Opinions on Sample Libraries

With $4000 you can get some pretty decent stuff I say!

Platinum is around $1300 if I remember correctly. This gives you 130 GB, more or less of quality sounds. It has the 3 mics, etc, so it's ok. BTW, PLAY versions seem to be somewhat unstable as of yet, so maybe wait a while? After all EW are known to be throwing offers every second week, so you could only get a 20% off or something.

The problem with EW is that it cannot really handle successfully 'smaller' and more sensetive sound. At least me and my Gold bundle have been rather unable. It's not impossible, but it's not been designed this way!

Until now, the problem with EW products was the lack of legato and portamento. This appears to have been corrected, but again, not sure how it actually sounds in PLAY.

So with the rest of the money you could compliment yourself VERY VERY well!

for example, for TOP jazz stuff you could go for SONIVOX, but it does cost above $2000. It does seem to be the only library able to do amazing jazz stuff, production wise. And it does appear that the player, which is based on halion I believe, STILL has issues.

Then it's the other stuff that you could compliment yourself with. Solo strings: Dan Dean. They are rather good and intimate, so a piano quintet could work well. The Garritan solo strings have been discontinued, otherwise I would recommend them wholeheartely. The WIVI stuff (google it), are synthesised but VERY realistic and he has brass and woods. Woods come also by westgate, which are very good and excellent for solo stuff.

The idea would be to get a full orchestra as your main pallet and various smaller stuff to surround it. Some things to think about.

Generally working depends on your DAW as well. If you get something with 8 or 16 GB then you won't have to bounce (yet and until the new products come to earth), so you should be fine. A good soundcard and good monitors to really listen to your well spent $4000 would also be recomendable.

That's all ffom me on a very hasty post and sorry for any tpyos!

$4000?? Definitely get Vienna. It's dry, no reverb added, but IMO it gives the most flexibility. I'm getting this when I have the funds and a new computer to go along with it. EWQL is mint as well, but if you want to compose pieces for smaller ensembles, it will be almost impossible to do it. Everything in it sounds so thick and powerful. It'll sound good even if you write crap lol.

Also, make sure you check out the ProjectSAM orchestral samples, I think those will be great too, maybe even surpassing EWQL.

Hey Cowboy-

I was listening to the first two movements of your clarinet sonata last night and was very impressed by your implementation of the GPO sounds! It certainly reminds me that the tools are as intelligent as the user. If I understand your posts correctly, you achieved this primarily through meticulous score markings? This seems like the way to go because it means the score will be ripe for interpretation by real performers.

Originally Posted by nikolas

BTW, PLAY versions seem to be somewhat unstable as of yet, so maybe wait a while?

What is "PLAY"? Is this a software player designed by EW?

Originally Posted by nikolas

Until now, the problem with EW products was the lack of legato and portamento. This appears to have been corrected, but again, not sure how it actually sounds in PLAY.

No legato? Is't that the first or second fundamental technique for most instruments? That seems like an odd omission.

Originally Posted by nikolas

for example, for TOP jazz stuff you could go for SONIVOX, but it does cost above $2000. It does seem to be the only library able to do amazing jazz stuff, production wise.

For jazz samples, they only need to be good enough to approximate the arrangements for me. They just have to be good enough to keep me from loosing my marbles when listening to them repeatedly. I can get a standard horn section around here easy enough (I'm in Philadelphia), pulling some strings I can even get free session work from good players.

Strings, on the other hand, are tough. Hiring a quartet of students from Curtis for one movement (depending on length of course) will blow half of my budget immediately. I'll check out the ones you mentioned and compare them to the VSL solo strings.

Originally Posted by nikolas

Generally working depends on your DAW as well. If you get something with 8 or 16 GB then you won't have to bounce (yet and until the new products come to earth), so you should be fine. A good soundcard and good monitors to really listen to your well spent $4000 would also be recomendable.

By 8 or 16 GB are you referring to RAM? Currently I am using a dual 2.5 G5
with 4GB of RAM. DAW is Cubase. Most of my previous projects have dealt with tracking and mixing, and I've gotten into the 150 track range before having to do some serious cleanup. For monitors, I've had a pair of Mackie HR624's for about 7 years. I personally think they are excellent for the money (the quality is much better than their consoles, which I do not recommend).

Thanks for your help so far!

some links, in case you didn't know:

Sounds Online (EW home)
VIENNA SYMPHONIC LIBRARY (VSL, obviously)
Westgate Studios (westage, obviously again)
Sample Modelled Instruments - Home page (home of THE TRUMPET, the most amazing synthesized trumpet ever!)
Kirk Hunter Studios (kirk hunter, another very good symphonic libraries creator)
Wallander Instruments - Site is under maintenance (brass to die for, woods, so and so imho. Walllander Instruments, all synthesied)
Pianoteq – True modelling of pianos and other keyboard or string instruments (true modelling and a piano that rocks at 15 MB!!!!! (not GB))
ProjectSAM Cinematic Sampling - Home (Project SAM, with the newly released Symphobia, a pleasent different style library, I think. Also some blood amazing percussion)
Garritan Home Page (we all know who Gary is and plus his Steinway is simply stunning!)

PLAY is the new player by EW.
Kirk, Project SAM, Westgate and maybe more (not sure about those 3 either, do check), do NOT have a player of their own, which means that you also need a sampler to work with their fabulous stuff. EW, VSL, WIVI, Pianoteq, all have their own players, so no sampler is needed!

Legato: Think of it this way: You get a violin. He plays on the E string and then slides the finger to the next note. This is called portamento in string playing. Or glissando if you want (although glissando is a different idea alltogether). This CANNOT be done successfully with samples at this time. I mean you get 2 different recordings. The 1st and the 2nd note. The problem is to connect them. How are you going to do the portamento? Some companies (VSL, primarily) has RECORDED various speeds in ALL intervals for ALL instruments. So the full package (which I think is $12,000 but not sure, Nathan, haven't checked for more than a year), is (or was, since I've not checked for quite a while) around 750 GB of hard disk space...

EW and their new player PLAY, have some kind of emulation, which I've yet to hear and yet to try, so I cannot say anything. Kirk Hunter has some great stuff for Kontakt (some scripts), which emulate pretty well the legato issue. WIVI and the trumpet (samplemodelling), are synthesized and NOT based on samples, so they can create realistic legato movements.

4 GB of RAM might be too little in a little while, I'm afraid. The monitors you have are not bad, but at some point, no matter the relation money/value, you might need better stuff. I mean EW Platinum is 24-bit. In order to hear this you need a good soundcard to support 24-bit and some rather good monitors. You won't hear it with some mp3 headhpones (for example, the Mackie are good, I repeat that).

Since you have a top budget of $4000, you might consider other ideas as well. If you do have access to various players, you might consider some good mics and a good converter (AD and DA). If you have access to a university studio, never mind really, but at some point you might realise that no matter the samples or your DAW, live playing IS live playing and if you are blessed with people who can play well, then use them with all your heart!

Originally Posted by nikolas

WIVI and the trumpet (samplemodelling), are synthesized and NOT based on samples, so they can create realistic legato movements.

Trumpet is based on samples. It's modelled samples (hence samplemodelling).

Okie... the trumpet is based on samples:

The base material of the instrument consists of 237 MB of samples, chromatically performed by a professional trumpet player over a very wide dynamic range, in an anechoic environment, and recorded with state-of-the-art technology.

, but really not that many samples as one would expect. This is what I meant and I apologise for my generalisations, etc

I'd be surprised if anything beat VSL Vienna Chamber Strings I and II.

What I would do is get

East West Platinum Orchestra or East West Composers Bundle (more sounds)
Vienna VSL Chamber Strings I and II (that's like...$1300 I think)

East West hides what each individual instrument sounds like under these boring hollywood scores.

Vienna doesn't lie. They are not afraid to show individual instruments' demos for a reason.


In my own opinion, Brass and Woodwinds can be mediocre. As long as you get the Strings down you are fine.

Decide for yourself which part of the orchestra matters most to you. To me, I am willing to pay $200 on Brass and Woodwinds and $10,000 on good Strings.


East West can kind of be annoying sometimes...

Want and Orchestra? How about a BIG orchestra! Dah dah daaaahh!!
Want a Rock Band? How about a BIG Rock Band!!! Dah dah daaaaahh!!
Want some Pianos? How about some BIIIG PIANOS!!! Dah dah daaaaaahh!!

Then again their sounds are frickin incredible. Only tryed them out through friends though... ;/

Originally Posted by markhansavon

Want and Orchestra? How about a BIG orchestra! Dah dah daaaahh!!
Want a Rock Band? How about a BIG Rock Band!!! Dah dah daaaaahh!!
Want some Pianos? How about some BIIIG PIANOS!!! Dah dah daaaaaahh!!

Then again their sounds are frickin incredible. Only tryed them out through friends though... ;/

Nice said!