Spectrasonics Stylus Vinyl Groove (Macintosh and Windows) from zZounds.com!

3-gigabyte core library. Elastic Tempo, Pitch, Pattern and Feel with Groove Control (tm). 1000 Kicks, 1000 Snares, 500 Hi-hats.

customer reviews

21 People rated this product : 5 out of 10

2 People wrote reviews

2 out of 10

"Hiphop only -- And you'd better not buy it used."

Feature:
The most useful feature is the groove control. Here, you are given a bunch of standard midi files that correspond to the loops. This means you can drop the SMF into your MIDI sequencer and change the grooves to your liking, even add fills, etc. The disadvantage, as was pointed out in another review, is that you can't change the drum kit that corresponds with the particular SMF. So if you want to add new drum sounds, you must use a separate sequencer track with a second instance of Stylus set to a different kit. And if all of the drums you want aren't in that kit, then you might need a third or fourth track, etc.

Quality:
Stylus does not use up a lot of memory or CPU, so it works pretty well on slower machines. I used it on a 1 GHz PIII with 512 MB and it ran fairly reliably.

Value:
Now that the price of Stylus has fallen (it used to sell for $299) it's more appealing than it used to be. And if you are primarily doing hiphop, it's probably great.

Desirability:
It's undoubtedly merely practical. There are many other ways to get good drums into your sequences. It's a great "extra thing" to have in your arsenal if you can get it at a really low cost (but not used!!!!), but unless you're doing exclusively hiphop it's probably not going to be the only thing you'll ever need.

Sound:
The sound quality is excellent, however it ONLY contains hiphop beats, NO rock or alternative beats at all. It's great if you're doing rap, dance, etc., but completely useless if you're doing rock, alternative, metal, jazz, blues, folk, songwriting, or arguably even techno styles.

Support:
BE FOREWARNED - Unlike most other software companies, Spectrasonics licensing agreement does NOT allow you to sell your software to someone else once you've gotten tired of it. And yet, there are often second hand copies available via the usual used channels. This is particularly a problem for the buyers of second hand Spectrasonics products, since they often unwittingly purchase the discs used without even knowing they aren't technically allowed to buy them. When you buy any used Spectrasonics product, the buyer must pay an additional $50 fee to register the product or it won't work. And not only that, once you've paid the fee you are still NOT ALLOWED TO PURCHASE UPGRADES for example to Stylus RMX. This means that including the cost of the used discs, you can easily spend MORE than the cost of a new copy and STILL not be able to purchase the upgrade to RMX -- you must still spend the full amount. This policy is quite unfair to buyers but Spectrasonics refuses to flinch on this.

Overall:
If the upgrade policy were more fair, this product be an excellent stepping stone to Stylus RMX. But it's not. So given the style and flexibility limitations, for the cost it would be better take a look at other options.

Submitted: 10/12/2005

Style of Music: Rock, Alternative, Blues, Jazz, Progressive Rock, etc.

4 out of 10

"FAIR WARNING!!"

Feature:
This is where you either love or hate this software, and I HATE it. You essentially have to use the app as a source of pre-built loops. Thats nice, but I don't know anyone that makes good original music that will just use existing loops. This is a good app for getting a good feel. So now you have that feel, now what do you do. It would be nice to go in and change kick in the loop to another kick sound. Or maybe you would want to program the beat yourself using the best of the 1,000s of kick and snare samples they have. Well you can't. Even though this is essentially a closed sampler, the makers of Stylus don't allow you to custom assign sounds to specific keys on the keyboard. This is incomprehensibly stupid and needlessly limiting. For example suppose you want to build a kit. You will need to open half a dozen Stylus plugins - a plug in dedicated to the snare menu, a plug in dedicated to hat menu. Now you have a lot of your PCs resources and tracks dedicated to what should be a simple beatbox.

Quality:
Looks and sound great

Value:
Absolutely not. Its is a professional sounding application for people with novice skills.

Sound:
The sound is great. I love the sound. Thats why the rest of the application is so maddening.

Support:
No experiences

Overall:
I feel cheated with this product. Its very expensive, and very limited in the ways that you can use it. I bought it because Spectrasonics says that you can build beats from scratch with the sounds. That is a gross exagerration.

Submitted: 10/26/2004

Style of Music: Electro

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About This Product!

Description

Multimedia

Spectrasonics Stylus Vinyl Groove (Macintosh and Windows)
Stylus (tm) is an innovative new type of software plug-in instrument that integrates a massive core library of thousands of cutting-edge groove elements, loops and samples, with a powerful user interface for creating your own grooves. Stylus can be used as a native plug-in instrument in hosts like Logic, Digital Performer, Cubase VST, Nuendo and Pro-Tools no sampler is necessary!

The huge 3 gigabyte core library of Stylus includes over 1000 brand-new loops, featuring insane new breakbeat remix loops with a cutting-edge vinyl attitude, from award-winning producer Eric Persing. The grooves are inspiration generators for application in a huge variety of remix genres including R&B, 2-step, Trip-Hop, Chemical, Epic House, Underground Hip-Hop, UK Garage, Downtempo Dub, Nu-skool, Acid Jazz, Trance, Funk, Alternative, Progressive, Rap, Abstract, Urban Neo-Soul, Big Beat, Slo-Jamz, Drum 'N Bass, and many others.

Each groove is presented in our widely-acclaimed Groove Control (tm) activated versions which allow you to change the pitch, tempo, feel and pattern independently ...without using any DSP! Since every groove can be mixed and matched at any tempo or feel, there are literally endless combination possibilities. You can also program your own grooves from scratch with thousands of edgy drum samples. In addition, the inspiring Groove Menus let you remix loops in real-time at every tempo from 50-180 BPM in both straight and swing feels. It's as simple as selecting a patch and playing your keyboard!

Over a thousand wild turntable FX and DJ tricks are included, as well as a killer live percussion loop section including congas, bongos, djembes, shakers, triangles, agogos and tambourines, all of which can be mixed into any groove separately!

Because of the powerful interface and synthesis engine of the plug-in, Stylus is a monster creative tool. You can do brand new techniques with Groove Control like randomizing the accents of a loop, turning a conga loop into a melodic part, radical filter sequencing, tweaking the tuning of just the snare, or filtering just the kicks, panning each slice in a different part of the stereo field, each all inside the loop! This is possible because the Stylus custom interface goes way beyond any of the current conventional samplers -each sample and slice has it's own adjustable synth parameters, and selecting the samples is as simple as playing the sample from your keyboard. The possibilities for creative manipulation are truly amazing... and yet it is so easy to use.

Powerful Simplicity

Stylus -The Ultimate Groove Machine!

Massive 3 gig core library

All new sounds

Insane new remix grooves and samples by Eric Persing

Over a thousand turntable tricks, skips, stops, beat-juggling and scratch FX

Killer live percussion loops can be added to any groove

Elastic Tempo, Pitch, Pattern and Feel with Groove Control (tm)

Real-time groove jamming at any tempo with Groove Menus

Built-in Groove auditioning system... Lightning-fast load times

1000 Kicks, 1000 Snares, 500 Hi-hats for creating your own grooves

Easy to use... Built-in patch management system

Sample-accurate timing

Fully programmable

Total recall with your sequence

Multimode resonant Filters for each sample, plus Master Filters

Three envelopes for Pitch, Filter and Amplitude

Matrix-style Modulation routing, two LFOs

Unique interface allows independent parameter control of each sample, and Groove control automation.

Powered by Custom 32 bit UVI Engine

Cross platform, plug-in compatibility!

MAS, RTAS and VST Mac/PC included

Operates as a virtual instrument software plug-in in all major hosts like Logic 5, Digital Performer, Pro Tools Mac Free/LE/TDM/HD, Cubase (VST-Mac/PC & SX Windows only), Nuendo, Fruity Loops, Acid Pro 4.0 and other VST hosts.
*also works in Sonar with a VST wrapper (not included)

System recommendations:

192 MB RAM, 3.1 GB free hard disc space

MAC: OS 9 or higher, 266 mHz G3 or better CPU, MAS, RTAS or VST 2.0 host

PC: Windows 98 or higher, 300 mHz Pentium III or better CPU, sound card, VST 2.0 host

CPU power usage: very low

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Spectrasonics Stylus Vinyl Groove (Macintosh and Windows)

Spectrasonics Stylus RMX Groove Module Software (Mac and Windows)

customer reviews

"Hiphop only -- And you'd better not buy it used."

"FAIR WARNING!!"

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