamic range? When I play Mr. Ray from my P250 at home at is has almost no dynamic range. I also had a small hope that Ivory would sound good live.

 

And if Mr. Ray (which uses physical modeling) trumps 16 bit Scarbee, then some keyboard maker should be able to match Mr. Ray any day now, no?

[sleepwalk]

Originally posted by burningbusch:

So I picked up a Receptor (160GB and 256MB RAM with 2GB on order). My experience to date has been extremely positive. It's a little geeky to work with, e.g. loading new plugins and getting it connected to your computer. I haven't run into any major issues and it has been performing remarkably well.

 

It has 16 slots for instruments. You can just simply set up as 16 MIDI channels, but it's really a lot more powerful than that. For example you might have a multi-timbral sampler like Kontakt in one slot and then assign various sampled instruments to different MIDI channels from within Kontakt. The new snapshot feature in 1.5 makes for an extremely versatile and CPU efficient system.

 

My plan is have the following initiated and available during a live performance:

 

B4 II

Atmosphere

Trilogy

Kontakt (Scarbee, everything else I need)

Mr Ray 73

FM7

Pro-53

Minimonsta

Oddity

SampleTank 2 (guitars, basses, etc.)

Ivory

+++

 

Right now I'm running B4II, FM7, Minimonsta, Oddity, and Mr Ray 73 with FXs comfortably on a 256MB machine. CPU load appears minimal. I already own everything save the Minimonsta and Oddity, so it's not costing me much more than the hardware.

 

Sonically unbeatable, IMHO.

 

Busch.

that's what i'm talkin about. as far as small setups go, i think you cannot do any better.

[burningbusch]

Originally posted by Jazz+:

I'm geting confused reading this thread. Are you guys concluding that for live playing the Mr. Ray trumps the 16 bit Scarbee RSP '73 ? I thought the Scarbee Rhodes was supposed to be much better.

 

I play solo/duo digital Rhodes gigs and the reason that I wanted to get a Receptor was to be able to have the best sounding- respoding digital Rhodes, which I thought was supposed to be the Scabee RSP '73. I thought I read that Mr. Ray didn't have enough dynamic range? When I play Mr. Ray from my P250 at home at is has almost no dynamic range. I also had a small hope that Ivory would sound good live.

Here's an example of how get Mr Ray 73 to sound. It's complete garbage but I put it together just to give you an example of Mr Ray's expressiveness. Personally I love it's organic quality and natural feel because it's modeled.

 

TOTAL GARBAGE

 

And if Mr. Ray (which uses physical modeling) trumps 16 bit Scarbee, then some keyboard maker should be able to match Mr. Ray any day now, no?

Seriously, do you think they have a clue? I don't say it trumps Scarbee at all. A sampled product like Scarbee is more accurate sonically. Physical Modeling is more accurate in terms of playability. Having to choose between Mr Ray 73 and Scarbee is not a negative for Receptor, it's very postitive. Use the one that rings your bell.

 

Busch.

[C J Hoffman]

In order to beat out Ivory on a solo piano gig, you'll need a $30-$50k piano, a great sounding room. IMO

-CJH

[Phil Aiken]

Originally posted by Jazz+:

I'm geting confused reading this thread. Are you guys concluding that for live playing the Mr. Ray trumps the 16 bit Scarbee RSP '73 ? I thought the Scarbee Rhodes was supposed to be much better.

 

Scarbee sounds better.(As always, IMO) Sometimes to conserve resources Mr. Ray is preferable. If I was playing a gig that called for a ton of Rhodes I would use Scarbee. If I was playing a gig that called for a ton of Wurly I'd use Scarbee Wurly and Mr. Ray for Rhodes.

 

They are both very good. Scarbee approaches and sometimes surpasses the real thing. Mr. Ray isn't as realistic, but the fact that it is physiccally modelled makes it continuously dynamic and as such can be played with a great deal of nuance.

 

Using Scarbee's FX on Mr. Ray brings it to life quite a bit. I also find I need to roll off some lows on it through my rig.

I find it quite dynamic.....I also use a P250 as my controller. I'm guessing you've tried tweaking the settings on Mr. Ray?

[Phil Aiken]

Originally posted by burningbusch:

Originally posted by Jazz+:

[qb]

I play solo/duo digital Rhodes gigs and the reason that I wanted to get a Receptor was to be able to have the best sounding- respoding digital Rhodes, which I thought was supposed to be the Scabee RSP '73

For this application Scarbee would be the way to go in my opinion.

[BOPBEEPER]

Yarda yarda...Went round to a mate's house to try out the receptor which he also raved about.He's got the Sampletech Black Grand and Scarbee rhodes running in Kontact but not just out of ram. They sounded great but the latency which he finds acceptable I found horribly unplayable. He has been tweeking the receptor a lot (programing is his main employment)but if thats the best it can come up with I think a fast laptop + firewire interface would deliver more.

 

Are you guys getting unnoticeable levels of latency out of your set-ups?

 

Yours Bemused.

[Geoff Grace]

BOPBEEPER, I don't yet own Receptor; but I played Ivory on one at the Winter NAMM Show, and its latency was remarkably low.

 

My understanding is that how Receptor compares to a high-powered computer setup depends on which software its running (Ivory, Atmosphere, Kontakt, etc.). Much of the time, Receptor will play more voices and have lower latency; but not always.

 

Best,

 

Geoff

[Phil Aiken]

Originally posted by BOPBEEPER:

Yarda yarda...Went round to a mate's house to try out the receptor which he also raved about.He's got the Sampletech Black Grand and Scarbee rhodes running in Kontact but not just out of ram. They sounded great but the latency which he finds acceptable I found horribly unplayable. He has been tweeking the receptor a lot (programing is his main employment)but if thats the best it can come up with I think a fast laptop + firewire interface would deliver more.

 

Are you guys getting unnoticeable levels of latency out of your set-ups?

 

Yours Bemused.

To get large piano libraries in Kontakt to play with DFD I have to set the latency higher than I am comfortable too. But loading into RAM I play with latency comparable to a hardware digital piano. This claim is just by ear. If I listen to the output of my controller/piano at the same time as Receptor I cannot hear a lag.

Apparently Ivory purrs like the proverbial kitten on Receptor, but I haven't tried it myself.

[BOPBEEPER]

Thanks for the reassurance.I was hoping this latency thing didnt turnout to be another one of those subjectinve matters of oppinion.

I think I need more reassurance though.

[Moon Zero Two]

I can't believe the deal on this thing!! Check the receptor web site - for two grand the receptor ships with the 160 gig hard drive - 1.2 gig or ram and Colossus - a 32 gig Kontat based sampler.

[Moon Zero Two]

I can't believe the deal on this thing!! Check the receptor web site - for two grand the receptor ships with the 160 gig hard drive - 1.2 gig or ram and Colossus - a 32 gig Kontat based sampler.

[Dan South]

I'm glad that you guys are having good experiences with Receptor. Please keep us posted as you learn more about it.

 

How much does one of these go for?

 

Is this technology a step backwards (i.e. away from the desktop and back to dedicated hardware)?

 

And am I the only one who thinks that the name sounds like that little thingy at the end of a condom?

[Ted Rackley]

By the way, the Receptor installer for Ivory has FINALLY been publicly released:

 

http://www.plugorama.com/customer/search.php?substring=&in_category=&price_search_2=&sort=3&devid=52&sf=1

 

Hi Dan,

 

The street price on Receptor is $1399, plus RAM and hard drive upgrades if you choose to upgrade.

 

I think of Receptor as a step forward from regular keyboards and synthesizers to the future of synthesizers. You can get a machine that is not only totally customizable for your needs, but will also give you the best acoustic piano sound, the best electric piano sound, the best clavinet or B3 organ, etc.

 

And when playing live, do you want a desktop? Running a PC/Mac OS that will possibly crash, have latency, have audio and MIDI driver issues, etc? How about simplifying your life and making music instead of dealing with technical issues?

[musicbysterling]

Busch, I saw your post on KVR regarding the Receptor and program changes. I see that nobody ever responded (suprise, suprise). Did you ever figure out your problem?

 

mark

[burningbusch]

Originally posted by musicbysterling:

Busch, I saw your post on KVR regarding the Receptor and program changes. I see that nobody ever responded (suprise, suprise). Did you ever figure out your problem?

 

mark

No I never did, but I came up with an acceptable workaround. For each synth I just create a preset file that can be accessed via 127/000/xxx. This works for the FXs as well.

 

Busch.

[Moon Zero Two]

Question:

 

From what I see on KVR Scrabee does not run on Receptor. I thought that Scrabee was in Halion format not in Kontak format.

 

Busch have you tried the lounge lizard rhodes modeling software? curious about your impressions.

 

sorry to hear about latency on Receptor. That clouds my decision....

[burningbusch]

Scarbee originally released his Rhodes, Wurly and Clav in sample library format (Giga, Halion, Kontakt, Exs). You can still buy the Rhodes and Wurly libraries, but not the Clav. To get the Clav you need KVR which is a runtime version of Halion and it does have copy protection. It will not run on Receptor. AFAIK, there is no way to export those samples out of KVR into another format. I own the original Rhodes Library as well as the Scarbee Vintage FX. So you can get the Scarbee Rhodes, Wurly and FXs (which includes the Clav D6 filter) on Receptor, but not the Clav samples.

 

I've tried the demos of Lounge Lizard 2 and 3. Personally I think Mr. Ray 73 kills it. I also think it kills EVP88.

 

I'm having issues with Kontakt and Receptor. I've moved to Kompakt and things run much smoother. Kompakt can read many formats and its interface gives me all I really need for basic sample tweaking and playback.

 

Regarding latency. Some people have a lower tolerance than others. I'm running Receptor at 128 samples which is lower than I would ever run a laptop live. There is something about DFD in Kontakt. When you turn it off, things respond better. I'm running Ivory and find it to be very responsive. Absolutely zero glitches. It certainly works better than on a PC and far better than on a Mac.

 

Busch.

[Moon Zero Two]

Thanks for the info.

 

I am running Ivory on my mega PC and latency is not an issue at all - some of my Arturia plug in's through cubase give me a headache - but that's another story.

 

I have a very low tolerence of latency.

 

I know from these discussions that you recently got your Receptor - since you bought it East West announced a pretty good deal - check it out from the KVR site - and it might be worth the trouble to ask your retailer if they could get you a free copy of Colossus - since it's a $1,000 bit of software.

 

The Recpetor with 160 gig hard drive and 1.2 gig of ram and Colossus for two grand sounds like a great deal, BUT if the Kontak based Colossus has latency issues...

 

Maybe the RD700SX is the way to go....

[Phil Aiken]

Originally posted by burningbusch:

. I'm running Ivory and find it to be very responsive. Absolutely zero glitches. It certainly works better than on a PC and far better than on a Mac.

 

Busch.

BurningBusch-

Can you play Ivory completely and utterly glitch free at 128 sample buffer on Receptor? And I mean COMPLETELY....sustain pedal pumping, forearms smashing, glisses galore....

I'm thinking of getting it to use on my Receptor for solo piano gigs, and also on sessions where the studio doesn't have a piano.

Thanks!!

[Jazz+]

Busch, thanks.

 

Did you use the default settings for the MrRay demo?

Did you use your RD-700SX as the controller?

Which effects did you use?

 

Did you save a MIDI file of that performance so we can hear the Scarbee Rhodes doing it for comparison?

 

It would be interesting to also hear your RD-700SX Rhodes and the Yamaha 'Vintage 74' play it.

 

-----------

 

EMAIL from SCARBEE:

Re: The Receptor

2/17/06

 

You need RSP73 in Kontakt (multi) version and use it with Kompakt or Kontakt.

 

But you may need to convert all samples to 16 bit first as Receptor doesn't stream well with 24 bit samples.

 

It does not include "classic EQ" but manual shows how to make that sound easily using internal FX in Kontakt.

 

VKFX will work in Receptor (unsupported plugin) - and this is offcourse best solution.

 

Kind regards

 

Thomas Hansen Skarbye

Creative Director, SCARBEE

 

Email: thomas@scarbee.com

Website: www.scarbee.com

[Dan South]

Originally posted by Ted Rackley:

I think of Receptor as a step forward from regular keyboards and synthesizers to the future of synthesizers. You can get a machine that is not only totally customizable for your needs, but will also give you the best acoustic piano sound, the best electric piano sound, the best clavinet or B3 organ, etc.

 

And when playing live, do you want a desktop? Running a PC/Mac OS that will possibly crash, have latency, have audio and MIDI driver issues, etc? How about simplifying your life and making music instead of dealing with technical issues?

Yes, I was being a little bit facetious when I made the "step backwards" comment, because the Receptor is certainly more flexible than any rompler keyboard. But it's interesting to watch the trends. Everything has been migrating to the desktop. Now, we're seeing the limitations of computers, especially in live situations, so the hot new items are dedicated hardware pieces that can load and play an almost limitless number of programs that were designed to run on computers.

 

I still think that the computer is best in the studio, because there's nothing between the sound generation unit and the recording unit - they are one and the same. But for live performance, no, I don't want to rely on a laptop.